The Bucs made it close, but they fell to the defending champs Sunday afternoon in Tampa 27-24. The Bucs are now 7-5, and continue to fall more and more behind the NFC South-leading Saints, who waxed the quarterback-less Denver Broncos.
Despite what the score says, the game against the Kansas City Chiefs wasn’t close until the fourth quarter, and even then it never felt like the Bucs had a chance. It really was almost as if two different teams that came out of the locker room: the Tampa Bay Three-and-Outs to start the game and the actual Bucs in the second half (the Brady bunch outscored the Chiefs 17-7 after halftime but was outscored 20-7 in the first).
Offensively TB12 continued to struggle with consistency, throwing a pair of interceptions in the third quarter while throwing for three touchdowns and 345 yards. The difference between Brady and Super Bowl MVP quarterback Patrick Mahomes when dealing with pressure was striking. Mahomes was calm and able to move around and make plays, while Brady was just a statue that throws the ball away if someone looks at it funny.
It seems like it might just be Raymond James Stadium that Brady doesn’t like, as nine of his 11 interceptions have come at home this season. But luckily, if the Bucs manage to sneak into the playoffs they won’t have home-field advantage anyways. On a positive note, Gronk had his first 100 yard receiving game as a Buc, with six catches for 106 yards. But Ronald Jones continues to struggle to get touches, as he only got nine carries but managed to gain 66 yards with no end zone appearances. The Bucs need to run the ball more. Especially if they want to actually beat good teams and not end the season hearing commentators talking about how Tampa Bay “stayed in” a lot of close games with quality teams.
The defense played its usual awful first half, giving up 20 points in the first half but only seven in the second. The Chiefs gained almost all of their yards through the air, as Mahomes threw for 462 yards with three touchdowns. Tyreek Hill made Carlton Davis look like… well, Carlton Davis, as the Kansas City wideout racked up 269 yards and three touchdowns receptions. What’s more is that 200 of those yards came in the first half (yes, you read that correctly).
On another positive note, after such a horrid start it was good to see the Bucs fight back and not just sit in a corner and cry like they did against the Saints in Week 9. Speaking of that game, a little fun fact: the Broncos lost to the Saints this week 31-3 with a practice squad wide receiver at QB because they lost all their active QBs to coronavirus. So they scored the same amount of points as the Bucs did in that Week 9 matchup against the Saints (three). With a wide receiver at QB.
The Bucs are still very much on track to make the playoffs as a wild card, and if they can manage to secure the top wild card spot (the Rams blew a weird game against the Nick Mullens-led 49ers on a game-winning field goal by San Francisco) they can get an incredibly favorable matchup in whoever manages to limp out of the NFC East. Then maybe they’ll manage to get the Saints again and the Saints will implode as they do every year in the postseason.
Honestly, the Bucs are who they are. They’re consistently good against bad teams and awfully bad against good ones (again, the Packers game being an outlier), with a defense that can stop the run better than anyone in the league, but with an absolutely horrendous secondary. Offensively they can move the ball, but weird play calling and poor decision making by Brady continues to cause problems. Luckily Tampa Bay has an incredibly favorable schedule to finish out the year, and as mentioned before, they haven’t managed to lose any head scratchers (yet).
I guess we’ll just be talking about how Brady just needs to “get more comfortable” until the end of the season. At least we get a break from the suffering next week, as the Bucs have a bye.
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This article appears in Nov 26 – Dec 2, 2020.
