Facing Rams' Aaron Donald & Another Shaq Barrett Great Performance | Bucs Insider Live

um already, we actually can start with this. I was gonna ask you about this news to begin with anyways, And Austin already asked what are the Bucks going to do with the extra cap from JPP? Oh? Well, I don't think we can know right now, right, I mean, there's plenty of things. Yeah, you caught me by surprise on that one. I don't know at this moment. You Nope, I definitely don't know the plan. Um. But I mean it is always nice to know that you have, all of a sudden this time of year and all of

a sudden end up with extra cap space super often. Well, what if you started talking to Shack Barrett about an extension. Would one deal right now? Yeah, that's a really great point. Seems like a guy I'd like to keep around a little bit longer. That's a really great point. We again, so as we give people a chance to submit some of their questions in that live video, figured we go and start talking a little bit about the game against l A that you know, playing against a team that

was in the Super Bowl last year. How similar or different do they seem to be from that team and is it going to still be a team that is potentially a Super Bowl content. Well, statistically, it seems like they're getting things done in a different way. They're three and oh, so they're getting it done. Uh. Last year they scored i think thirty two points seven points per game. Only the Chiefs scored more. And while their defense was good and obviously revolves around Aaron Donald, Um, they were

clearly an offensive led team. Um. It turned out differently in the Super Bowl, as it turns out. But uh, this year, their offense is good, but it's about middle of the pack right now, and their defense has been very good. So uh, I would just say that's probably small sample size. They still have almost everybody back from last year. Really, the only two changes on their offense

were two guys on the offensive line. Their left guard and their center are new and their young second year players, and I think the offensive line maybe has has struggled just a little bit for the RAM so far. But that's a lot of potential on that offense. One thing about it is they've got those three receivers, Robert Woods and Cooper Cup and Brandon Cooks, and they're on the field all the time. You know how teams use three

receiver sets and you see two tight insets. All three of those guys are on the are on the field for more than their snaps. So that's what you're gonna see all the time, all three of those guys. And you've got Brandon Cooks who can take the top off. You've got Robert Woods who does everything, does jet sweeps, there's a good blockers, a good all around receiver. And the Cooper Cup is the one getting all the high volume.

He's a more of a possession type receiver, you know, like eleven point five yards per catch, but he catches everything really well. He gets open and uh so you've got all those different types of receivers. They do their own things, They have their own niches in that offense, but all of that plus tied Gurley makes for a pretty hard offensive stop. So even though their offensive numbers haven't been through the roof this year, they've definitely been

in decline from the year before. That's probably just a small sample size, so I think this is a really tough offense. Um, we have a couple of people asking about Devin white Jade, you know when he's going to potentially be back or what we know about him. David had also asked about him, So when when do we know if you know, he's going to be able to return. So we always have the show on Wednesdays in the morning, and it's always a few hours before the first injury

report comes out. And since we're playing the Rams and there are three hours behind, the injury report probably won't be out until late this afternoon, maybe early evening, but that'll be our first opportunity because during the portion of practice that was open to the media and there for us that we can talk about, they were just doing

special teams, which Devon doesn't really do anyway. So we don't have a report yet or until coach says it in his post practice press conference, if he says these guys didn't practice, then we'll have a little bit better idea. I you know, he didn't practice at all last week and then was out for the game. It wouldn't surprise me if he was still sidelined for a little while longer. But the fact that coach continues to say I'm still calling it day to day tells me they think he's

not that far away. Okay, um, Gary had asked about do you think Rojo is gonna be getting the starting spot? So I figured overall we can just talk about the two running backs and and the fact that they're they're both doing well. Yeah, and Rojo's looked really good, really really good, and I think he's going to continue to get you know, more and more higher percentage of the snaps. I guess we get this question every week, so I guess it's important to people, maybe because of fantasy football,

who starts running back? The really the much more important question is who gets more snaps? And if Rojo continues to run the way he is. You know, Peyton has been good too, but I think if you look at their yards per carry, Rojo's definitely head and He's had some more dynamic runs. Peyton's had a couple as well, but I think Rojo seems to be consistently giving us those dynamic runs with the second cuts six or seven yards downfield for another three or four or five yards

probably a better big play. We haven't really broken a real big one yet, probably a better option for that, and we've we've seen him in the in the passing game. Hasn't got a lot of throws, but when we've thrown to him it's worked really well. So UM, I don't think it matters a ton who starts. I guess at some point you have two running backs and one of them gets to such a higher percentage or the other that he's clearly the higher use guy, then you might

just go ahead and make the change. But more importantly is how many snaps do they each get? And I think it's going to continue to sort of turn in Rojo's favor. Kevin had asked, how much more can the defense improve during this season? You think, well, they can improve quite a bit over last week, at least in the secondary. Um. I felt this way, and I think most people did, but coach arians said it, so we

can you know, repeat what he said. The front, the defensive front, the front seven or eight or whatever you want to call it. Front six played very well and there was a lot of pressure on the quarterback. There was nowhere to run for the running backs. But the secondary had his worst game, and there was some blown assignments, particularly on the big catch by Sterling Shepherd in the game winning drive. Uh, And it just was not a

really good game for those guys. You know, they had played pretty well in the first two weeks, but we're still talking about a lot of really young guys. And I think there's a lot of room for improvement for those guys to you know, get more experience and and learn to communicate well and and you know, just become a better unit altogether. And it's it's probably hard to do when you're starting a rookie safety, a first year safety,

a second year cornerback, a second year quarterback. At nicol and Vernon Hargraves is your you know, your elder statesman. That group, it's a young group. I think there's room for improvement there. I don't know if you can ask for a whole lot more from what your D line is doing, because they've been just absolutely phenomenal is the run and their pressure is helping Shack in particular, but also Carl gets quarterback. So it's on the back end

that we have to get better. Um. Justin asked, why did we take the foot off the gas in the second half on something. I don't think they took the foot off the gas. I just think they didn't execute. I mean there was in the third quarter we just didn't convert on some third downs. Um. That happened also in the in the fourth quarter on the you know,

the one where Cam got tripped up. If we'd have made that third down, we probably would have, uh you know, probably would have been able to run off the clock or get close to it. Um. The only thing I would say in agreement to that is the fourth and two play when we were up by three and fourth and two and their five on third and two, we

ran a read option. Uh. Coach said that Jami has made the right read because of what the end did to give it to Peyton and he didn't have to get five yards for a touch and he just had to get two to get a first down, and we just didn't block it well on the front end. So, Um, you get to that point. Now it's fourth and two. At the five, you're up by three. If you kick a field goal, which we did, then you're up by six. But either way, a touchdown is gonna beat you, and

that is in what ended up happening. So I might agree with the with the assessment of taking the foot off the guests and choosing to kick the field goal and so the touchdown there, But I don't think from a play calling standpoint, that's what we were doing. I think I think they they stumbled out of the halftime and didn't execute wall on offense. I don't think it

was a matter of strategy, you know what I'm saying. Okay, Yeah, Jim asked why hasn't o J been involved the more he was in the last game, And I think they made a particular effort to do so, and they hit him downfield several times. He drew in a big pass interference on another downfield pass. So after the first two games. In the first game, of course o J had you know, he had a couple of miss kews. He had a fumble, he had a ball that went through his hands and

was intercepted. He actually got targeted. He had four catches in that game, was targeted several other times in the Carolina game, the ball didn't find him. The coaches said that was just a product of who they decided to cover. The best example being Chris Godwin's twenty touchdown, which was a pair of really well run uh posts, right to

posts together and OJ was the other one. The defense went towards him, left no safety over the top for Chris, and so James made the right reading through to Chris. Had been the other way around, he probably would have thrown to o J. And in this last game, other than than Mike Evans, I think o J was the number two options in that game. So yeah, that's a great point. Kevin said, what would you say is the over under on how many sacks Shack Barrett will end

up with this year? That's a really good question because right because he's on you know, eight after three would be like two and two thirds times sixteen, close to forty, so probably forty. No, yeah, that's standard. Uh You obviously you can't expect him to continue to get uh three or four sex every week. But I don't think what

he's done has been flukey. I think he's getting a lot of one on one opportunities because as we said, Vida Vea and and Sue and uh Will Golston are all doing well and commanding double team blocks because there's there they're just so hard. They're powerful men, and they're hard to stop. So they're they're letting they're who whether it's a tight end or the tackle on that end,

they're letting him. You know, this is a guy's your responsibility, and Shacks just making all kinds of really good moves. I mean, he's had somewhere he's powered the guy back, but he seems to be particularly good at you know, as soon as he engages with that tackle on the outside, he gets that shoulder low and then is able to accelerate around him right and then and then again on

another play. And you know where I know this from is because I watched Randy Barber's film session thing, which is one of my favorite videos on the website every week, and I would highly recommend watching that every week, and this week he'll give you a little bit more idea

of why Shack was so successf game. And like one of the Shacks Sacks that's fun to say was actually Karl Nassa just completely had a straight arm on the tackle and just pushed him all the way back to Danil Jones and forced Daniel Jones over that way and then here comes Shack. So Karl Nassa really made that play happen, but Jack did what he had to do. Um. So,

I've been talking about Shack for a while. I can't remember what how many sacks you think he's gonna So he's playing well, so I don't expect him to just all of a sudden, this was a fluke and it gets no more. So let's say, uh, you know, he has a couple other two seconds which agave him to twelve one. I'd say fourteen or fifteen, which would be close to the Buccaneer records. That'd be incredible, That'd be awesome. Jacob asked, what have you seen as Brichard Perriman's role

so far? Well, I mean he is the third guy. He's on the field a lot as your third receiver, and so far we've been throwing him the ball kind of underneath a lot. You know, he's he's kind of a speedster. He's had a lot of big plays last year in the second half for Cleveland. But we've been

sending as you saw him last game. Mike Evans deep constantly, and Chris Godwin gets some kind of more like winning in twenty yard targets, and when the ball does find Brushott, it seems to be finding him underneath a little bit more. These catches are all like five and six yards so far. He had the opportunity to catch that one in the end zone in Carolina. It was a tough play. Didn't make that play. That would have been a bigger play.

But he's out there on the field as your number, as your three receiver, your third receiver, and the Bucks, like every NFL team does a lot of three receiver sets. He probably should get some bigger numbers going forward, but I would think it would be, you know, one game, maybe it's three or four catches in one game. He doesn't it Just again, who's the ball going to find?

Ken asked, what's the game plan for stopping Todd Gurley? Well, I think, you know, you could feel a little bit confident in this regard after what they did against Christian McCaffrey and sick when Barkley back to back, and I know Barkley got hurt and was out the second half, but even before that they were phenomenal in stopping him and Todd Gurley like, I mean again, this is like a murder's row of the hardest running backs in league

to stop. But after you do so well against McCaffrey and Um and Barkley, you gotta believe we have shot. And it's the same thing we talked about last week. It's gap integrity and it's swarming to the ball and we've been doing that. All you gotta do is keep doing what you've been doing. Yeah, Travis asked Um, how many wins you feel like it is feasible over the six week road game stretch of what would be considered successful.

And it's five games. It's six weeks, but five games, two road trips, London bye week, two more road trips, So it's five games in six weeks, Um, you know, feasible for in the NFL, it's any anything from zero to five is feasible. And so if you want me to say a number in between, like two or three, then you're asking me to say, well, which ones we're gonna lose? And I don't think you go in any

game with that, you know, with that mindset. But that being said, if you're looking at this from the outside, I'm sure I know the Buccaneers are nine and a half point underdogs this week. I'm sure that what will be underdogs when we go to Seattle, and then the other trips are New Orleans without Drew Brees and Tennessee, and I would think those would be ones where we would can be considered more like, you know, more of

an even thing. And then in Carolina, I mean in London where we're the home team, we're playing Carolina without Cam Newton. I don't know if that's better or worse at this point, considering the way Cam was limited, but I think most of the time you prefer not to play candid breeze, so feasible the answer that is five? Would what would you be happy with at the end of this Three? Right, and then you'd be at five and then you're heading into an easier part of your

schedule where you have a lot of home games. Right thre't we three and two? Yeah? We'd be Yeah. Three would be something that would make them happy they want five. I would be pretty pleased if at the end of this we had three wins. Okay, um, and we'll close out with this. When Steve asked why didn't we try to get a touchdown at the end of the game

when we had time to try. So overall, now you've got to hear from coach few different times about all this was that that was the first time we got the point blank question about what about this about the very end, not the fourth and two I was talking about. But they so let's just go over that sequence because I can't believe we haven't talked about it till now. Mike Evans catches the ball at the nine yard line with and they run up and spike it with about

thirteen seconds left. The point is to maintain your time out so then you can position the ball where you want it, because they specifically wanted to get it off the right hash because while Mackay has been very, very good, if he's had problems, they've noticed it's been on the right hash. So they wanted to get him off the

right hash. So from the moment you catch the ball with at the nine yard line and the offenses run down the field, your goal is to spike the ball to save your time out and then use another play to position the ball and then kick a shot field goal. That is a completely reasonable strategy that many, many, many, if not all, coaches in the NFL would take. It might be the highest percent a chance of success of all the strategies, because anyone you throw out there, you say, okay,

let's run down the respect the ball. We have a time out, so let's throw one into the end zone. I don't have a problem with that concept. But you gotta admit you could throw an interception, you could get sacked, and now you're in real big trouble. Things can happen if you choose to run the ball. Maybe they'll be think it passed. Hey, we might catch them on a run. You can fumble. I'm not saying you will, But I also don't think you expect him miss a thirty four

yar field goal, right. I think any coach in the league, after Mike catches that ball, if the outcome is we're down by one point and we're about to kick a thirty four yard feel gonna win. They're gonna take that. It's the most basic and obvious strategy, and it might even be the highest percentage one afterwards, and it's part of watching the game, and I understand it. But afterwards, it's easy to say, well, we could have thrown in the end zone, or we could have run one more time.

But the strategy that the coach took is completely reasonable and I think almost every coach in league would do it now. In between, there was the delayed game penalty that turned a and then the kneel down costs two more yards, but the delayed game costs you five yards, so it made the kick five yards further. There was some there's been some complaints about the two things that Bruce said on Sunday and Monday, And except for one

little part of it, none of it's really contradictory. When he said he did it on purpose on Sunday, as he clarified on Monday, he means he saw that we were going to get the penalty. We couldn't get the snap off because of the substitutions and the ref standing over the ball, so he purposely made the decision to let the penalty happened rather than using the last time out, so then they could then position the ball. It's not like he ran out there saying, I want a penalty

for the nine. We can't kick from the nine. We need to kick from from the fourteen or the sixteen. After the kneel down. I don't have a problem with that either. And actually, if you look at those win probability graphs that I sometimes bring up, which shows you know which team is expected to win in this particular situation, after the catch from Mike Evans, which would have put us in position for a twenty seven yard field goal, we were eighty two point to percent likelihood of winning.

After the penalty, it dropped all the way to eight two point zero. The point being in the NFL, you expect your kicking to make a twenty seven or thirty two yard now, as it turned out, because of execution, we missed it. And not only did Matt Gay miss it, but he missed it just barely to the right. And you think, if we're a five years culture, maybe that's in And that's totally true. But it doesn't mean that the strategy the execution lacked. It doesn't mean the strategy

was wrong. Okay, Yeah, that's a great point. Yeah, that's a great explanation. All right, Well, that's gonna do it for us on this edition of Buccaneers Insider Live presented by Miller I, thanks so much for joining us, and we'll see you next week.