Practice Makes Better, Not Perfect
November 22nd, 2020
Bucs S Antoine Winfield.
Allen Iverson will not like this.
No stranger to a casino, the former NBA star saw fit to work on his dice-throwing skills much more than free throws. We’ve all seen his “We’re talking practice?!” sophomoric rant. (Yes, Joe knows Iverson was a good free throw shooter.)
Well, Iverson probably wouldn’t fit in with the 2020 Bucs.
Earlier this year when the Bucs totally waxed the Packers, Bucs coach Bucco Bruce Arians said after the game he could smell that coming by the way the Bucs practiced leading up to the game.
Last week, Bucs safety Antoine Winfield sort of echoed those words.
“It starts in practice – whatever you do in practice, you do in games,” Winfield said. “Making sure that we emphasize that we’re finishing through our practice [and] finishing our last few periods strong is, I think, helping us and it shows during the game.
“One thing I feel like we do need to work on is starting faster, so that’s kind of been our goal this week. Start fast and finish through.”
Joe is not surprised to hear this from Winfield. He seems like a smart guy, and he very likely got a strong work ethic from his dad.
This is why Joe is slightly concerned about left guard. It’s up in the air if starting left guard Ali Marpet can play. And yesterday, Arians noted he didn’t know how much he could use Marpet in practice because doing that would cut precious practice snaps for Ryan Jensen, who will play left guard if Marpet cannot go for the third consecutive game.
In case this slipped past you, a guy by the name of Aaron Donald that plays in the middle on the Rams defense that the Bucs will see on Monday night. Any human would need to practice to prepare as much as possible for this guy.
November 22nd, 2020 at 10:12 am
Of course Arians knows you have to be prepared with what you have, and going back to pop warner days, eacy player and coach knows you have to play hard and fast from the whistle. So the talk of slow starts repeatedly coming from the Bucs over the years….numerious coaches, GMs, and players, rings hollow with me. Even back to the SB era days, the Bucs too often seemed anemic in the “fire” and “explosion” department on the offense. And that 45-0 loss against OAK then was still not as bad as two weeks ago.
Marpet is a key piece of the offense but all teams have to deal with injuries.
The team is good enough, or it’s not. Get over it BA and company. The conversation about the future of your season will be mapped out based on your MNF performance.
November 22nd, 2020 at 10:40 am
He plays all over the line this year including the edge, they’ll just let him abuse Donovan Smith all game
November 22nd, 2020 at 11:11 am
Got to see Winfield yesterday. Me and my son were getting our haircut at a Tampa mall and there he is two chairs down from us. I think me and the guy cutting his hair were the only ones who new who he was. He was still rocking his gophers gear.
November 22nd, 2020 at 11:44 am
I hope Aaron Donald is as ineffective as he was last year against us.
Based upon history, that is my bet.
November 22nd, 2020 at 11:57 am
Perfection is unattainable but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.
Vince Lombardi
November 22nd, 2020 at 12:06 pm
geno711 … Did history tell you whether or not Marpet will play tomorrow? (My guess is no. History only tells us what happened yesterday … thankfully).
But regardless of whether Marpet plays or not, Bucs’ OLine has a job to do: run-block and pass-protect effectively. No excuses. And my guess is that Jensen can handle himself (and Donald) at either Center or Guard. I’d be more concerned with those times when Donald lines up over LT or RG (I understand he lines up everywhere on the DLine but can’t verify that since I don’t watch Rams games).
In any event, glad to see Winfield’s quote: “One thing I feel like we do need to work on is starting faster”. I hope the Bucs’ offense took that to heart as much as I’m sure the defense did.