Practice Notes On Final OTA Open To Media
June 6th, 2023
So after this morning’s underwear football practice open to media, the Bucs will have a three-day mandatory minicamp next week. After that, training camp in late July is the next time players will be seen together on the field.
Mike Evans was here today and seems to be, well, Mike Evans. Rookie reciever Trey Palmer continues to get a lot of snaps with the ones (first team), and it appeared that Kyle Trask got more snaps today, though still mostly working with the twos.
(Please remember: Underwear football is basically flag football without the flags. No hitting of any sort. The only pieces of football equipment players use is helmets, cleats and jocks.)
* Baker Mayfield tucks the ball when he couldn’t find anyone open and ran up the middle towards the left side. There seemed to be a little more of this today, quarterbacks under pressure.
* K.J. Britt dropped a can of corn pass over the middle from Mayfield that should have been picked. Britt jumped up and down in frustration.
* Trask throws a bit too long down the left sideline for a diving Kaylon Geiger. But given his slippery hands, the extra effort probably wasn’t needed from Geiger.
* Ke’Shawn Vaughn takes a handoff, runs right then cuts back left for some yardage. It must have been a nice run because Joe could hear the offensive players yelling “Sneak!” (FYI, “Sneak” is Vaughn’s nickname.)
* It looked as if Patrick O’Connor blocked a Mayfield pass at the line of scrimmage. Logan Hall was right there too with outstretched arms so maybe he had a hand in there?
* Trask fakes a handoff up the middle, takes two or three steps to his right and connects with Patrick Laird (Cal) on the left side.
* Now a veteran. … Lining up after breaking the huddle, Trask gets the attention of undrafted rookie running back Ronnie Brown and points to where Brown should line up. Brown heeds Trask’s order.
* On a slant pass from the right side, a Mayfield pass hits Evans right in the hands in stride and Evans cannot haul it in. Looked like a defender may have gotten a fingernail on the ball just enough to change the flight a split-second just before it hit Evans’ paws.
* Mayfield connects with Chris Godwin coming in from the left side.
* Mayfield pumps and aims for Cade Otton on the left side but Otton couldn’t quite bring the ball in.
* David Moore (East Central) is wide open on the left side and Trask makes sure he gets the ball.
* Trask is chased out of the pocket under pressure.
* Under center, Trask hands off to Brown who runs right for a big gain.
* Trask throws just a tad behind Ryan Miller (Furman) but Miller, coming in from the right side, still comes up with the catch.
7-on-7
* Mayfield hits Kade Warner perfectly in the hands down the left sideline.
* Miller slides to pull in a pass from Trask.
* Trask finds Cade Otton over the middle.
* Trask to Brown on the left side.
* J.J. Russell breaks up a Trask pass intended for Geiger.
Red zone
* The immortal tight end Tanner Taula (Illinois State) catches a pass from Trask down the right seam.
* Mayfield threads a tight window to Palmer over the middle for a touchdown as Jamel Dean throws Palmer down with one arm as Palmer leaned over the goal line while falling after catching the pass. It looked as if Dean’s hand got inside Palmer’s frame when he caught the ball and hung on as Dean tried to rip the ball out. In the follow-through, Dean took Palmer to the turf.
* Joe will repeat/remind readers that since Russell Gage is hurt (again), Palmer has been getting a lot of snaps with the ones and he’s not throwing up on himself.
* Lots of traffic around Mayfield as he sets up to throw and he just takes off.
* Trask connects with Taula right on the money as Taula quickly turned around to face Trask and set his feet and squared himself to the line waiting for the ball.
* Hey, it’s practice: Mayfield lofts a giant rainbow to the far left corner of the end zone where only Mike Evans had a chance of catching the ball. He couldn’t, though. Dean dove and got a hand on the pass as it fell out of bounds.
* Trask down the left seam to tight end Dominique Dafney (Indiana State) who pops up and does the Keyshawn Johnson first down routine.
* Trask throws to Evans down the right sideline a little too wide outside out of bounds for Evans. He just couldn’t hang on as he dove for the ball.
Goal line
* Mayfield hits Evans as he got loose cutting inside from the right. Mayfield dropped the ball right in the bucket for Evans.
* Trask throws low (this is not always a bad thing) to Palmer who goes low to dig it up and scores. Palmer immediately popped up and held the ball aloft to show folks he caught it.
June 6th, 2023 at 2:32 pm
Great work Joes
June 6th, 2023 at 2:34 pm
JBF bringing it strong.
June 6th, 2023 at 2:36 pm
Seems like the silver lining with the Gage injury is heavy reps for Palmer……and, it appears that he can actually catch the ball.
Any Myron Lewis sightings today?
June 6th, 2023 at 2:53 pm
Seems like Palmer is putting some good practices together. I’ll wait and see when the pads come on to make further judgments.
June 6th, 2023 at 3:00 pm
“And he seems to be, well, Mike Evans.” Best compliment a person can give. When you’re that consistently good, and you play great/look great in practice, it’s barely newsworthy because that’s just Mike Evans and what you expect. Underrated, underappreciated.
June 6th, 2023 at 3:06 pm
Thx Joe!
June 6th, 2023 at 3:09 pm
Thanks, Joe! Was your overall impression that the D was getting some PBU’s, or was QB accuracy an issue?
June 6th, 2023 at 3:39 pm
Joe don’t bother to explain to people that Trask is throwing low for a reason. This is something he learned from Brady who learned it from Belicheat who learned it from Parcells. Throw low over the middle!
June 6th, 2023 at 3:50 pm
Let’s hope that Palmer don’t catch kennybellitis when the real games start.
June 6th, 2023 at 3:53 pm
Doesn’t sound like either QB is doing too bad, all things considered.
Hopefully they will both get the new scheme down and the competition (ha-ha) can begin.
June 6th, 2023 at 3:58 pm
“It looked as if Patrick O’Connor blocked a Mayfield pass at the line of scrimmage.”
Pat O’Connor is the NFL success story most fans don’t give a damn about because he’s “only a special teamer”, but if you find yourself watching preseason games later this summer keep an eye on him and how he works. Former 7th round pick, going on year 5 with us, and last season blocked a kick off the boot of HOF kicker Justin Tucker.
June 6th, 2023 at 5:04 pm
Big thank you Joe!
June 6th, 2023 at 5:40 pm
thanks joes, always love the camp notes
June 6th, 2023 at 6:07 pm
Does Evans have the dropskis again? Ruh roh.
Just kidding.
Thanks for the detailed notes as always Joe(s)!
June 6th, 2023 at 6:59 pm
If my figures are correct, according to the reporting, both Quarterbacks took eleven snaps , Mayfield was flushed twice and had to run , Trask was flushed once, Mayfield threw nine times , had four completions and one touchdown with no interceptions, Trask threw ten times with seven completions for one touchdown and no interceptions, sounds like they are doing pretty well with the advantage going to Kyle today.
June 6th, 2023 at 6:59 pm
Thanks, Joe. Did you see anything from Devin Thompkins?
June 6th, 2023 at 7:55 pm
JD Still Says: “… sounds like they are doing pretty well with the advantage going to Kyle today.”
Shhh! You’re not supposed to notice that! Baker is our savior!
June 6th, 2023 at 10:29 pm
No, LOL. Joe’s not documenting every play — but most plays. There are some plays where Joe is screened by players/coaches/suits/rabble on the sidelines. That’s like 20-25 percent of the plays — we’re about 20-25 yards from a practice field so when they are in goal line offense on the other side of the field, it gets gnarly trying to see through people.
Trask sure seemed like he had more snaps today.
(Joe also is not documenting plays where John Wolford is throwing to camp meat. Joe understands some websites will do this but there just aren’t enough folks who want to read that stuff.)
June 6th, 2023 at 10:30 pm
Didn’t see him at all today.
June 7th, 2023 at 12:45 am
It sounds to me like both QBs had a rough day. Not a big deal.
The fake competition is what it is.
June 7th, 2023 at 8:57 am
Thanks for the breakdown Joe. I love this stuff.
Joe FYI the first down signal thing should be credited to Joe Jurevicius. Not Meshawn. I believe Joe was the first to do it.
June 7th, 2023 at 9:23 am
To Joe says, Oh yes , I understand the difficulties of reporting from the sidelines, ( and You do a great job ) I did not include the plays that you did report involving handoffs, but only the ones directly involving the QB competition,( I would have only included them if there had been screwups, like fumbles in the exchanges , which were not mentioned if there were any), but I think you did great in reporting , 70 to 75 percent of the plays is outstanding and the best coverage you can get outside of actual video tape of the entire practice , and as far as the the 20-25% you missed , that would have only amounted to maybe two or three snaps per QB , not enough to change the overall evaluation, Thanks for the good work!
June 7th, 2023 at 3:01 pm
If Kyle can’t beat out Blaine, he’s not beating out Baker, these reports confirm that. If they have a losing record the first 6-8 Baker games, they’ll switch to Trask just to make sure…but also to Collapse for Caleb or Die for Drake.
June 7th, 2023 at 7:58 pm
Thx for the report, Joe. Palmer sounds like he might be a real gem. People were drooling over FA Sean Tucker, maybe with good cause, but this Ronnie Brown kid looks very promising indeed. I’d read that Jose Ramirez had a heads-up scoop n score too. I think a lot of pundits will be feasting on crow come November.