An Ex-Buccaneer’s Call For More Cappa
November 26th, 2018
(Photo courtesy of Buccaneers.com.)
A former Buccaneer wants to see more Alex Cappa at right guard following his NFL debut yesterday.
After watching 11 weeks of Caleb Benenoch there, Joe concurs.
The season-long starter, Benenoch continues to cause hair loss and irritable bowel syndrome from Bradenton Beach to the Tarpon Springs bayous. Go watch the first quarter yesterday against the 49ers and key in on Benenoch. It’s ugly.
Benenoch is not all bad, but he’s just not very good.
Cappa, the rookie third-round pick, enjoyed his first regular-season action Sunday. Joe talked to Cappa after the game and couldn’t pull an interesting quote from the guy. Cappa basically said he was completely ready for his debut that featured ups and downs and plenty from which to learn.
Former Bucs tight end Anthony Becht watched Cappa yesterday and thinks the rookie should get more snaps, so he said on WDAE-AM 620 this morning.
“His feet were off at times, but he’s a tough guy, nasty guy. He gets his hands on people. He’s very strong and he can sit his behind down and take on some of that push,” Becht said of Cappa.
“He needs to get more reps. I think he should play more. Caleb Benenoch has been an up-and-down guy. He’s not an aggressive style type of player, a little more finesse. He can get himself out of trouble. But I don’t know you’ve seen consistent enough play from him to say Cappa doesn’t deserve reps or doesn’t deserve to start a game.”
Joe’s all for giving Cappa a bigger shot. What’s the harm? More film equals better evaluation, and it appears Benenoch is just as likely — or more likely — to get Jameis Winston decapitated.
November 26th, 2018 at 11:05 am
Outside of that one block where he completely whiffed Cappa looked pretty solid to me yesterday. I say keep him as the starter at RG the rest of the season, throw him in the deep end and see if he sinks or swims.
November 26th, 2018 at 11:06 am
Well, we have certainly seen enough of the human turn-stile Caleb Benenoch!
Cappa did struggle a bit yesterday but you can give him the benefit of the doubt, all things considered.
November 26th, 2018 at 11:13 am
It’s a lost season and Cappa should have been out there earlier in the season even if it’s only for 10 snaps a game.
November 26th, 2018 at 11:16 am
Kid needs a full off season of weight and diet training….
November 26th, 2018 at 11:17 am
Is wanting more Cappa like wanting more Cow Bell?
If so……. gimme more Cappa.
November 26th, 2018 at 11:23 am
It is disappointing to see us investing 3 years or so on Benenoch and to have him still questionable…..
Let’s go with the Rookie the rest of the way.
We only gave up one sack yesterday and that is when JW wisely ate the ball….wanted to go deep on the play and nothing was there. The protection was there but the run blocking still isn’t…..started the game getting stuffed on 3rd & 1…….and Barber went 18 for 47 yards (seems like he had more)….but he was continually hit at the line or behind the line….
November 26th, 2018 at 11:35 am
we got some high priced guys on the line who can’t get our running game going.
vexing.
Gotta have it Sunday or were doomed.
November 26th, 2018 at 11:38 am
Nuke the entire offensive line outside of marpet and start over. dotson sucks, smith sucks, jensen sucks, Benenoch sucks and every backup should be in the arena league not nfl.
it’s a shame it’s so hard to develop offensive lineman on this team. having such a weak dline led by bad character mentally weak cancer93 really hurt the development of some promising young men. .
November 26th, 2018 at 11:54 am
Nobody is developing on this O-Line either- D Smith is not worth NFL LT money- they moved Marpet 3 positions so far- no RG, no Center so we had to pay FA. George Warhop may be a bigger thief than Mike Smith, Jay Hayes paid the price running someone else’s scheme that I’m guessing handcuffed him (Buckner too). How are the rest of these jokers keeping their jobs.
November 26th, 2018 at 12:05 pm
The quality teams in this league do not change staff every 2-3 years. Belicheat…Carroll..Tomlin…
Remember last year everybody here was going gaga over the Jags talking about how Coughlin brought in a new “toughness”
What happened to Coughlin’s toughness? We have a better record right now than Jax. So much for the flavor of the year eh.
I’m leery over busting up the group just yet. Let’s see how things play out. The team obviously hasn’t quit on Koetter…JW finally looks like an NFL QB…the DL showed flashes yesterday against a better OL.
Unless we produce a turd sandwich the remainder of the season I’m not in the knee jerk category. If we end up 8-8 in a season marred by our franchise QB getting suspended the first three games it’s going to be hard for me to recommend cleaning house. Make some moves for sure but cleaning house means starting over again.
DJAX goes of course and any other clubhouse cancers need to be replaced.
November 26th, 2018 at 12:09 pm
I sure do miss reality-is-a-beotch.
Whatever happened to that guy?
; )
November 26th, 2018 at 12:16 pm
Joe had an interesting piece on Antony Auclair yesterday.
Auclair commented on how much easier it’s been the second year than his rookie season. Not just acclimating himself to the offense…learning plays etc…Auclair said something I’ve heard over and over again. He said the game has slowed down for him.
Year one he was surprised by how fast everybody is in the NFL.
Then you add in a year with some success and a player begins to believe he belongs in the league.
I think this can happen for Cappa. Get him plenty of reps and see if we can slow the game down some for him.
November 26th, 2018 at 12:22 pm
Yep – its time. Get Cappa on the field. He needs reps in real games to improve at this point.
November 26th, 2018 at 12:40 pm
Give me Jonah Williams, OT from Alabama, please. With our first round pick.
November 26th, 2018 at 12:42 pm
Get Benenock off the field–Becht was kind to him in that interview, we have seen what he can do so time for Cappa who likely has more upside
November 26th, 2018 at 12:48 pm
Tampabaybucfan Says: started the game getting stuffed on 3rd & 1
That was Barber’s fault. If he would have bounced to the outside he would still be running.
November 26th, 2018 at 12:52 pm
Glad we didn’t rush Cappa. I agree, he needs to put on some strength but he does have that mean attitude the bucs are looking for. He’ll develop nicely next year. I think all our draft picks will do much better next year, except perhaps for Rojo. Hope I am wrong though.
November 26th, 2018 at 12:52 pm
Benonoch is an excellent athlete, maybe not the type of athlete to thrive inside at the NFL. He still might be the best choice to take over for Dotson outside, where he can use his athletic ability to its best advantage. Inside. things happen much faster and even the smallest mistakes in technique are the difference between stonewalling a defender and being a human turnstile.
November 26th, 2018 at 12:59 pm
We had Vea buried.
Could be we are a bit hasty to evaluate rookies.
November 26th, 2018 at 1:36 pm
Considering the Bucs trends and negativity surrounding the personnel, coaches, and management, what were the fans supposed to think?
November 26th, 2018 at 1:36 pm
A real coach would have him ready.
November 26th, 2018 at 1:43 pm
Hey hv to give some props to someone that has brought him along because in preseason he was beyond overwhelmed. There had to be half a dozen plays where he got pushed 4 yards in the backfield and another dozen where he almost failed to put a meaningful hand on the d lineman . Props to Cappa !!!
November 26th, 2018 at 1:43 pm
I’ve been a big proponent on holding off on Cappa until next year. But, if he can hold his own, that is great.
Notice how Becht mentioned leverage there. Cappa has elite balance, born with it, that’s why I think he’s a more natural tackle.
Just remember, he is still about 15-20 pounds of muscle light of an NFL body. As he gets stronger he will only get better.
November 26th, 2018 at 1:45 pm
@Issaic, his biggest problem is he was just not strong enough. I don’t think they had much of a strength and conditioning program were he came from.
November 26th, 2018 at 2:07 pm
I really wasn’t paying any attention to him yesterday but I’m glad to see he had a good day. Next week is a whole new world, but if you’re going to spend a 3rd rounder on someone you might as well find out what you have at some point. It’s not always needed, some guys benefit from not getting thrown into the fire if they’re not ready, and for a guy with margin physical tools that is very often the case, but he performs and doesn’t get the franchise QB killed, then let him play.
November 26th, 2018 at 5:51 pm
Why hasn’t Cappa been playing is the question and why is Beneoch even starting still? This staff has not focused enough on basics and it shows thru this. Why is a 3rd round OL on the bench for 11 games instead of being inserted in earlier in the season. Week after week the talk is always the wrong kind of strategy to with into the next game. Instead of focusing on a weak and injury rattled secondary that needs improvement fast. Everyone was so focused on the QB drama fans, coaches, and execs that the obvious problems were not being addressed like getting more physical in the trenches and reliable as well. I think Beneoch would benefit moving to Tackle the rest of this season as well but Cappa has that guard spot on lock to me. Just wondering what took them so long to make this obvious move.
November 26th, 2018 at 7:26 pm
Mclaurin – Probably Cappa hasn’t been playing because he looked terrible in the preseason, like he shouldn’t even be on an NFL roster terrible. But he’s making a big leap and he didn’t have nearly the same physical skills as Marpet so you don’t just throw him out there and get his QB killed. It’s perfectly OK to sit rookies, it’s what you do if you have a good team, it’s what the Bucs would often do the SB run (Barber didn’t play his rookie year). Anywho since he was forced into action and looked OK they should play him again, but I’d personally keep him on a short leash however in case this was just a terrible 49ers team that just travelled across the country to play an early game and didn’t show-up. But hopefully he’s been hitting the weight room, putting on muscle and learning from the vets, because he needed to do all those things, and if he was able to go from looking completely lost in the preseason to being able to start without being a giant liability then that’s a very very good sign since it shows a ton of progress.
November 26th, 2018 at 8:22 pm
I would love to see him develop and play good next year. He’s mean player and next to Jensen’s crazy ass that would make nasty duo which we desperately need. Bring in a good vet RT in FA and these offensive line problems that we’ve had for years could take a turn.
November 27th, 2018 at 10:17 am
Cappa is a natural Tackle and should have been developed as such except we have Warhop who doesn’t have the ability to develop anybody and is foolish enough to keep trying to develop Benenoch simply by throwing him into the fire which has been a complete failure, when he has an accomplished Guard, Liedtke (who even can play LT better than D. Smith and proved it with no sacks in two preseason games this year), and he should have been playing RT all this time. Benenoch already bombed at LT, but fire Warhop and perhaps the next DL Coach can properly develop him.
November 27th, 2018 at 10:57 am
What a great OL Coach would do is move D. Smith to LG where he won’t ever have to block speed rushers on an island again, and move Marpet back to his best position at LG, and ending all the bad play there, and lobby the new GM to take a top LT in the draft, backed up by Liedtke, and play Dotson at RT, and develop Cappa to replace Dotson upon retirement and to spell Dotson during games til then. Then try developing Benenoch as a backup Guard and cut him if he can’t develop him. Keep the other Smith as backup Center to Jensen and a backup Guard. Work with further development of our other backup Tackles. Once he gets his starters work hard to develop good chemistry between them and make sure they are strong enough to push back defensive lines and open holes for the RBs, get to the second level and block LBs, stop twists and all types of blitzes, and yet can stop all sacks when we are passing. We have none of that with Warhop which has made us losers the whole time he has been here. This losing is not all Koetter and Licht’s fault!