The Best Bucs Offensive Line
November 22nd, 2021
Strongest Bucs’ line.
With apologies to men like Paul Gruber and Charley Hannah and Sean Farrell and Davin Joseph, excellent Bucs offensive linemen of the past, Joe is confident suggesting this current Bucs front line is the best in franchise history.
The line is damn good and it has been for a few years. Now, it is elite.
For years Joe fought the loud crowd claiming the Bucs offensive line was horrid. Joe simply did not buy this (thought it certainly was godawful in 2014) because Joe could see the performances and read the box scores.
The Bucs, from 2015 through today, have had one of the NFL’s better offenses year after year. That’s simply impossible if there is no blocking like so many habitually hollered.
Tampa Bay’s media department pumped out just where the offensive line now stands in various statistical categories. And it’s pretty awesome to read.
While in years past the Bucs had some incredible offensive linemen, Joe is confident the Bucs have never had an offensive line unit as top-shelf as today’s.
The @Buccaneers O-Line ranks:
-1st in Lowest Sack %
-1st in Lowest Pressure %
-1st in Most Games without a Sack Allowed
-T-1st in Fewest Total Sacks AllowedFor an offense that ranks:
-1st in Pass Yds/Game
-2nd in Yds/Play
-3rd in Yds/Game
-3rd in Points/Game#ProBowlVote pic.twitter.com/ghuC5DCCJ6— Buccaneers Communications (@BuccaneersComms) November 19, 2021
November 22nd, 2021 at 5:50 am
Swampbuc Says:
November 21st, 2021 at 1:15 pm
The Panthers are carving up WTF. Washington is awful. We lost to them bad. Nice work boys.
#BucsSuck
^^^^^^^^^^^^
This didn’t age well. Hahahahahahahahahahaha
November 22nd, 2021 at 6:26 am
The stats speak for themselves in terms of sacks allowed.
Personally, I would like to see a LOT more balance in this offense. We CHOOSE not to run the ball for some reason. This WITH a good offensive line.
November 22nd, 2021 at 6:54 am
As long as there is not balance between running and throwing , you will continue to see close games and some losses . Blame the coaches.
November 22nd, 2021 at 7:09 am
I agree with Bucsfanman about the need for more BALANCE in the offense 9like we showed in the playoffs?). Stats are useful for big-picture perspectives, but can mislead you into believing you’re doing better than you really are IMO.
For instance, Bucs are #1 in Passing Yards per Game (315.6). We’re also #1 in Passing ATTEMPTS per Game (42.7), very slightly ahead of the Chiefs (42.4). At the same time however we’ve rushed the LEAST number of times in the NFL (192), although our Yards per Rush puts us in the middle of the pack at 4.3 YPR.
With an average-at-best defense (currently surrendering 23.6 PPG average) that’s pretty well beaten up, a Bucs strategic priority SHOULD be to either score a ton of points OR keep the defense off the field as much as possible (TOP?) OR both.
Right now our average TOP this year is 30:10 … ranking us #18 in the NFL. Not high enough IMO but it’s MUCH worse in our 3 losses … 25:51. Our defense was on the field for an average of over 71 defensive snaps/game, part of that’s the defense’s own fault for not being able to get off the field, but part of it was because we fell behind early in each game (turnovers, punts?) and passed, passed, passed to catch up. Lack of balance made a bad situation even worse IMO.
Obviously didn’t help that the offense scored an average of only 23.3 PPG in those 3 losses. Bucs have to do better at controlling games instead of being controlled. We need to get a lot more physical if we expect to go anywhere this year.
November 22nd, 2021 at 7:20 am
OK, something’s wrong here. ALL common sense says if you give Tom the best O-line in the league, the Bucs would be undefeated. as a matter of fact the league would just concede 17 wins. (that’s a joke). BUT we get our ass kicked by the WFT as well as the Saints. Wouldn’t that fall on the coach?? Offensive and defensive. Did anyone else watch the Dallas/KC game???? What did KC do? They doubled their best receiver, (Lamb), and crowded their receivers. I’ve been preaching this to Todd since last year’s regular season game against KC when the Cheetah got 200 yds in the 1st. ficken qtr before he made any adjustments. Sorry Todd, that’s blasphemy!!!!!
November 22nd, 2021 at 8:09 am
Our oline is great….as is our offense…..our problem is with our defense, turnovers & penalties……when you look at our losses….it becomes quite obvious…..we need to play cleaner games.
November 22nd, 2021 at 8:19 am
DefenseRules
Erudite my man, a very good summation indeed. I want to focus on the TOP point. I have thought for some time now that our offense, emphasizing the long ball, chunk plays can at times score too quickly. No sooner does the defense sit down, but TB12 launches a 3 play scoring drive and it’s back to the field. Nice drive Tom, hey I almost had time to hydrate! Long ground and pound drives take the starch out a defense, look no further than WFT’s fourth quarter 10 minute drive that killed us last week. TOP counts.
LFG Bucs!
Let’s Go Brandon!!
November 22nd, 2021 at 8:59 am
So DR, I was going to include JimBuc but like others he had to add his political narrative so I will ignore him. FYI, I am not a fan of current admin but this is not a place to voice it), why NO fullback? Lenny is not Fred Taylor.
November 22nd, 2021 at 9:00 am
Oh, I’ll take the points all day and let the D suck it up.
November 22nd, 2021 at 9:43 am
@Joe in Michigan, everything that moron says ages like milk.
November 22nd, 2021 at 9:43 am
Is this site for children now? Too many absolute as of late. “Best this, greatest that” and then when you watch play, they are barely squeaking out wins. This site has evolved into boredom for Patriots fans
November 22nd, 2021 at 10:07 am
Elite OL?
I don’t think so.
A good OL overall that benefits immensely from a QB who gets rid of the ball quickly is what I see.
November 22nd, 2021 at 10:22 am
No doubt about it.
That said, they need to step it up a little going forward.
November 22nd, 2021 at 10:26 am
Sparky Says:
November 22nd, 2021 at 9:43 am
@Joe in Michigan, everything that moron says ages like milk.
^^^^^^^^^^
Truth!
November 22nd, 2021 at 10:29 am
If this is so, what happened at WTF game?…our Oline got owned by “supposedly” scrubs…Wtf!!
November 22nd, 2021 at 10:30 am
As a unit, sure. But Gruber is the best Bucs lineman ever by far. By far, far, far. It may be Wirfs in a few years, but not yet.
November 22nd, 2021 at 10:34 am
One quarterback hit is getting “owned?” If so, Joe prays the Bucs offensive line is owned every game.
November 22nd, 2021 at 10:54 am
Listnfrmafar … ‘Oh, I’ll take the points all day and let the D suck it up.’ And I’d agree with you, PROVIDING the offense puts up LOTS & LOTS of points. And yet in our 3 losses they managed to put up a grand total of 70 points, and in the Pats game put up another 19 points. So 89 points in 4 games is 22 PPG average … against some good defensive performances. But against the other 5 teams our offense put up a total of 190 points … an average of 38 PPG.
Do you NOT see any INCONSISTENCY there? We’ve put up a LOT of points in our wins (except for the Pats game), but were just average at best in our losses. And when you have a beaten-up defense, an INCONSISTENT OFFENSE doesn’t cut it.
And BTW, of our 6 wins, I’d give the defense credit for 2 of those: Dallas & New England. Our offense turned it over FOUR times against Dallas & continually put the defense in crappy field position (thankfully we held the #3 offense to 3 TDs, 3 FGs plus 2 missed FGs after all those giveaways, one FG with only a little more than 1 minute left in the game). Against the Patriots our offense struggled almost all night I thought, and we would’ve lost that game if not for our defense forcing 2 takeaways and holding the Pats on that last drive (missed 56-yd FG).
November 22nd, 2021 at 11:12 am
Man for man, yes the best BUCS OL ever.. and what is that good for? Absolutely nothing. We still get outcoached and outworked, and that will more than nullify any talent advantage on paper.
November 22nd, 2021 at 11:30 am
The only people hollering about the offensive line over the past seven seasons were the knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing FSU fans and Jay-Miss honks that blamed his propensity for getting sacked on the offensive line. The Bucs have had a very good offensive line for years that got better when they drafted Tristan Wirfs.
November 22nd, 2021 at 11:34 am
Running the ball effectively means mixing up the play calling so it’s not so damn predictable. Humor, Leftuwurst, try a few first down play action passes, checkdown Tom can toss it to Lenny and then run him on second down. That would surprise everyone and might just gain some yards.
November 22nd, 2021 at 11:42 am
Are line isn’t as good as those stats say cause we still can’t run the ball and run blocking is a very important part of blocking… They’re not tuff in the trenches more fineness
November 23rd, 2021 at 12:29 am
Let’s hope Ali Marpet isn’t out long. Stinnie did an excellent job filling in but he isn’t Marpet.