Bucs Travel to Detroit for Primetime Playoff Preview
The Bucs finally managed to get to victory formation this season, not needing a score to tie or take the lead in the final minute to get a 30-19 victory over the San Francisco 49ers, a first this season. In fact, the Bucs only trailed for five minutes and eighteen seconds of game time, and they scored the final 10 points of this game. They only surrendered one touchdown and scored on all but two drives outside the first quarter. One of those two drives was a missed field goal that ultimately didn’t end up mattering.
The truth is that the Bucs are playing like one of the very best teams in the NFL and they’ve deservedly gotten their flowers this week. Baker Mayfield is playing the best football of his career, posting another passer rating over 134.0 on Sunday, which is the eleventh time in his career and seventh time as a Buc. He should be the MVP front runner, and he very nearly is the betting favorite, in part because he continues to win without his weapons. The Bucs played a large stretch of that game without their top four wide receivers (Mike Evans-Hamstring, Chris Godwin Jr.-Fibula, Jalen McMillan-Neck Sprain, Emeka Egbuka-Hamstring), and the entire right side of his offensive line.
This defensive bounce back game was huge for the Bucs, especially facing one of the best offenses in the league coming up this week, and they’ll get two of their injured corners back this week. The Bucs are still a top five defense when it comes to yards per attempt allowed on the ground, and they lead the league in tackles for loss so far on the year. They rank in the top half of the league in third down conversions allowed and they have been the sixth best fourth down defense by percentage so far this season. It’s not as though they haven’t been tested either as they’ve seen the 5th most fourth down attempts.
The one spot they’ve consistently struggled has been the red zone, allowing the 5th best touchdown rate in the league. The brightest spot though, is the fact that the Bucs remain the second best defense in the league by “Havoc”: the percentage of plays a defense gets a pressure, tackle for loss, forced fumble, interception, or pass breakup, with 42.9% of defensive snaps logging one of those designated stats. Denver is the only team ahead of them with a slim lead that puts them at 44.8%.
The Good
Baker Mayfield is playing MVP caliber football through six games this season, tied for the best start in Bucs history. Obviously, wins are not a QB stat, but the QB stats don’t lie. Only seven Quarterbacks have 1500 yards passing through six games this season, and only five quarterbacks have 12 or more touchdown passes. Baker Mayfield is the only Quarterback in the league to have both 1500 yards and 12 touchdowns while only throwing one interception. He’s also only eleventh in both completions and attempts, and his completion percentage of 66.2 so far this year is second only to last season for Mayfield.
His four fourth quarter comebacks and game winning drives both lead the league, with no other quarter back over two in either category. He’s delivered two 134.0 passer rating performances in a row, just the second time he’s had back to back such games in a row in his career. And he’s done it without a fully healthy WR core for one single game. He has yet to have more than two of his top 4 receivers at a time, with the combinations of Evans-Egbuka and Egbuka-Godwin, but never the trio. Nor have we seen Jalen McMillan to this point, and it’s unclear when we will.
Baker will look to lead the team into hostile territory at Ford Field in Detroit, where the Bucs won in week two last season. They were without Luke Goedeke last time they played the Lions and they will be again. Baker was sacked five times last year, with 4.5 coming from superstar EDGE Aidan Hutchinson, who matched up with former backup RT Justin Skule.
On the other hand, Detroit will be missing just about every starting defensive back in this game, including CB Terrion Arnold, Safety Kerby Joseph, CB D.J. Reed, DB Avonte Maddox,who are all injured as well as Safety Brian Branch who is suspended. The Bucs are likely to have Mike Evans back from his hamstring injury, and there’s an outside chance that Emeka Egbuka returns from his hamstring injury as well.
With Emeka Egbuka being limited by a hamstring injury before leaving the game altogether, the Bucs were forced to turn to their Wide Receivers five, six, seven, and eight, the only healthy receivers for the game. Sterling Sheppard, who just turned 32 and was on the practice squad just last season; seventh round pick Tez Johnson who had four catches for 59 yards the week prior and just one catch for eight yards combined in the three games he was even active before that; Kameron Johnson, an undrafted free agent from 2024, who had never recorded a catch before Sunday, and was primarily the punt and kick returner; and Ryan Miller, special teams extraordinaire, who had a touchdown on his only catch against the Texans in week two. Not only did they survive that second half, three of those receivers managed to put up impressive stat lines.
Sterling Sheppard continues to impress this season, dragging in 70% of his targets, a vast improvement over his 62% mark last season, and his 19 catches have gone for 11 first downs, when just last year he had 16 first downs on his 32 catches. He will continue to have an expanded role Wide Receiver 5 in an offense that has been without Wide Receivers 1-4 for various stretches, and will be without at least Chris Godwin Jr. and Jalen McMillan this week against Detroit
Tez Johnson broke free in the secondary late in the third quarter, splitting the safeties for an acrobatic touchdown grab, and of course hit his signature gymnastic floor routine. Tez will need to continue to produce for the Bucs, especially if he wants to retain some semblance of a workload once the Bucs get healthy. His work as a gadget receiver was predictable, but this touchdown showed his usefulness as a pure speedster deep threat option, something the Bucs have not had in recent years.
Kameron Johnson ended up being the Bucs leading receiver with 64 yards and a touchdown on four catches. Even more impressive is that the Barton College product had zero career catches headed into the day. The only real difference in usage between the Johnsons has been Kameron’s usage as a returner, which has guaranteed his roster spot this season. Despite their difference in size, the Bucs seemed to have a pair of twins out there last week.
The Bucs got yet another serviceable game out of Rachaad White in the lead back role, where he will continue to reside for the foreseeable future, as the Bucs have not put a timetable on Bucky Irving’s return. After losing their streak of 100-yard rushing yards last week, they returned to form against the 49ers with 104 between White, Sean Tucker, and Baker Mayfield (who picked up a third and 14 with his legs). With their success against a middle of the pack rushing defense like the 49ers, one has to wonder what they can manage against a statistically similar defense that will probably have to account for a rough day stopping the pass.
Dare I say it? The Bucs pass protection has actually been fairly good over the last few weeks. They’ve given up five sacks in the last four games, one of just six teams with five or fewer in that span. They’ve managed to find the level, especially after a brutal matchup with the Jets where they had about eleven billion holding calls.
Unfortunately there was another injury, this time to their fourth string Guard Luke Haggard, who will miss this game against the Lions, and they are still without Luke Goedeke, who has been replaced by Sam Eagle look-a-like Charlie Heck. It seems as though Mike Jordan, who started at Left Guard in the first two weeks will be elevated from the practice squad to start after missing the last few games with a knee injury. Otherwise it will be former sixth round pick Elijah Klein who relieved Haggard on Sunday. Not only are they facing Aidan Hutchinson who nearly won the game single handedly for Detroit last season, but DT Alim McNeil is returning from his ACL injury last year, surely licking his chops at the idea of facing a practice squad Right Guard.
The Bucs once again won the turnover battle, forcing two interceptions, one for newcomer Kindle Vildor, just the second of his six year career, and one for Jamel Dean his second of the year, good for a 19 way tie for sixth most in the NFL through six games. Jamel Dean also recorded his first career sack and forced a fumble, but it was recovered by the 49ers. There was a chance for them to force a second Mac Jones fumble, but this time around the referees decided that a shin being down can negate the fumble (ask Bucky Irving about that one).
Jamel Dean’s sack was one of six on Sunday in a dominant showing by the Bucs front seven. With two for Yaya Diaby, one each for Dean and Lavonte David, and a half each for Vita Vea, Elijah Roberts, C.J. Brewer, and Haason Reddick, it was not a pleasant day for an already injured Mac Jones. They’ll look to continue their success from four man rushes against a team that has only surrendered nine sacks all season. Jared Goff has been graded by PFF as one of the worst Quarterbacks when facing pressure this season, but has the sixth quickest time to throw and one of the top grades against the blitz as well.
The Bucs had exactly one major goal in this game. Mac Jones had hardly thrown down the field all year, and he had essentially no weapons. Except for McCaffrey. Christian McCaffrey has, ironically, been the only healthy weapon on the offense, and has posted 100 yards from scrimmage in every game on the season. While he still had 111 yards total, he only scored one touchdown (his career average against the Bucs), and the Bucs managed to hold him to his lowest yards per touch on the season, mostly thanks to SirVocea Dennis, who posted an average depth of tackle of -1.0 yards, and allowed just 39 yards on 4 catches. That’s three games out of the last four where he has been targeted four or more times and allowed fewer than 40 receiving yards, a vast improvement after a brutal start to the year.
The Bad
Special Teams, Special Teams, Special Teams. What would I write about if not for you? Not only was there another missed field goal, there was a running into the kicker penalty on Vita Vea (why is he getting special teams snaps??) just four plays later when they got a stop. Luckily Jamel Dean bailed them out with an interception that led to the game sealing field goal. While neither of these gaffes were as disastrous as they could have been, nor as disastrous as similar mistakes have been earlier this year, they cannot afford brain farts on Monday Night Football especially in a game that will presumably help determine home field advantage in the playoffs.
The Ugly
There were three truly ugly plays all day for the Bucs, but on a bright note, there were only three!
Kendrick Bourne 41 yard catch 9:48 1st Quarter
The Bucs truly got gamed here. Not only do both off-ball linebackers get taken out by the play action, Antoine Winfield Jr. bites hard on the Jauan Jennings hitch route. Mac Jones makes a beautiful layered throw, and the Bucs give up a long catch and run to set up an early field goal. Bend don’t break, I guess
Kendrick Bourne 56 yard catch 15:00 2nd Quarter
The Bucs are winning the field position battle here, with the 49ers set up inside their own 10 yard line, and the Bucs are actually all positioned well here, with SirVocea Dennis set to make a play on the ball here, and he trips and falls. If he could’ve stayed on his feet, he actually has a decent chance at making a play on the ball here, but he misses, Jamel Dean tries to undercut the route, and gets outrun, and Antoine Winfield Jr. takes an awkward angle before being blocked out of it.
Demarcus Robinson 31 yard catch 0:34 2nd Quarter
This answer is a lot simpler. The Bucs are not allowed to play good defense before the half, it’s actually written in the rule book. At least it might as well be. Antoine Winfield Jr. gets turned around as Robinson starts to break inwards, Tykee Smith tries to knock the ball out rather than tackle, and SirVocea Dennis tries to tackle with his arms.
If this team could play even 2% better over the middle of the field, they would have a much easier time defensively. Not only do they fall down, or bite hard on play actions, they can’t seem to play with good fundamentals in the two minute drill much less when their coverage gets busted. Jared Goff will look to pick them apart over the middle in an offense that has run the second most play action in the NFL this season, and a Quarterback that has the second highest grade on throws between 10-19 yards.
Prediction: Bucs Win, 38-30
The Lions have yet to beat a team with a winning record. While some of their wins have been blowouts, they lost to the Packers and Chiefs by a combined 27 points. While they’ve thrown more touchdowns than the Bucs, they’ve been very middle of the road in passing yardage. They’ve been a very impressive rushing offense, but will be matched up against a top five rushing defense in the Bucs.
This has all the makings of a shootout, between Jared Goff’s ability to mitigate pressure and hit his targets in the middle of the field on play action, and Mayfield’s already impressive resume going into the game, before you consider the lack of health in the Lions secondary. While guys like LB Jack Campbell and Aidan Hutchinson have been game wreckers in pass rush and creating turnovers, the Bucs have largely avoided turning the ball over. If the Bucs defense can just get a handful of stops, especially in the two minute drill, and the offense can score at will the way I expect them to against a very injured middle of the road defense, this game ought to go Tampa’s way.
