“Tommy, if Licht can get Gronk and Chris back, just wait till the rest of the NFL b@stards get a load of us this fall.”

Let’s imagine Bucs AC/DC-loving general manager Jason Licht uses voodoo witchcraft to get the following players back with the Bucs: Shaq Barrett, Chris Godwin, Ryan Succop, Gronk, Antonio Brown, Lavonte David and Ndamukong Suh.

(Nothing against Playoff Lenny, but Joe has no clue how all of them can come back and still be under the cap.)

Could the Bucs be even better next year? Matt Miller seems to think so. The draft guru formerly of Bleacher Report (who was just hired by BSPN) had what Miller called his “Too Early Power Rankings” for 2021, as part of his newsletter that Joe received yesterday

Joe normally doesn’t give a flip about power rankings unless someone has some obscene view of the Bucs. But out of curiosity, Joe read what Miller typed. He has the Bucs at No. 1 and wrote there is no reason to believe Tampa Bay won’t begin 2021 as the best team in football.

…Tom Brady seems immortal, they’re expected to be able to retain key free agents like Shaq Barrett, Chris Godwin and Lavonte David, and the entire coaching staff returns.

Barring a fall-off from Brady, this team looks to pick up right where they left off when they were red hot throughout the playoffs.

Boy, the Bucs sure were hot as a firecracker once they got past Washington, and ended the Super Bowl-winning season on an eight-game winning streak, a franchise record.

Then Joe remembered what Bucs quarterback coach Clyde Christensen told Pat McAfee earlier this offseason.

Because of all the new parts on offense (including park-violating, home-invading, NFLPA-ignoring, down-forgetting, handshake-stiffing, jet-ski-losing, biscuit-baking, tequila-shooting, trophy-throwing Bucs Super Bowl-winning quarterback Tom Brady) and no offseason, that the Bucs offense was “eight games” away from peaking.

And Christensen said this after the Super Bowl!

So Miller may be onto something here. Perhaps as well as the Bucs offense played in the playoffs, that’s just a taste of what we can or should expect this season.