Running It Back
March 17th, 2025
Expectations. (A Tampa Bay Buccaneers photo)
The Bucs are flying under the radar again.
Joe’s hearing all the about the same teams from national football sophists: the Chiefs, the Vikings, the Eagles, the Commandos, the Bills, the Seahawks.
Lil’ ‘ol Tampa Bay? Stuck down there in the NASCAR division? Pfft! Whatever.
Well, Bucs AC/DC-loving general manager Jason Licht is once again quietly pulling off the unthinkable. Remember when the Bucs won the Super Bowl after the 2020 season? And Licht brought the whole gang back, 22+1 starters?
Licht has basically done it again with pretty much every player on his dangerous offense returning.
Well, one guy in the national media is paying attention.
John Daigle hopped on the Ross Tucker Podcast last week, perhaps the best series of football-only podcasts you’ll find. There, while Daigle was speaking specifically about fantasy football, he basically warned folks that the Bucs may be even more dangerous on offense than when they finished with the third-best offense in the game last year.
“Between [Chris] Godwin, Baker [Mayfield], Mike Evans, Bucky Irving in his second year, you just have to love the overall offense environment for Tampa Bay as a whole, said Daigle, of EstablishTheRun.com.
Daigle also pointed out, yes, Liam Coen bolted in the dark of the night to Jacksonville but the Bucs did promote his right-hand man Josh Grizzard to replace him.
Joe really hates to put pressure on a first-time offensive coordinator and first-time play-caller, but Grizzard has a chance to make this offense even better, even though that may be unfair and unreasonable.
Think about it: The Bucs started three rookies in Graham Barton, Jalen McMillan and Bucky Irving. If those guys improve, common for good players, imagine how good this offense could be.
“Between Godwin, Baker, Mike Evans, Bucky Irving in his second year, you just have to love the overall offense environment for Tampa Bay as a whole.”@NotJDaigle is a big fan of what’s going on with the Bucs: pic.twitter.com/TL32E4FRHO
— Ross Tucker Podcast (@RossTuckerPod) March 15, 2025
March 17th, 2025 at 4:32 am
After so many bad seasons, I’m fine just winning the division and making the playoffs. Though, I do think we have the offense to make the Superbowl, I’m just not sure we have the defense. Seems like AWJ fell off and we only brought in an edge rusher. We need CB depth and an ILB. I hope the draft pans out
March 17th, 2025 at 6:13 am
Only thing this offense lacks is a good backup TE.
March 17th, 2025 at 7:23 am
Every season there is luck involved in getting to the Super Bowl, avoiding injuries, not having MRSA in the locker room, etc. The best teams find a way every season to put themselves in the playoffs so if the breaks go their way, they are playing in the Super Bowl. I am perfectly fine with that strategy rather than destroying the salary cap to go “all in” one year.
The off is good enough to get us there. The defense… We need to find a way to pressure opposing QBs without having to run ridiculously exotic blitzes. A lot of QB pressure with a four man rush is the key to winning in this league.
March 17th, 2025 at 7:24 am
Every season there is luck involved in getting to the Super Bowl, avoiding injuries, not having MRSA in the locker room, etc. The best teams find a way every season to put themselves in the playoffs so if the breaks go their way, they are playing in the Super Bowl. I am perfectly fine with that strategy rather than destroying the salary cap to go “all in” one year.
The offense is good enough to get us there. The defense… We need to find a way to pressure opposing QBs without having to run ridiculously exotic blitzes. A lot of QB pressure with a four man rush is the key to winning in this league.
March 17th, 2025 at 7:25 am
Sorry for the duplicate post. I am a Luddite.
March 17th, 2025 at 7:31 am
Injuries!!! AWJ didn’t fall off. Dude was hurt all year as was most of our secondary. If the starting 4-5 of our secondary remains 90% injury free with the addition of HR, we will be fine. Bucs D will be downright formidable if Licht has a draft this year like last year, especially if he’s drafting primarily defensive players, which is what I hope he does.
That being said, if this defense is riddled with injuries as they were last year, all bets are off.
March 17th, 2025 at 8:05 am
“Lil’ ‘ol Tampa Bay? Stuck down there in the NASCAR division? Pfft! Whatever.” Also known as our annual right of passage.
March 17th, 2025 at 8:09 am
” A lot of QB pressure with a four man rush is the key to winning in this league.” said Patrick Mahomes.
March 17th, 2025 at 8:31 am
@Ron Mexico, yeah because our 2 backup TEs didn’t play great when Cade was hurt! You watch the games man? Caught everything thrown to them, key blocks, first downs, 2 touchdowns. The least of our problems.
March 17th, 2025 at 8:59 am
“The least of our problems.”
So you think RB depht is a bigger problem. Weird.
March 17th, 2025 at 9:07 am
Phred, Lol, just keep posting and stay away from your local cotton and wool mills.
March 17th, 2025 at 10:00 am
Injuries were huge last year. And to that end I got 3 remotes now, 1 for changing stations and 2 for throwing…..
March 17th, 2025 at 11:24 am
I’m ok with the TE room and RB room heading into this season. If he adds a lil meat and can block… I was impressed with Culp. He showed sure hands in those couple games he got targeted, made good grabs.
If Klein has improved, with the signing of Heck and Shepard returning… we really have no holes on offense entering the draft. Another OL and/or WR if the board falls that way wouldn’t hurt but we are set up to hammer away on D picks this draft.
March 17th, 2025 at 12:05 pm
@Ron Mexico, one of the least. Feel better.
March 17th, 2025 at 12:48 pm
“one of the least.”
Shifting the goal posts. And still no mention which offensive position group is worse…
March 17th, 2025 at 1:45 pm
@ballwasher61:
Hilarious!!! I both laughed out loud AND hung my head in shame as i read your post! Definitely guilty of breaking my fair share of remotes, tv sets, and even playstation controllers… I’ve since learned that close to game time i need to hide/remove all heavy objects that can be hurled towards the tv or walls… Smh!
March 17th, 2025 at 2:31 pm
@Mexico
Sucks you aren’t familiar with the way that term is used.
But, how deep are we at QB, at Center? At any of the WR positions? Starters? Yes, all those groups good. Depth, nah…At Least the backup TEs have played and performed. How is Trask? Who even is our backup Center?
March 17th, 2025 at 2:42 pm
We need to pick a versatile gaurd that can play both gaurd positions but mostly lg..
Te is always good to atleast shop for..
Rb I’m good with that room…
Wr could be a nice luxury pick some one that could step in for Mike for a few plays and shadow him at one buc places. If he takes a bite of food you take a bite of food mentality.
Depth at oline and a new secret weapon is all offense can do unless we see a real upgrade via trade or draft.
Defense is the cancer of this team and we need to cure it.
I think if possible the front 7 needs to be fixed.
Idk if we retained whitehead if not a ball hawking safety would be nice.
Depth or comp at cb would be nice but we need MLB to pair with David and dline upgrades.
We gotta find qb hungry players.
Winfield getting healthy will fix a lot of the defense issues but we could really use some killers on defense.
March 17th, 2025 at 3:06 pm
Phred, good gawd the Bucs had MRSA in their shower room once in almost 50 years and you mention it. Bet your a lot of fun to be around. What a tool.
March 18th, 2025 at 3:51 am
“But, how deep are we at QB, at Center? At any of the WR positions? Starters? Yes, all those groups good. Depth, nah…At Least the backup TEs have played and performed. How is Trask? Who even is our backup Center?”
Finally some arguments instead of personal attacks. Why was that so difficult?
QB: no one really knows what Trask is worth, but a team is f’d anyway if their franchise QB goes down (few exceptions).
C: Bredeson is a good backup. But we could indeed use a replacement for Hainsey.
WR: The level of the backups is higher imo. When we lose a starter we have less of a problem compared to Otton being injured.
March 18th, 2025 at 9:22 am
@Mexico
Personal opinion I guess. I was alot more comfortable with Durham/Culp going down that 5 game stretch when Otton was injured than I would have been with Trask playing instead of Baker. So yeah, that’s 1 position i think is weaker . To my point, “ the least or our worries”….
March 18th, 2025 at 9:12 pm
Agree that the weakest position “group” is QB, but that’s only because none of us knows what we have after Baker because neither has played.
We have one of the strongest overall offensive units in football, including backups. Our weakness is defense, particularly depth at several positions, particularly MLB and Safety. I have no doubt that will be addressed in the draft. We drafted almost exclusively offensive players last year and that paid off for that unit. It’ll be defense this year in the draft and I expect similar results.