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Observations of the Bucs 2014 Preseason



1) If anything, thank GOD for the Bucs cheerleaders. ...what?

2) With a lot of thanks to Sander and Leo and JC, we've been able to get good observations on the talent displayed this August. Which breaks down to two key elements:

2a) Our Bucs defense is looking to be the most dominant it's ever been since the 2002 Super Bowl run, which is uber-nice. When the First-string Starters were on the field, the defense gave up just a field goal. While some of that may be from other teams not breaking out their full playbooks for games that didn't count, the sheer dominant performances of the likes of McCoy, McDonald, David and Foster indicates our front seven is gonna be another Brick Wall like the days of yore.

2b) Our Bucs offense is having trouble maintaining drives and scoring points. A lot of is due on a questionable offensive line, one in which key players - cough Cousins cough - that were brought in to start proved to be total disasters. A weak offensive line is gonna make it hard for our running backs / run game and make it harder for our QBs / passing game.

3) The Bucs thankfully exited the preseason with a minimum of injuries to key starters. That's always the best thing to hope for. Which tells you all you need to know how risky, useless and dangerous the preseason really is.

4) While our talent is great along the starting line-ups (sans the OL), we've got questionable depth at every position except RB. If the Bucs endure a rash of injuries all at once, we're going to see a lot of winnable games turn into disasters real quick.

5) Somehow, the Bucs defense deployed a high amount of stunts along the defensive line this preseason, which is shocking considering how bad those stunts were called during the #FireSchiano era. The odd thing is that these new stunts seemed to work: the players were running them faster and were better organized. If anything, this is a sign that our coaching has improved: that they're getting the players running things right on the field and that they're gaming out the schemes with better smarts.

6) That the Bucs were trading early and often for replacement Guards - not for filling injury gaps but for filling talent gaps - has been the big drama this preseason. It happened because the off-season efforts at Free Agency and drafting did not fix the OL problems of the past three-four years, and because our talent evaluation was seemingly faulty (we were warned back in March that Cousins was a disaster in the making). The trades and cuts of players like Zuttah and Joseph in hindsight looked questionable: Zuttah's in particular, where he's been a standout on the Ravens roster for their running attack.

6a) The final preseason game did not give us a full chance to see the new Guards the Bucs traded for - Johnson or Mankins - but they are projected to be starters for the regular season. Mankins in particular is looking to be an interesting pick-up: a constant presence on one of the best OL's in the league at New England. The biggest problem is that Mankins is now at the point of a long career where he's starting to show the injury bug...

7) We're looking at a Bucs team that could be a legitimate threat to score more defensive touchdowns than offensive touchdowns. I'm serious. Our key Linebackers Foster and David have a decent track record of going after fumbles and INTs and converting them into six points. And that was playing in a defensive scheme that sucked managed by coaches who were idiots. Now picture them - and the defensive line and the secondary made up of Barron, Goldson and Banks - playing in the turnover-friendly Tampa-2-esque cover-based scheme we've been seeing this preseason. I can honestly picture 20 defensive TDs over the regular season. I can't say the same - yet - for an offense that may have great WRs and a great RB, but a game-manager veteran QB and a questionable OL.

7a) Has there ever been a team that had the defense score more than the offense?

8) It's the unbalanced look of this team - talent-heavy on defense, holes on offense - that keeps me from making any serious predictions about how our regular season is going to play out.

8a) On the one hand, our schedule has some favorable matchups - we're playing a weak-looking AFC North division - but we're still playing in an NFC South that has seriously-talented Saints and Falcons teams, with a Panthers team that won the division last year behind a scary-good defense.

8b) The best things in the Bucs favors are: The Saints and their God-QB Brees is due for a collapse; the Falcons may have talent but they showed last year how injuries and bad luck could kill a season; the Panthers literally imploded their offense this off-season and whatever luck they had last year winning close games (how many 1-score games did they play?) can well be gone this year. But that's all based on "ifs". We can't predict a season on "ifs".

9) The first two games - at home vs. Panthers and then Rams - look winnable at this point (Rams in particular due to their preseason injury woes), but the real key will be Weeks 3 through 5. They are all road games, including a "WHY THE F-CK THURSDAY NIGHTER" game at Falcons, and they're against teams that can contend for the postseason (including Steelers and Saints). If... IF the Bucs can come out of that road trip with even one win, we're looking good at 3-2 with a lot of nice matchups in December (where we get the Saints at home for the season finale and a possible playoff spot on the line).

10) All things considered, I'm seeing a 7-9 season as the most likely result. IF we get out Week Five at 4-1, I would start planning for the postseason 'cause I'm seeing an 11-5 winning season if we're playing that well.

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