“They’re Beating Us Most Of The Days”
June 12th, 2017
Spring winner
Tampa Bay’s weapons-heavy offense seems to be getting all the meaningless spring glory.
However, that’s not deserved.
That was the general message from Mike Evans last week when he chatted with Joe. Evans, without being asked, said the Buccaneers’ defense has scoreboard through spring practices.
“Everybody’s more comfortable. The defense looks great. Even though we’re not game-planning against them, they’re beating us most of the days in [OTAs]. It’s good to see that,” Evans said.
Media had access to less than half of the OTA sessions, which concluded Thursday. (Mandatory, three-day minicamp starts tomorrow.) So it was noteworthy to hear Evans claim a winner in the offense vs. defense battles, even if they are hitting- and pads-free.
Joe and Bucs fans happily will ingest every crumb of insider nuggets. Thanks, Mike!
Joe hopes Evans is on the mark with his assessment. The Bucs were so damn good on defense through their final eight games, allowing just 17 points per contest. If the defense won out through spring practices, then maybe that means a legitimate carryover is on the way.
It’s fun to speculate. But without hitting and contact, that’s all it is, fun.
June 12th, 2017 at 3:11 pm
Whenever I hear or read most of the national media people talk Bucs and rag the D… They never mention the second half of the season and how the abysmal first half drug stats way down
This was a totally different team on D the second half and if they continue that trend into 2017, I have little concern about them. This team gonna be fun to watch this year!
June 12th, 2017 at 3:35 pm
Although they finished off strong the defense still worries me grimes and McCoy aren’t getting younger and it seems like dline is injury prone.
June 12th, 2017 at 3:44 pm
If the dline stays healthy we will win the division. Mark my words
June 12th, 2017 at 3:54 pm
IMO the D is fine. Bring it on.
June 12th, 2017 at 3:59 pm
New HC and new defenses scheme,we did d@$! good pulling off 9 and 7 last season. Coach Smith says the D was 1+1 this time last season. Says they are at calculus this time around. I believe him. ME just confirmed it. We won’t be good next season,we will be scary good next season.
June 12th, 2017 at 4:05 pm
NOSBOS
I luvs ya bro….I try to be the blog optimist here but I gotta give it up to you. I like the way you think!!
We won’t be good next season,we will be scary good next season.
June 12th, 2017 at 4:21 pm
Our defense won us a Championship years ago, and it’s about to win us another
June 12th, 2017 at 4:31 pm
If Defense can be top 10 this year – we should be in serious contention for a Super Bowl. Big If though considering the division we play in.
June 12th, 2017 at 4:55 pm
The games that stands out to me was the Cowboys and Saints game. Those 2 games was the games that we needed to make the playoffs. We gave up 866 yards and 57 points and created one turnover, during those two most important games. Dak Prescott and Drew Brees completed 78.5% of their passes with no INT. And the two teams ran for 308 yards, that’s what they gave us, when our playoff berth was on the line.
June 12th, 2017 at 5:29 pm
Lakeland
We could all dissect last year’s results from our own biased perspectives…pointing out the good and the bad.
But that was LAST YEAR! There have been SIGNIFICANT changes to that team.
BTW…that “crappy” team…and I agree they were not as good as this year’s squad…was able to take a team that had won 11 of it’s previous 12 games in the thick of the playoff race as well on their HOME field and they didn’t really put us away until the freaking 4th Quarter. They should have blown us out by halftime!!!
June 12th, 2017 at 6:42 pm
“average” defense and this team is in playoffs.
June 12th, 2017 at 6:57 pm
At this time of year the defense should be getting the better results. Whenever you watch preseason its noteworthy that the tv announcers generally state that early in the year defense usually has the edge. This may be nothing. I think our offense is loaded and by the 3rd or 4th game it will show.
June 12th, 2017 at 7:02 pm
Question is, will we be able to stop that quick slant that killed us last year?!?!
Hey Joe, hate to look to far ahead but are we grooming anyone for DC when Mike Smith eventually leaves to take a HC position? We all know he’ll be on the short list every offseason and it’s just a matter of time. hate to lose any momentum we hopefully will have gained by that point.
June 12th, 2017 at 7:22 pm
‘Tuckey
What part of “Tuckey”? I grew up in Newport and Fort Thomas.
We don’t have to worry too much about Smitty because he gave us two years.
Hopefully by then his heir apparent will be obvious. Maybe Jay Hayes.
June 12th, 2017 at 8:01 pm
The defense was’t very good against Dallas.
June 12th, 2017 at 8:21 pm
bucs_365, the Cowboys were the most difficult team for us to play last year IMO. They had a very interesting balance between their running game & their short/intermediate passing game. Cowboys OLine was awesome I thought. Stop Elliott in the run game, and Dak Prescott picked us apart (32-of-36) in the passing game, most of which was short to intermediate passes to Witten (10-for-10 for 51 yds) and Dez Bryant (8-for-10 for 82 yds). Prescott threw a total of THREE deep passes(and connected on 2). It was a great offensive game plan which took advantage of their strengths & picked over our weaknesses. And yet even though our defense gave up over 36 mins TOP, our D ‘only’ gave up 26 points to their high-powered offense and we came within 1 TD of beating them.
June 12th, 2017 at 9:37 pm
The offense did not help the defense in Dallas. I hope we don’t have to watch a series of 3 and outs for our offense in the 2nd half. That’s just asking too much of our D.