Bucs Week 6: NFC Division Leaders Face Off

The 2025 Tampa Bay Buccaneers have to be one of the most entertaining teams in league history. Four victories in the first five weeks of the season, all of them by three points or less, and a total point differential of just three. 

All four wins have been sealed on a last minute game winning drive, all of them led by QB Baker Mayfield who is fourth in yards, tied for third in touchdowns, and the second best completion percentage of his career. He’s even managed to keep his turnovers down, with one interception (0.6% of his pass attempts) compared to last year’s 16 interceptions (2.8% of passing attempts). Despite the lack of cohesive offensive line play, he’s been sacked at the lowest rate (less than 5% of dropbacks) since his rookie season. 

And they have yet to play a single down of offense at full strength, even when you factor for season ending injuries. The Bucs were missing their franchise anchor LT Tristan Wirfs and their second WR Chris Godwin, 3 weeks for the first three weeks of the season, and they’ve been without their star RT Luke Goedeke since the second quarter of Week 2, and their starting RG Cody Mauch played through a season ending knee injury to finish that game. Top target WR Mike Evans has been sidelined since the end of Week 3, and RB Bucky Irving remains out with no certain timetable for either of their returns. 

On the defensive side of the ball, they were almost perfectly healthy to start the year, and the defense kept them in games, giving up just 20 points per game (excluding the kicks blocked) in the first four weeks when they were mostly healthy. Despite giving up a season high 122 yards rushing (first 100 yard rushing game allowed since 11/4/24), they still have the 8th best rushing defense by rushing yards allowed. This is also the first time the Bucs have allowed a team to throw for more than 300 yards as well as allowed an offense to gain 400 yards since 11/10/24. 

To be completely fair, they’ve largely operated without DT Calijah Kancey, who tore his pectoral muscle in week 2, which is especially devastating considering that he was perhaps their best pass rusher. Yet the Bucs led the league in Havoc, which measures the percentage of plays that the defense forces a fumble, a tackle for loss, an interception, a pass break up, or gets a QB pressure (46.2%) headed into week 5. 

As long as their cornerbacks can get healthy (they were missing two of their top three, as well as their top backup nickel corner), they should end up being fine. We saw how well the team did last season with one of the worst defenses in the league, and they’ve improved in nearly every aspect since then. Obviously you don’t want to see dedicated special teams players and practice squad players starting at corner, because this is the result you get nine out of ten times.

But the Bucs keep finding themselves in position to win. Every. Single. Week. That’s what the very best teams in the NFL do. The Bucs are off to their best start since 2021 in spite of it all, they are firmly entrenched in the NFC South driver’s seat with a game and a half lead over the Falcons who had an early bye week, and a two game lead over the Saints.

The Good

Baker Mayfield had his best game of the season by a long shot, and easily his second best in a Bucs uniform. This duel with Sam Darnold is second only to his perfect game at Lambeau field 2 years ago. His 379 yards are the third highest of his career and though he only threw two touchdown passes, he also had a completion percentage of 87.9 the highest mark of his career with at least 25 passing attempts. It’s also the second highest in a single game for a Bucs QB since Vinny Testaverde in 1992, when he threw 22 completions in 25 attempts in a 31-3 victory against the Packers. Not only that, Baker has now passed Tom Brady for the highest completion percentage and passer rating in Bucs history, and broke his tie with Vinny Testaverde for all time Bucs passing touchdowns, putting Baker in 4th place all time.

All four of the Bucs wins have now come in the final minute, by far more than any team. It truly feels like the Bucs have flipped the script from 2024, where they went 3-6 in one score games including the playoffs. The Cardiac Bucs seem incapable of playing anything but close games, and so far they’ve come out on top 80% of the time, which is as good a sign as you’ll get.

Emeka Egbuka is making a case to be the top target on this team even when Mike Evans and Chris Godwin (yes, he’s out again) return. He should have the Rookie of the Year award all but locked up, as he now has the 4th most receiving yards in the entire league while having the least catches of anyone in the top 12, he’s tied for 2nd in receiving touchdowns, he’s fourth in yards per catch despite having the most catches of anyone in the top 8.

Egbuka is the first player in NFL history with 25 catches, 400 yards, and 5 touchdowns in the first five games of an NFL career. As fast as guys like Puka Nacua (46/572/2) and Ja’Marr Chase (24/456/5), the pair of superstars didn’t match Egbuka’s volume or touchdowns. He has the most yards through a Bucs rookie’s first five games, and he’s one of just four players with 7+ targets, 150+ yards and a receiving touchdown while catching 100% of their targets in a game since 2020. And he managed to do it in front of friends and family in his hometown.

Egbuka has been critical for the Bucs success, and he will continue to do so for a very long time. He has an opportunity to be the WR1 now with Evans and Godwin sidelined this week, and he should flourish against a Niners defense that surrendered 85 yards and a score to Puka Nacua and almost 400 passing yards.

Tez Johnson had 5 catches for 67 yards, and he showed exactly why the Bucs took him late in the draft. He may lack true straight line speed, but he absolutely dazzled in space, very much deserving of the Chris Berman “whoop!” sound effect on multiple occasions, and he came up clutch with a 27 yard catch that ultimately led to an Emeka Egbuka touchdown. It was really our first time as fans seeing him outside of his normal screen pass capacity, and he is poised for a much larger role now against the 49ers. 

Sterling Shepard got a lot of flak from me last season, when he only caught 32 of his 51 targets, but this season he’s up to a catch percentage of 70.8%, the highest of his career since 2020. Despite last year’s concerns, he’s turned himself into a reliable target for the Bucs, and his veteran presence is now uber-valued in the Bucs locker room with him being essentially the only healthy veteran wide receiver. He caught the game tying touchdown, his first of the season, and he’ll look to add to his success against a team that he once logged 11 catches for 142 yards on 13 targets against alllllllll the way back in 2017.

I never doubted you Cade Otton. 81 of his 115 receiving yards this year came in this homecoming game, and the Washington native recorded 20 yards per reception, the highest of his career (minimum 5 targets). With the way the offensive line has improved this season, he was finally available to run routes in the passing game, and it opened up the playsheet for OC Josh Grizzard. Unfortunately he will probably not be a major factor this week, given his matchup against Fred Warner, but the 49ers have been very mediocre against tight ends this year.

Rachaad White was able to shoulder the full workload against the Seahawks this week. While the game script leaned away from the ground game, and they were not successful on the ground for most of the game against one of the league’s top run defenses, he still managed to score twice against a defense that had surrendered exactly no rushing touchdowns all year. He also sealed the game on the final drive, picking up 12 yards on 3rd and 7 to set up the game winning field goal, even sliding in bounds to run the clock. 

With his two rushing touchdowns, he matched San Francisco RB Christian McCaffrey, Miami RB De’Von Achane, and Washington WR Deebo Samuel as the only players since 2022 with 10+ receiving touchdowns and 10+ rushing touchdowns, and he remains to be one of the most underrated utility players in the league. 

He’ll remain the top back with Bucky Irving set to miss this week again, and they’ll need him especially in the passing game, where he has 59 yards over the last two weeks. He’ll look to improve upon his 16 touch, 70 total yard game from last year against the 49ers where he also added a reception touchdown, and picked up a miracle 4th down on the Bucs final offensive drive.

The offensive line has gotten better every week, and they looked and they looked just about as good as they have all year this past week in Seattle. They allowed just 7 pressures all game, a season low, and the only sack of the day came on a fire zone safety blitz where the entire offensive line seemed to forget how to block. While they definitely struggled to block in the run game, I was particularly impressed by Josh Grizzard’s usage of Tristan Wirfs as a lead blocker in the red zone. There was legitimately a Rachaad White touchdown play where he blocked three different players. I would absolutely love to see him deployed as a weapon in the run game more often. 

The 49ers currently lack a top pass rusher, especially after the injury to Nick Bosa, and they’ve only created 20+ pressures in a game twice this year. In fact, there was a game where PFF measured them as creating only 5 pressures, and according to the tracking of Pro Football Reference, they boast a pressure rate of just 10%, second lowest in the league.

The Bad

The defense in general had a bad week, and it’s not difficult to diagnose why. Not only were they missing CB Jamel Dean who has played at all-pro level so far this year, but they were missing rookie CB Benjamin Morrison, who is concerningly injury prone for a rookie, they were also missing NCB Christian Izien who would have likely been the replacement at outside corner. Not forgetting of course, that their other CB Zyon McCollum, was playing through a thumb injury that he has now had a procedure on this week. 

To start the season, the defensive secondary that was one of the worst of 2024 had improved to the top ten, and now due to injury might once again be one of the worst. Obviously it’s going to be difficult to defend one of the best WR duos in the league with a rookie nickel corner sliding outside and special teamers swapping in to take the nickel spot. 

On top of that, Sam Darnold has simply looked ridiculous this season, with a +10.5 completion percentage points over expected. Yes you read that correctly. The current Seahawks QB, who was once a draft bust journeyman backup, is now completing 10.5% more of his passes than he should, which is nearly 2% higher than 2nd place in the league. 

The good news is that Dean and Izien will be back this week, but the bad news is that McCollum and Morrison have yet to practice this week. While this is an improvement over last week’s situation, it’s still far from ideal to be facing Kyle Shanahan with this defense. 

The pass rush had a below average game, with 16 pressures and 2 QB hits, both of which could have been sacks. With the way Bowles’ defense is predicated on the blitz, it’ll be difficult to manage a game defensively with subpar cornerbacks in coverage.

Ultimately this game came down to who’s secondary was more injured, as the Seahawks were arguably in the same spot, and managed to have even more players get hurt during the game

The Bucs uncharacteristically struggled against the run, something they haven’t done much of in the last 6 years. With how good their DB’s have been against the run, it’s possible that some blame lies there, but the defensive line in general seemed to get pushed off the line very easily, but luckily they are preparing to face one of the worst rushing attacks in the league. 

The San Francisco 49ers average just 3.1 yards per carry, tied for 32nd in the league, and their 6 fumbles are tied for seventh most in the league, while they are the only rushing offense that is yet to score on the ground. 

These stats are deceptive however, as RB Christian McCaffrey’s 387 receiving yards are 117 yards more than the second place running back, and he’ll be facing the Bucs defense that has surrendered the third most receiving yards to running backs all year.

The Ugly

I have been cursed to write about the Bucs special teams play, and it was bad this week in a new, fresh, exciting, and definitely not deeply concerning way. The Seahawks kick returns set them up to have a very easy day scoring points, with their average starting field position on kickoffs being the 31 yard line. 

They managed to break two big returns, with one at the end of the second quarter that set up the offense at the Seattle 46, perfect for the last minute Seahawks touchdown right before the half, and another that put them at the Seattle 49 that ended up leading to a fourth quarter touchdown.

While the Seahawks primary returner, Dareke Young, has the current highest average yards per return in the league the Bucs cannot keep shooting themselves in the foot on special teams, because they continuously put the defense in terrible field position and the offense in scoring deficits. If they could just be slightly below average on special teams rather than one of the worst units in the league, they could actually win a few games by multiple scores this year.

As for this Sunday, the Bucs have another huge test against a probable NFC playoff team, this time against one just as injured as they are. They will be without edge rusher Nick Bosa, who tore his ACL earlier this year, as well as TE George Kittle, and as of writing it’s not clear which WR’s between Jauan Jennings and Ricky Pearsall could be healthy for Sunday, as well as which QB between Brock Purdy and Mac Jones will be healthy, if either. 

In addition to Mike Evans, Bucky Irving, and Benjamin Morrison, who were all out last week, they appear to be missing Zyon McCollum and Chris Godwin as well this week, while getting Jamel Dean and Christian Izien back.

It’s not entirely clear how they will align Christian Izien and Jacob Parrish, especially in terms of who plays outside and who plays nickel. One could assume it will be similar to last week, with Parrish being the outside corner, while he also plays nickel in nickel packages and Izien plays outside for nickel packages.

Either way, defensively speaking the Bucs will have their hands full with Christian McCaffrey regardless of the other weapons at Kyle Shanahan’s disposal. On the other side of the ball, the Bucs will presumably have all the time in the world to throw the ball against an already sub-par defensive secondary, a recipe for disaster. Unfortunately for those Bucs fans among us with heart conditions, this one will come down to the very end once again, and naturally there will be a special teams gaffe by the Bucs that keeps the score way closer than it should be.

Much as the Bucs have been successful despite their injuries, the 49ers have been equally successful with even more injuries. Can Todd Bowles exorcise his Kyle Shanahan demons? The Bucs are 0-4 with Bowles calling defensive plays against Kyle Shanahan. Can they get revenge for the last second loss from last season? Due to the way that these teams matchup at the current moment, I think that this one goes all the way to the wire.

Prediction: Bucs W, 24-21