Five Things
September 12th, 2022
Offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich celebrates with Tom Brady during the Bucs’ 19-3 win at Dallas. Photo courtesy of Buccaneers.com.
Joe returned to the Bucs’ team hotel in Dallas after banging out story after story at Jerry’s World. It’s 2 a.m. central and 3 a.m. eastern. Let’s get rolling to celebrate the start of a memorable season, so Joe can get four hours of sleep.
Hey, it’s “Victory Monday!”
Defense Wins Championships
The old football saying that defense wins championships is outdated. In the third decade of the 21st century, if you don’t have a dangerous offense, you are effed.
Joe suspected the Bucs would have a helluva defense this year. If yesterday was any tip, the Bucs sure will.
The defense made Dak Prescott look like Stewart McClown. Prescott was bad That’s because the Bucs’ pass defense, aside from the opening drive, was pretty dang stout.
Combine that with an already vicious run defense, and you are cooking with fire.
Joe wrote many times about how dominant the defense should be this year. Yesterday did nothing to change Joe’s mind. And that defense will carry the Bucs until the offense can hum after all the injuries.
Playoff Lenny Is Rolling
Remember the summer reports that Playoff Lenny was a DQ Blizzard away from 260? That he was on the verge of eating himself out of the league? That Bucs types were peeved at his alleged dad bod?
We should all be so out of shape.
Playoff Lenny looked really sharp all through August and he had has his best Bucs game running the ball in the regular season yesterday. Oh yeah, Playoff Lenny also lit up Dallas pass rusher Micah Parsons on a long pass to Julio Jones.
Playoff Lenny’s crushing block — does Parsons have to go to the dentist today to get fillings replaced? — showed folks he’s not f’ing around this year.
Jenna Laine of ESPN had a way cool stat on Playoff Lenny. Per Laine, 93 of Playoff Lenny’s 127 yards last night came before contact. That tells Joe the run blocking was damn good, especially on a line that had three guys out there that few expected to play meaningful snaps back in July: left guard Luke Goedeke, center Robert Hainsey, and backup left tackle Josh Wells. 
The Chris Godwin Injury
More might be known later today about Chris Godwin’s hamstring injury. Saying Godwin would play and play well in the season-opener after rehabbing from January knee surgery would have been a full-blown shock six weeks ago. .
Godwin was looking like his old self. Maybe there was something happened tied to muscle memory because he was playing live, full-on football for the first time since he blew out his knee in December? Maybe his body wasn’t ready? Who knows?
Seeing Godwin limping heavily on the Bucs sideline made Joe sick thinking the worst. Joe guesses Godwin will be ready to rock and roll in October.
How ’bout Shaq Barrett?
The Bucs sack king had a nice impact Sunday. Maybe a huge impact. The official gamebook has Shaq with no sacks. Yeah, that stinks. However, Shaq had seven quarterback pressures, per Laine. That’s a whole bunch.
If Shaq keeps up that sort of pressure he is going to be a monster, that’s for sure. And let’s think about it, the next quarterback Shaq faces is America’s Quarterback. Pro Bowler Jameis Winston. He’s not exactly mobile. Prescott is.
Joe wouldn’t be shocked that, given the slimy Saints’ issues with their offensive line, Jameis could hit the turf a time or two from Shaq.
The Rebirth of Lavonte David
Anyone notice Lavonte David looks like he’s five years younger? He’s quicker and he appears stronger.
David was all over the field making plays. That’s what David has done for years. Dinged with injuries last year, Joe thought maybe the best of David’s playing days were in the past and he slowly starting to fade at 31 years old.
David played yesterday like he was in his prime. And what the hell, Mike McCarthy? Did you really think you could sneak a screen pass past David? Man, David smelled it right away and blew up the Cowboys receiver.
Joe couldn’t believe McCarthy was crazy enough, after the game David was having, to try to sneak a screen past David. Dummy.
It reminded Joe of what of “The Pope,” Mike Francesa, talking about McCarthy week on SiriusXM last week, “I watch his games and I see stuff that I just don’t understand.”
Targeting David with a screen pass fits that statement.
September 12th, 2022 at 3:57 am
BUCS win! All is right in the world…. until the BUCS lose. Hard fought win.TB was fired up and rightfully so.
September 12th, 2022 at 4:26 am
Overall, a businesslike win with a balanced, well thought out game plan emphasizing defense and smashmouth. In other words, the right brand of football that hopefully this team consistently imposes. Nice overall work on defense.
The offense still has work to do, many missed opportunities, and one game doesn’t answer all questions about this OL. Losing D Smith could be huge, and can’t depend on Wells. They have to do something to add depth. Losing Godwin would be hugely disappointing, and Gage is gimpy too.
It’s still week 1, always full of wild upsets and surprises, but the Packers, 49ers and Rams look worse, the Steelers look better (the Bengals are still legit, although amusingly their expensive new OL still hasn’t gelled), Chiefs the same. If these become trends, it could be good news for the Bucs, the schedule won’t be as bad as it looked on paper.
September 12th, 2022 at 5:18 am
Someone please tell me HOW HORRIBLE the OLine is…
I mean after all these guys only have ONE game of XP.
Trade some WRs and Bring in a retired center and or someone that has played a few years because these guys are going to get Brady killed.
I know because I am SOOOOOOOOO scared of my shadow. This OLine sucks out loud because our coaches and Jason L has no idea what they are doing…
PLEASE LISTEN TO ME, I hate this team and I really want them to do good. The OLine is in Shambles…
LMFAO…. CLOWNS… ALL OF YOU…
How did we look running the Ball??? Did ME13 get his 100 yards and a TUDDIE???
September 12th, 2022 at 5:23 am
McCarthy seriously looked like he didn’t want to be there last night and I don’t see him lasting the season.
September 12th, 2022 at 5:24 am
Thanks for your hard works, Joes. I did not watch the game. It is appreciate if you could how the defense was dominant compared to last year.
September 12th, 2022 at 6:21 am
This should’ve been Six Things. Special Teams were good. Kickoffs kickoffs had great hang tinge and they tackled very well
September 12th, 2022 at 7:13 am
Buczilla, yeah saw that all night, along with all those long Jones faces up in their suite. McCarty better have UHaul on speed dial. The good news for Mike is there will be plenty of rentals at his disposal with all those hair-on-fire fleeing Californians. You are probably right about hot seat Mike, he is working the phones right now! Buh bye McCarty.
Go Bucs!
September 12th, 2022 at 7:19 am
Solid choices for the “five things”. Totally agree. O was OK. As Brady noted after the game, though, “things to clean up.” The O is still getting in synch. But the D was very impressive. Great win on the road. Dallas is never an easy place to shine. Now do the same thing next week in NO.
September 12th, 2022 at 7:21 am
The run defense was not good. The ‘boys were dumb to get away from it. They were gaining 5,6 & 7 yards a pop. Another McCarthy inexplicable?
LVD was very good; D White, the CBs (I only saw SMB on special teams & more press coverage, good moves me thinks) Lenny, CG & others too. I hope they didn’t rush CG back too soon. They could have won without him.
They can improve in areas for sure but, they can beat the ‘aints with this same offensive style of play because, the “throw-it-around-the-yard-45-times” approach sure hasn’t! Good win for sure!
September 12th, 2022 at 7:34 am
Where are the trolls this morning? They run their mouths, then disappear like the cowards they are.
September 12th, 2022 at 7:39 am
Now that’s how a offense keeps a defense off balance. Loved the play calls and misdirection. Oline exceeded expectations and Otton is sick on ST’s and blocking. Winfield is a stud, the D was great and it was great to see the secondary not puke all over themselves. Negative takeaways, Edward’s shaky and Darden still stinks. Folks that was a arse whipping on Dallas in Dallas and there D.is for real. Parsons by far the best LB in the NFL.
September 12th, 2022 at 7:39 am
We were fretting about the poor tackling and hoping that improved technique would be stressed during training camp. Well, apparently the message go through. Excellent tackling last night.
September 12th, 2022 at 7:43 am
Bucsbeback. The defense allowed 3.9 yards per rush and the defense allowed 3.8 yards per pass.
If you do that you win every game this season including the 2 Saints games.
September 12th, 2022 at 7:49 am
Remember when it was rumored McCarthy was in the mix for HC when we hired BA? Whew
September 12th, 2022 at 8:15 am
The Cowboys are in deep trouble…….they really don’t have a backup QB……and they have ruined their WR corps……
They do have a halfway decent defense.
September 12th, 2022 at 8:28 am
Poor Lenny. I’ll bet those LB’s and DB’s thought he was fat and out of shape last night. LOL Lenny. Nice message to the league.
September 12th, 2022 at 8:29 am
I’m sure when the Bucs watch the film of the Saints after yesterday’s choke by the Falcons the first thing they will see is that the Saints offensive line isn’t what it used to be. For 3 quarters the Falcons were mixing up defenses and confusing and sacking Winston. He was sitting on the bench be-fuddled.
New Orleans was very fortunate that the Falcons coaching staff had their defense go zone and stopped sending extra pass rushers at Winston. During the 4th quarter comeback he had some very clear throwing lanes and time to throw.
The Buc defense is much stronger across the front 7 than Atlanta. Atlanta ran the ball very well against the Saints. Fournette will have plenty of opportunities to have another strong game.
All the losses to the Saints under the Arian’s days featured an unbalanced number of passes vs rushes. Bowles will let the beasts, Lenny and Rashad White get 30 carries to bring up those dbs and open up the passing game.
Using a fullback lead blocker worked. Keeping in a blocking tight end to help Wells is important. He isn’t capable of handling a strong edge rusher without help.
Both White and Fournette are great protectors of Brady. Pound New Orleans defense with physical style and protect the ball. Jameis will be wary of Devin White too.
September 12th, 2022 at 8:31 am
A Sixth Thing
We played a very clean game as far as penalties……all of our penalties were 5 yards…..I think two false starts and 3 offsides…..not one holding or DPI…..
With that Oline….not one holding penalty….
Fantastic coverage without a DPI…….
Great
September 12th, 2022 at 8:31 am
Breshad Permian was disappointing
Rashad White reminds me of Eric Dickerson and Marcus Allen. (His style not his production so relax)
Defence was good not great. Let’s face it Dallas has one receiver (Lamb) and even he would be our #4 if Godwin is healthy.
Succop can’t miss 36 yard field goals period.
Jaelon Darden plays afraid and his football IQ is very low.
Cameron Brate for being a Vet was very disappointing tonight. Cade will be #1 baring injury very soon.
Overall nice win for Bowles. Finally balance on offence. Unlike Bruce and I appreciate Bruce ego was not his enemy. The pass/run ratio was perfect. It kept the defence fresh all night.
Luke and Robert had a great start. Did they make mistakes? Yes. Did they compete? Yes. They did especially well in the run game. I see them only getting better.
Let’s hope the boys who were hurt get healthy quickly.
September 12th, 2022 at 8:33 am
Ultra… McCarthy is just the flip side of Lovie during a game, and probably very similar in the overall coaching job. Lovie is constipated at game time. McCarthy never saw some bizarre coaching decision during the games he didn’t like. I knew we were in trouble when we chose Lovie as HC… basically said so. I’ve seen McCarthy for years in Packerland. If we hired him, I’d probably have had a stroke. Which might make one or two people happy. But not me. LOL.
September 12th, 2022 at 8:33 am
The Bucs had a great game running the ball. Kinda reminiscent of the Legarrette Blount days. Great game plan. Give the O-Line an opportunity to be aggressive and attack the Cowboys D-Line, instead of being back on their heels all game. I like what I saw from the Defense, but there’s still room for improvement, at least on the D-Line. I didn’t feel like they fully took advantage of the Dallas backups like they should have. I saw Vea getting blocked 1 on 1 a few times and he wasn’t able to steamroll his guy like he usually does, though he did get a late sack after breaking off of a double team, so not all bad. Hicks made a few impact plays and looked solid. Wanted to see more moves from JTS but all he showed is a bull rush or getting run far wide. Didn’t really use his hands well at all. Still needs work. The defensive secondary played an outstanding game for the most part. Davis and Dean both were on lock, and Winfield did great as well.
September 12th, 2022 at 8:36 am
Maybe David is on the TB12…
September 12th, 2022 at 8:42 am
@Geno
I am a big fan. You always “correct” the bad posts here without rancor or hyperbole. You use FACTS and STATS what a concept eh? lol
Agree with TBBF about the lack of penalities and I was also impressed by our special team coverage which previously left me worried.
September 12th, 2022 at 8:47 am
54 had to be injured and struggling this year, because he was Johnny on the spot a few times last night. 45 looked much more under control as well. I think he will benefit the most from the healthy play. Even though they held Dallas to 3 points, I still felt they could have dominated even more with a takeaway or 2 more. Really cool to see red jerseys batting and tipping passes all over the field. Definitely one of the more solid team efforts in the last 3 seasons. Lets do it again in Nawlins next week.
September 12th, 2022 at 8:57 am
Lombardi Lenny did limp off near the end of the game. Is he OK? I haven’t seen much reporting on that.
September 12th, 2022 at 9:10 am
Yeah hoping its just cramps or soemthing. White was a nice change of pace type. Looked very smooth. One thing that did look like it had some effect early was ko koeft as a lead blocker. Was quite pleased in general with the rookie star blocking. ottom had a nice seal at the edge on a bif run
September 12th, 2022 at 9:12 am
It wasn’t your typical Bucs’ game under BA to be sure, but the game plan & it’s execution was impressive. Bucs controlled the game via the clock: 33 mins TOP to 27 mins, even though Dallas had several more plays (69 them to 62 for us).
To do that, Bucs ran the ball MORE than we passed it (the Bucs? Really?) … 33 runs vs 29 passing attempts (53.2% run-pass ratio). But we didn’t just run it, we ran it EFFECTIVELY (152 rushing yards for a 4.6 average YPC). Lenny is an absolute beast (21 carries for 127 yds … 6.0 YPC). Julio really surprised me running the ball (2 runs for 17 yards). White did OK given the situations that they tried to run him in (6 runs for 14 yards, all but 1 in the 4th qtr).
Seems like the strategy was to keep the pressure off of TB12 by letting Lenny primarily take it to the Cowboys, and he sure did. That same strategy SHOULD also work against the Saints (Falcons did it fairly successfully, for 3 qtrs at least).
September 12th, 2022 at 9:23 am
I really enjoyed the 3 tight end run plays!!! Lenny had huge wholes to run thru!! Hats off to the rookies KK and CO .
September 12th, 2022 at 9:46 am
I’ll say this about Lenny, that’s by far his best game as a Buc and it had little to do with stats. He ran through contact and kept his legs moving. In years past he would launch himself into tacklers and didn’t break any. He looked really really good and a lot like the beast that was in Jacksonville leading the surge there several years ago.
September 12th, 2022 at 10:05 am
I pray Godwins fine. But I’m saying this if the Bucs depth at widereceievr is so deep them it would have made more sense to sit Godwin until the home opener. Traveling takes its toll on the body especially injuries. That would have given him 3 weeks more and a home game. Just saying the Bucs are always pushing the envelope on injuries
September 12th, 2022 at 10:17 am
The good:
Antoine Winfield is going to have a huge year. Bowles is using him like he used Honey Badger in his prime.
They were mostly playing against nobodies, but our corners were blanketing their recievers.
The two rookie TE’s were amazing for what they were being asked to do. I love that plan for those guys. Very impressed with their blocking in the running game.
The offensive line can get out and run. Great job pulling around and engaging and holding blocks. Shaq Mason is perfect for this style of play.
Fournette hit the hole like he actually wanted to punish people, which is a welcome surprise compared to how he’s run the last two years. Once White gets a little better feel for the speed of the game that should be a good one-two combo.
Our young punter is a cannon for a leg. That is a weapon if we can continue to cover.
The bad:
Our recieving group is great, but if they start getting banged up and Breshad Perriman has to play alot we’re screwed.
A prolonged Donovan Smith injury would be disastrous.
Russel Gage needs to step up his game. This isn’t crappy Atlanta anymore. He needs to be able to win one-on-ones underneath and give Brady a quick outlet.
Kickers can’t miss inside 40 yards. Period.
September 12th, 2022 at 10:18 am
That hit on Parsons by Lenny was my favorite play of the game. Lenny punking Kearse was my 2nd favorite.
September 12th, 2022 at 10:38 am
The run blocking was fantastic rookie tightends blocked their tails off super impressed with that. Special teams coverage finally looked good hang time from Jake was awesome looks like we got a good one there for sure was a roughing the kicker penalty I couldnt believe that call.
September 12th, 2022 at 10:49 am
Anonymous, that’s negative if you’re a Dallas fan. You think I’m negative read Marques post. Geez, that’s what he got out of that game? Dude do you kick the dig when they lose?
September 12th, 2022 at 1:49 pm
“Defense wins Champions” is absolutely outdated. (See Tony Dungy years here in Tampa) Points Win Championships!
September 12th, 2022 at 8:06 pm
I did see one difference from the BA years. PHYSICALITY. On both sides of the ball thanks to Playoff Lennie sticking all those fat insults back down people’s throats. That MAN came to play! And play HARD!
September 12th, 2022 at 11:14 pm
Brady has the whole team on the TB12 program. The older players look like they found the fountain of youth.