My Two Doubloons: Washington

Welcome to the premier of a new article here at Bucs Life Media. My two doubloons is my chance to rant, at you the reader. If you’re looking for not letting advanced metrics get in the way of an opinion, this is the place for you.

I’m going to start with the obvious bit first and rip the bandaid off. Yesterday’s loss to the Washington To-Mired-in-Controversy-To-Register-a-New-Name’s was awful. I have other adjectives available, but kids might be reading this. Every phase of the game was bad, and nobody gets to leave the Nation’s Capital with their heads held high. Coaches were out-coached, and players were out-played.

Given just how inept the “Football Team” had been, only the most die-hard of Washington fans gave the team a chance of not being blown out. Instead, the 29-19 score left Buccaneers fans feeling that they had been on the receiving end of the predicted routing.

No, it wasn’t bad as that loss to the Saints last year, but it was close. Let’s hope it serves as a kick in the pants to the whole team, and they pull their heads back into fresh oxygen.

I’m blasting the whole team here, but I’ll pause on our Super Bowl MVP.

In the past fifteen seasons of Brady’s career, he has a long-standing tradition of playing like hot garbage for two or three games. It’s almost a bi-annual process that Brady plays a couple of bad games; then everyone points at the “proof” that Brady is washed up and Father Time has come calling.

So I hope that you’ll forgive me if I don’t even look at the panic button, let alone drive my face into it as many fans have done over social media.

No, Brady isn’t even a concern.

Right now, people are concerned about playoff seeding. The loss against Washington certainly didn’t help seeding or help establish a dominant lead in the NFC South. Languishing in 4th place, if the season ended today, the Bucs would be away from home and traveling back to LA.

To get to the big dance, you have to beat the best teams. If you aren’t good enough to walk into somebody else’s house and win, you aren’t good enough to win a Super Bowl. I’m not going to sit and hope we can sneak into the biggest game on Earth and maybe get lucky on “Any given Sunday”.

Two Lombardi trophies have been awarded to this franchise since its inception. Neither of them came with the number 1 seed. Get over it and just focus on winning the division. The seeding will be what it is, and you must beat the team in front of you.

Teams either play for the draft or the Super Bowl. Which team do we want to be?

So you’re probably asking what I am concerned about if it’s not the record or player performances?

Have you SEEN our injury list? When the Tampa Bay Buccaneers became the first team since the 1979 Steelers to return all 22 starters, I was hopeful. Pittsburg won the ’78 Super Bowl, brought everyone back, and then won in ’79. Pretty sure we could repeat that.

Twelve players currently sit with an injury designation. Nine of those players are or have been starters. With the majority of those players being on the defense, how long before Bruce Arians is walking around the seats at Raymond James, looking for someone who looks like they could cover a slot receiver or rush a QB?

Right now, this team is missing crucial puzzle pieces, and I don’t expect 7th and 8th string guys to consistently perform at the NFL level. If they could, they’d be on teams elsewhere.

The bye-week passed almost too quickly for returning players from injury, and now into the back half of the season, players are facing a time crunch to get healthy.

We’ve all seen how good this team is when our actual starters are in the game and not the treatment room. Considering how beat up this team is, I’m going to let two bad losses slide for now.

But that’s just my two doubloons.