Previewing 2022 Buccaneers Matchups, Schedule Release | Bucs Insider

excited to find out the whole things. To make sure you're tuned into buccaneers dot com for the schedule release later on. I know they have a fun video for it, and uh so for now though we at least a couple of them have already been released, they try to release a couple of things ahead of time. Yes, a

little chromes. So one of them that we have found out is the Buccaneers versus the Chiefs, and I wanted to hear your thoughts on finding out about that matchup, when it's happening and what you think that could end up meaning for this season. Well, it's week four, it's Monday, Night, UM, which I think has become like the best showcase of all the prime time games. And uh so that's NBC

and being a twenty kickoff on September October two. And obviously you could have guessed all along that when you looked at the buck schedule, even though it's packed with playoff teams from last year and marquee matchups, what's better than the rematch of Super Bowl the rematch of Brady versus Mahomes for the sixth time. Um, It's it's just it's a game you knew they were going to give a major spotlight too, so it's no surprise, but it's it's cool to find out exactly when. Yeah, and I

kind of like that it's earlier in the season. I think that that will be something that could be a big tone setter, you know that if you get that win that makes you feel really good prime time spot in that first quarter of the season. I think that's going to be a really big deal. So yeah, and then you know, we were talking about Brady Versus Mahomes every time these guys meet, and who knows how many

of them there are left? Because who knows how much longer Tom Brad's gonna play, but every meeting is just a huge story. Patrick Bones has actually done quite well against Brady, you know, which is hard to do think, but Brady has the upper hand and the winds and especially to see their postseason wins. Both times they've met in the postseason, including Super fifty five, Tom Brady's teams

have won. Some of these games were with the Patriots, the last two have been with the Buccaneers, and just basically they both have put up really, really good numbers. So they tend to put on a show. Yeah, it's going to be incredible, And so we talked about the fact that the schedule is coming out tonight, but we also figured we could talk about the off season schedule

and what is coming ahead for the Buccaneers. Where they at in the off season program at this point, and the things that are coming in the next month or so. What they're doing right now is they're finishing up Phase two, and in Phase two, the coaches can go out on the field with the players, but they really have to stay like you can't do offense versus defense. So they're basically working on laying the groundwork. You know, if you're working with receivers and young receivers that are new are

still fairly new. Uh, you know, working on alignment and and their routes and their footwork and dbs working on footwork and how they turn their hips and things like that.

That's the kind of thing you're working on now. Coming up after Uh, well, first thing we got is rookie Minicamp that's this weekend, and that involves all your draft picks plus about plus there'll be some number of twelve or thirteen undrafted free agent that will officially announce probably today, and then you'll bring in about thirty guys that will that will work on tryout contracts, so you'll have enough for a full mini camp, but it's just rookies, a

couple of first year players usually. And then after that you see the Buccaneers roll into Phase three, which is when you get to do the O T O T a S, which is offseason training. I can't remember what they stands for, but anyway, we said, right, um, any organized team ACTIMT. I was sitting there, Wait a minute, I don't think the word off seasons in there, but it should be. It should be anyway you've said O taste for so long as you have to lose the

meaning of it. But organized team activity days, which are a lot more like real practices. You get to have up to ten if I'm we're gonna do ten over the course of three weeks there, and then you can start doing the drills you you you recognize, like seven on seven, nine on seven full team. You still can't wear pads, have contact on purpose. Um, but it's a lot more like a real practice. And finally the whole

thing wraps up with a mandatory minicamp. Now everything above that, all those otes are voluntary and uh, but that June seven to night is the only three days of the offseason program that are mandatory, so we should have the whole team there. And then after that players and coaches are off until training camp. It's the best time in the year for them. It is that is their favorite time of the year. Okay, and I know something else we wanted to talk about. Of course, everyone still is

wondering about Gronk. Is he gonna sign, is he gonna come back, is he gonna retire? All the questions. And then of course when the Buccaneers went through the draft, they drafted too tight ends and everybody said, Oh, does this mean he's not coming back? What could this look like? What could this mean? So let's talk a little bit more about that of how this team likes to use tight ends. Do you see that draft affecting whether or

not Grunt comes back or they want him back? And if he did come back, how could this look with all of them? Yeah, it was funny when Byron left, which was at the podium on Tuesday, he was asked a question long lines of you know so about Grunt coming back, about not coming back, and he's like, well, I don't really want to think about not coming back. So I think we all have the feeling, and we could be wrong, but we all have the feeling that at some point you'll choose to return and play one

at least one more season one Tom Brady. Um, I think it'd be a different story of Tom Brady and back so um that I think the Buccaneers drafted two tight ends. Uh it regardless of whether or not Gronk is going to come back. I think they would have done that, um without Gronkowski. Uh. And even with him, you don't have a lot of guys that can play that why inline tightan, we're the first thing they do

above all else is are good blockers. And both the guys we've drafted, Kate Dotton and co Kft are good blockers. Now Kaid probably has a little bit more ability to um help in the passing game. But what those guys will give you, depending on if they both make the team or whatever, what they'll give you if gron comes back is a is a much better personnel for twelve personnel, which is when you put to two tight ends and

two receivers on on the field. And if you look at this here in we ran about percent of our plays in twelve personnel, and the success rate was very good and the yards for play was very good. Just you don't have anything to compare with here, but those numbers were better than when we were in eleven personnel, which is what we do more than the time last year. You see they they kind of went down in those categories.

And mainly the reason why it was Gronkowski missed like five or six games and right in the middle of the season. And in fact, if you look at the chart, you can see the twelve personnel usage just dips dramatically during that time and then came back up when he came back, and then if you look there at the bottom with Gronkowski back in the postseason, nearly thirty of

our snaps we did in twelve personnel. So clearly our coaches and we still I know it's a new head coach, were still the same offensive coordinator and most of the same coaches, they do want to use this twelve personnel and drafting these two guys, especially when and if gron comes back, will make that a lot easier. Absolutely, all right, We're gonna get into some of our Facebook questions again. If you want to leave one of those for us, you can do it in the comments section underneath our

live video. Market asked, so, do you think we are bringing Sue back? Or is there a chance of bringing in a veteran D alignment? So let's kind of look at the Sue part another veteran D A lineman or do you think where the D line stands that it's okay, okay, okay, um one at a time there. I think every week we go that in Dominican Su doesn't return makes it

seem less likely that's going to happen right now. And now we're after the draft and they had to make decisions in the draft based on the likelihood that you based on the fact that you can't assume that he'll be back so earlier in the offseason, because we get

this question pretty much every week. I was saying, I think it comes down to what does he want to do, because this is the fourth year in a row where he's basically waited into the free agency and decided, after some contemplation on it, whether or not he wanted to come back. The other three years he did. Who knows, he may want to move on to other things now. So I don't think you can assume that he'll be

back at this point. But I do think there is room for the Buccaneers to add a veteran at that position, because if you look at it, they drafted Logan Hall and with with Dominican Sue out of the picture, if he is that opens up a really big role for Logan Hall. He's probably starting along with Vida Via and Will Golston, assuming you know he's not gonna be given it,

but he'll have to earn it. But he probably is the guy you would expect to start there, and that's a lot to put on a rookie, right you'd like

to have some other options. Steve McClinton hasn't resigned either, So, UM, if you look at it, behind those three, you have your your main backup is Nachos Roaches, but he's really more of a backup news Tackle raise more redundant with Vita than the than So now you're talking about Patrick O'Connor, Kobe Smith beaning pat guys like that, which, hey, maybe one of them will emerge, but I don't think you can count on it, right, So it wouldn't shock me

if they added another player at that position. Francisco had asked, how do you guys feel about Trask? And UM, I think we did get a chance to hear um about that from Clyde Christensen this week, and that really I guess I this will change my answer on this because this is another question we've gotten a lot. Right. My feeling was when Brady briefly retired and the Bucks, Bruce Arians and Jason Light were questioned on what they were going to do. They always said they were going to

try every avenue to try to see what's best. But one of the things they did say was, yes, Kyle Trask will get an opportunity to compete for the starting job. So to me, that said, even if Blaine Gabert is back, which he eventually did resign, Trash gets to compete for the starting job. Well, if Brady returns didn't, doesn't that also mean that Trask gets to compete from the number two. Well, Clyde made it pretty clear that's problem not gonna happen.

That the plan that they'd still like Kyle trast quite a bit, and they think he's progressing nicely. But with Brady back now and you're back in full wind now all in mode if for some reason he wasn't available, they really prefer to have the veteran who they are confident in, who they've used before in their offense as the next guy. So Kyle probably is going to continue to be the three and continue to learn. Okay um. Our next one was Richard asked where is our salary

cap it? Now? Well, we cleared up some space off with a few moves, so I think read about thirteen million, but some of that, a good chuck of that is going to have to go to signing the draft picks. Okay um. And we also had let me see where

our questions are here? Um, we had a couple of questions about the schedule in terms of we still, of course don't know the times weeks that will be announced tonight, but we do know who they're playing, looking at just based on that before we know the times, the days, all of that. The strength of the schedule, the difficulty of it. What are you thinking compared to previous years or the league at large? Just schedule is I mean,

it's fun, it's it's exciting. I don't think we've ever had one this jam packed with incredible marquee games, but it's also very challenging. There by strength of schedule, which is how the NFL determines, um, you know who has the toughest schedule, and strength of schedule is the combined winnings percentage of your opponents this year from last season, and the Buccaneers is around five thirty eight or something. It's the fourth hardest by that measurement. The Rams they'll

have the toughest one. And but the way I look at is we have eight games against playoff teams from last year. That tells you a lot right there. That doesn't even include Baltimore, New Orleans, Cleveland. All those teams were in plaoffs in twenty but didn't make the playoffs last year. But I don't know what to me, they

sure feel like playoff contenders. And look at Baltimore. They were eight and three last year then Lamar and a bunch of guys got hurt and they lost their last six games, and five of them by three or fewer points, three of them by one point. I mean to me, that's a playoff caliber team that just didn't happen to make it last right, due to a certainstances. So I think we have eleven to twelve games against playoff caliber teams. Yeah, that's that is a tough schedule, but you know you

gotta beat the best to be the best, exactly. That's true. And I'm sure everybody else is looking at us as one of those tough games on the schedule too, so it seems fair, all right. Well, that is going to do it for us on this edition of Buccaneers Inside a Live presented by Miller Lte Against Stay tuned tonight for the schedule release. We're also going to have a reaction video up after it, so if you want to

hear our full thoughts. Once we know all those dates and times for all those games, make sure you stay tuned to Buccaneers dot com and we'll see you. Then to Saccer