Evans: Don’t Blame Fitz
September 25th, 2018
Shoulders blame.
For as wonderful as Bucs backup (?) quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick played in the second half, he was dreadful in the first half, especially his pick-six in the second quarter, one of three in the second quarter.
But new Bucs receiving touchdowns record holder Mike Evans said singling out Fitz for the loss simply isn’t fair.
“Absolutely not! Evans said after the Bucs lost to the Steelers Monday night. “I am here telling you what happened. I was in the game. Fitz got us back in the game. He was throwing the ball to us and letting us make plays.”
In the second half. After the Bucs trailed 30-10 at halftime.
Evans would only talk about how his play impacted the Bucs, both good and bad. One bad way Evans frankly and quickly admitted was a poor adjustment on a play. He took full blame for Fitz throwing a pick.
“One of those picks was my fault,” Evans said. “I deviated on my route. I misread [a play]. I thought [Fitz] was going to scramble up and I was just trying to give him [some help].”
Evans moved closer to the line of scrimmage thinking Fitz was going to scramble. Instead, Fitz threw to where Evans was supposed to be, but because Evans “deviated there was a void resulting in an interception.
“Fitz got us back in the game,” Evans said. “He was throwing the ball to us and letting us make plays.”
September 25th, 2018 at 12:43 am
Mike Evans will go down as Lichts greatest draft pick instead of Jameis Winston
September 25th, 2018 at 12:45 am
Wet ball, wet field, fluky loss; and not on Fitz.
All of those are truths.
We are way better than all those fluky mistakes.
We are one of the best teams in the NFL this season.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:46 am
Mike was incredible tonight
Fitz was awful
September 25th, 2018 at 12:46 am
Evans is taking the blame, but that ball was like 15 yards over his head, I don’t know how he could have been anywhere near that ball. Maybe I need to see it again, but this is Mike trying to take some heat off Fitz I think. The TV view that I saw wasn’t remotely close and I don’t know Mike would have gotten to that ball no matter what route he ran. Again, perhaps it’s just the angle on TV that made it look a lot worse than it did.
Anywho if Fitz didn’t mess up here then it makes Dirk look even more dumb for taking the ball out of his hands and punting to end the game.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:47 am
Wet ball, poor field conditions, fluky loss, and not of Fitz.
We will come back strong from this.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:49 am
Let’s just say that it was Evan’s fault. Much of the other stuff wasn’t. Fitz folded tonight. He came back but it didn’t seem very sound at first. Winston doesn’t get rattled so easily.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:52 am
Season is Over
Very true Winston does not get rattled so easily but he does have this disgusting habit of fumbling the ball whenever he gets touched. I’m willing to bet it would have happened tonight if he played. Steelers brought the pressure today and Fitz didn’t have an answer for it 90% of the time
September 25th, 2018 at 12:56 am
Mike has really turned into a pro’s pro since last season.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:56 am
BSPN is still hyping up the Fitz vs Jameis starting job. BSPN reporting that it wasn’t Fitz fault. Then throw up a misleading stat about consecutive 400 yard passing games. That stat is there because the Bucs can’t run the ball… What a crock…
The Bucs should’ve won the game. With Jameis in, Bucs win! And tell me why the heck Conte even has a locker.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:58 am
Fitz stepped up into pressure on a lot of plays when he didn’t need to.
Mike is being nice, Fitz played significantly better in the second half but overall he was awful.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:04 am
My problem with that game was the first play of the bucs last drive….. we have 3 minutes left with 2 time outs. We had plenty of time to score. So why throw it deep on first down. We need to just move the chains and get positive yardage. Our defense is atrocious. That needed to be treated as the last drive of the game. We should have won that game but throwing deep on 1st is just giving away a free down. STUPID STUPID DECISION by whoever decided to throw that deep.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:08 am
Yes Evans 13 is right one of those picks was his fault but that PICK 6 was ALL FITZ!!! Terrible decision!! While under no pressure to boot!! BSPN tried to make it seem like it wasn’t but it really was!! Regardless of who Dirk starts. We should be able to beat CHI. They cannot move the ball offensively. This will be our bounce back game. Mitch Tribusky is inaccurate as h3ll. And I saw WR’s running wide open in their game against the Cards. Their problem was clearly the QB which why they blew that 14 point lead and a good defensive effort. We must do better under the lights of primetime!
September 25th, 2018 at 1:10 am
buncha silly commenters here
September 25th, 2018 at 1:12 am
I did not have the tv view or ability to rewind. I was at the game but from my perspective, Fitz had about 6 very bad throws and 1 of the 3 interceptions was god awful.
I also thought he had some incredible throws too.
Seemed to me that the pro pass protect was off. Again not watching the game and able to rewind, it appears that some of the guys that had the bad game there were Jensen and Barber. Seemed like a lot more pressure than you want on your QB. Id say the pro pass protect had a worse overall game than Fitz.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:19 am
Mike was supposed to continue up into his route. How do you know how over thrown it was? Hogwash. 2 out 3 picks were not Fitz’s fault. The pick-6, even though his passing lane got congested (Jensen got bull rushed) and he threw out of the end zone to avoid the safety, should have been a ball he threw to the sidelines. That’s the one bad play he had. The first half was atrocious because of dropped balls, miscommunication on route running, horrible OL blocking, and a putrid running game. And I didn’t even get to the porous defense.
The Bucs couldn’t stop anything tonight. They had some flashes, but it was too little too late.
Chris Godwin’s dropped TD pass itself could have won this game. DJax’s punt return TD was nullified by a stupid penalty. I mean the play was as sloppy as the field this night.
I didn’t expect them to be undefeated, but apart from the defense and running game, this team is good enough to win each and every Thursday/Sunday/Monday. If you running game stinks, why not go for high % screens? They’re as effective as a running play and sometimes much more. I wasn’t sure what to make out of the play calling in the first half. But, part of the credit has to go to that Steeler defense whose backs were against the wall.
Fitz showed he has the ability to forget about the bad plays and come back strong. He kept going to Godwin even though Godwin had a few plays that were uncharacteristic. I think the play call and forcing the ball to the RBs was the wrong approach. Yea, the Steelers were trying to take away the big play by applying pressure, but you take your shots down the field early and often and test those DBs. We have the greatest show on grass. Air it out and live and die by what got us here.
Over all this was a team loss but they played with heart almost pulling one out late.
I just don’t know what to say about Mike Smith’s D though. The pass rush is there with JPP consistently pushing Alejandro back and being an arms length from Ben. But, what are you gonna do about that horrible secondary? LBs played soft too. They had Connor bottled up most of the game until the end.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:20 am
Hold on. When fans were saying all of jameis ints were not his fault ie his 1st ever int because adam ran the wrong route, the trolls are not going to blame the career back up? How is that even fair? Are the trolls going to say fitz threw for garbage yards in the 2nd half because they were down? Ofcourse not. At least they can understand it takes a team. The defense as always sucked and the oline was not very good tonight. But the trolls would have blamed jameis for everything. Where are those same trolls to blame fitz for everything? Crickets….
September 25th, 2018 at 1:20 am
@sandwichman,
Watch the play again, Ryan Jensen got blown up and the defender stuck his paws in Fitz passing lane while Fitz was in the endzone with the same defender closing in. He panicked and tried to adjust over the guy’s hand. It was a poor decision, but there was definitely a LOT of pressure. He should have thrown it out of bounds.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:21 am
“misleading stat about consecutive 400 yard passing games. That stat is there because the Bucs can’t run the ball… What a crock… ”
_______________________
just like Winston’s 4000 yard season …so what when you don’t win right?
September 25th, 2018 at 1:35 am
(Don’t blame Fitz)
Dude threw 2 boneheaded picks and should’ve had another on the last drive, of course I’m gonna blame him when he Fs up.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:36 am
Where are the trolls who blamed jameis for every turnover? The trolls are not going to blame the career back up for looking like fitz? This is the 1st game this season where fitz was under duress and wouldnt you know he looked like fitz. The 1st 2 games, he was playing as if it was a 7 on 7 drill and he looked amazing. He looked like any nfl qb should look with all day to throw. He was under duress this game and he looked like fitz. The trolls would say d@mn 4OO yrds because jameis threw 3 ints and a pick 6 and the 4OO yrds was in garbage time. But the trolls will also say, its not fitz fault because godwin fumbled. They overlooked OJ fumbled 2-3 times last year in the redzone. They overlook barber fumbled twice in the red zone. The forgot martin did too. They blamed winston. It takes a team trolls and jameis is the better qb because he can make plays when the play is f^ck. Oh and the defense sucked tonight. You cant just outscore every team. It takes a team to win. Im still confused why fitzmagic could not save the bucs from the poor oline play and poor defensive play. According to the trolls, that is what great/good qbs are supposed to do.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:53 am
@webster,
There are enough people clamoring for Fitz to go back to the bench. Do you not read the comments?
September 25th, 2018 at 1:56 am
He sure threw it right to the defender from his own 5 yard line on thw=at pick six. Game over. Jameis does that and torches and pitchforks are being readied.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:59 am
Lamb
I read comments and listen/watch tv and the whole nation is caught up in fitz magic. I dont know where you have been but read the comments before tonights game. Look at the tv before tonights game. A lot of idiots were saying jameis will never play for the bucs again. You missed that? Where have you been?
September 25th, 2018 at 2:29 am
The Bucs don’t deserve Jameis Winston. The NFL doesn’t deserve Famous Jameis. But Jameis needs the league and a team to play for. Go get em Jaboo
September 25th, 2018 at 2:41 am
“misleading stat about consecutive 400 yard passing games. That stat is there because the Bucs can’t run the ball… What a crock… ”
_______________________
just like Winston’s 4000 yard season …so what when you don’t win right?
Wins and Losses and Championships
September 25th, 2018 at 3:04 am
Its funny how Fitzmagic covered up the the rest of the team playing like crap. Koetters tenure as hc. Bad defense bad special teams bad. Bad running game. At some point the coach has to be head accountable right. This season it took 2 historic games from Fitz for us not to be 0-3. So to bash Jameis when he has already had an historic start to his career. To be even more historic than he already has to overcome this teams flaws as a fan base that is simply delusional. It takes a team to win in this league. A COMPLETE TEAM! which we aren’t currently havent been coached up to be in over a decade.
September 25th, 2018 at 4:15 am
This site is horrible. Not sure what is worse, the click bait Joe Bucs Fan and his horrible articles or the fair weather fans who dont know jack.
Lets look at the 3 interceptions;
-The one to Evans was zone and if Evans stayed on his route it wouldn’t have been an interception more than likely, it had to be a little high for his 6.5 receiver to get it over the coverage. It was where it needed to be.
-The deflection one was on the tackle (Dotson) not picking up his assignment, Fitz threw to the blitz side since he knew it was void of that linebacker. If Dotson would have done his job it would not have been deflected.
– The one intended for Rodgers, Fitz had someone in his face and had his hand up preventing Fitz to follow through with his throw. He had to release it to the check down due to the free rusher and not taking a safety.
These dumba**es on here focus on the wrong stuff. Not the fact Godwin had one of his worse games, the defense not holding up their part of the bargain, stupid penalties (like the 2nd year safety Johnson on one of the dumbest holds negating DJ punt return) That would have flipped the game with tons of time left.
Fitz did his job for the majority of the night. He had about 2 errant throws for incompletions, they were low. Which is where they need to be if not complete so you dont get interceptions off deflections. If you watch Winston when he misses its always high, making it easier for defenses to get pop ups.
If anyone should be roasted it should be Mike Smith. That defense was not there, Grimes might as well stayed on the bench, which is probably why the rookie covered Brown even though he was burned in New Orleans. They played zone yet had no pass rush. Horrible combination call on defense. And thats all on the DC Smith.He goes with a game plan and never adjust to game real time. He had a good half a year three years ago and has been clinging to that fact for two seasons now.
We need complimentary football. Not this horrible defense in Smith’s third year
September 25th, 2018 at 5:44 am
give fitz the chicago game…if we lose we are 2-2…then just make the switch back to jameis…you might as well, as we are pacing for 8-8…
if we are 3-1 and fitzenfuss lights it up, ride the quirky harvardsman some more…
jameis is probably pretty busy anyway…snacking in geraldini’s
man-cave and “eating W’s”
September 25th, 2018 at 5:50 am
Man I don’t mind 2 picks but 3 or more is a bad game which it happens but I told every one that if we go down by 2 tds we are going to lose with fizpatrick .
September 25th, 2018 at 6:38 am
We had the ball with a chance to win. Fitz had time to throw on three straight pass attempts and he threw it to the Steelers on all of them. Each should have been picked. Just like you can’t trust a kicker who misses in the clutch, same applies at the QBs position. You have to move the ball in that situation.
September 25th, 2018 at 6:58 am
Evans is saying he ran the wrong route. Fitz gmade the correct throw, Evans stopped running.
September 25th, 2018 at 7:54 am
Mike is a total pro. Too many mistakes all around. Fitz threw a lot of sloppy passes last night, but the horrid pick six was on him. The other two not really or totally his fault. Did USF play at RJS on Saturday? That field was wretched. If USF is still playing at RJS they need their own stadium.
September 25th, 2018 at 7:58 am
Even the announcers were lamenting the terrible Bucs defensive calls. “They’re running zone and blitzing. You can’t do that”
September 25th, 2018 at 9:41 am
Fairweatherfan is mostly SPOT ON. Some of you people make me sick. Until recently, I just stopped reading the comments.
I do think Joe runs a great site. JBF is my “go-to” for my team info and news. Commenters? So many trolls and idiots.
September 25th, 2018 at 11:32 am
JW will probably not dress for the Chicago game.
September 25th, 2018 at 11:34 am
And it is not Dirks call. Glazers are still fuming about his lies