Bucs head coach Bruce Arians – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

It’s time for PewterReport.com’s 2-Point Conversion post-game column, which features two statements, two questions and two predictions based on the latest Bucs game. Tampa Bay opened the preseason with a sloppy, 19-14 loss at home to Cincinnati. There were missed tackles and miscues galore from the Bucs’ backups.

2 BIG STATEMENTS

STATEMENT 1. Arians Embarrassed By Bucs’ Poor Tackling, Miscues

The Bucs totaled 62 tackles against the visiting Bengals in Saturday night’s 19-14 loss in the preseason opener for both teams. I don’t know how many tackles Tampa Bay’s backup defenders missed last night, but it may have been about the same number. According to head coach Bruce Arians it was too many.

“Probably the worst tackling experience I’ve seen in a long time,” Arians said. “It was like we had no arms. Everything was shouldered and blocking. Some young guys put some embarrassing stuff on tape.”

You can bet that defensive coordinator Todd Bowles knows exactly how many missed tackles there were by now, and he’ll be eager to share that number with the team and look for improvement next week when Tennessee comes to town.

Bucs DC Todd Bowles – Photo by: USA Today

Tampa Bay’s starters on offense and defense played just six snaps in the preseason opener, and the only eventful things to report were Tristan Wirfs getting beat inside for a sack by rookie Joseph Ossai, and Lavonte David doing Lavonte David things and stripping Samaji Perine of the ball and recovering it. That was one of four takeaways by the Bucs defense on the night – but those splash plays didn’t make up for the sloppy tackling.

Bucs reserve safety Javon Hagan was a prime example of how the defense played and how Tampa Bay’s season opener went. He had six tackles, three tackles for loss, a pass breakup and an interception. But he fumbled that interception right back to Cincinnati, and also missed a handful of tackles.

After backup QB Blaine Gabbert led the Bucs on a touchdown drive in the second quarter, third-string quarterback Ryan Griffin threw two bad passes into traffic in the third quarter that were deflected and intercepted in Tampa Bay territory. Those turnovers led to 10 Bengals points and helped Cincinnati build a 13-6 lead.

“A little disappointed in Griff (Ryan Griffin) with his experience and throwing those balls over the middle,” Arians said.

Griffin gave way to rookie Kyle Trask, who received a loud applause when he appeared late in the second half. The former Gators star flashed a big arm with several deep balls, but couldn’t connect on any of them. Trask finished 4-of-15 for 35 yards and was sacked twice, but didn’t get much help from his supporting cast. His box score looks worse than he actually played.

There were at least five dropped passes when Trask was in the game. His prettiest pass of the night was a great touch pass in the back corner of the end zone on a two-point conversion play to tight end Codey McElroy following Joe Jones’ pick-six.

“The ball game – there was good and bad, a lot of bad, a lot of ugly,” Arians said.

The Bucs starters figure to play more against the Titans next Sunday. They’ll play least a quarter and perhaps the first half. Hopefully it won’t be as bad – or as ugly – as it was Saturday night.

STATEMENT 2. Bucs Special Teams Not Even Close To Being Special

The emphasis in Tampa Bay this offseason was improving special teams. It’s still early, but the special teams certainly did not impress in the preseason debut. The tone was set on the opening kickoff when linebacker Kevin Minter, who was last year’s special teams captain, was called for holding.

The Bucs went with an exotic special teams look on the first extra point attempt from the 2-yard line, looking like they were going for a two-point conversion. But then the offensive line that was spaced out wide, came together and got into a kicking formation and Ryan Succop made the extra point kick. But the kick was deemed illegal because it wasn’t kicked from the usual extra point range, which was the 15-yard line.

“Obviously, we had really bad communication on the fake extra point where the kicker didn’t know the rule,” Arians said. “You can’t line back up and kick it, you don’t get a point for it. Evidently, it wasn’t communicated well enough to him that he couldn’t do that and that’s on me.”

No, it was on special teams coordinator Keith Armstrong, whose units had a horrible night.

Bucs KR Jaydon Mickens – Photo by: USA Today

On the ensuing kickoff the Bucs allowed a 40-yard return with wide receiver Tyler Johnson finally making the tackle after a few Tampa Bay players missed. If this were the regular season the Bucs would have had Bradley Pinion kick the ball in the end zone for a touchback. But in the preseason, the coaches want to get a look at the team’s coverage unit, which struggled last year.

Tampa Bay’s return game wasn’t any better. Second-year running back Ke’Shawn Vaughn had meager kick returns of 11, 13 and 18 yards. Vaughn has made strides as a running back, but he doesn’t have the juice to return kicks. He’s not the guy.

Jaydon Mickens had that job last year and turned in a 33-yard kick return, but only covered six yards on his lone punt return. The Bucs would love to see rookie Jaelon Darden win the job, but Darden’s only kick return went for just 12 yards.

There were also two false start penalties on punts with Hagan and cornerback Herb Miller as the guilty parties.

2 PROBING QUESTIONS

QUESTION 1: Did The Officials Have It In For The Bucs Or Were They Just Bad?

For many years it seemed like the refs had it in for Tampa Bay, but the officiating crew on Saturday night was awful. It was just an embarrassingly bad night for the refs.

Where do we begin? The most egregious call of the night was the terrible whistle on Bucs rookie outside linebacker Joe Tryon, who was robbed of a sack of Brandon Allen. Can we get back to football where it’s actually okay for quarterbacks to get hit and sacked? I’m all for player safety, but the sissification of the NFL is reaching an absolutely disgusting level. That was a clean football play by Tryon.

Bucs head coach Bruce Arians – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

The refs continues to suck when they blew the whistle on ticky-tack calls to defensive backs Jamel Dean and Dee Delaney, robbing Delaney of a nice interception. (It was interesting to note that Dean was also playing with the third team defense. File that away for later.) Those calls probably don’t get made in the regular season, so why make them now?

Same thing with a supposed pass interference call across the middle on cornerback Antonio Hamilton, who had a strong night with seven tackles and a forced fumble.
The refs also blew the call on a supposed fumble by wide receiver Travis Jonsen that needed a challenge by Arians to correct it.

The officials also didn’t blow the whistle on an obvious incompletion by Trask when he was being hit. Instant replay had to correct that one, too. Just absolute crap by this officiating crew.

QUESTION 2: Which Bucs Rookies Stood Out?

Several of Tampa Bay’s draft picks made at least one big play on Saturday night.

Although it doesn’t count, Tryon’s sack was a confidence-booster for the team’s first-round pick. You could see it by how he was reacting to it after the play. Tryon was disruptive on several snaps and was praised by Arians after the game. Not a bad debut for a guy who hasn’t played football since December 2019.

While Darden didn’t have too many great reps, he did have a nice 13-yard catch-and-run on a quick smoke route in which he dodged a defender and picked up a first down. The elusive fourth-round pick finished with two catches for 19 yards.

Bucs ILB K.J. Britt – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Fifth-round pick K.J. Britt appears to be in line for the fourth linebacker spot. Britt hustled downfield to record a fumble recovery and finished with three tackles. But he also missed a few.

He’ll have nightmares about whiffing on running back Chris Evans at the goal line in the second quarter. Britt will need to step it up next week as his main competition, veteran Joe Jones, made a huge splash play with his second half pick-six.

Trask’s highlight play, his beautiful two-point conversion pass to McElroy, was already mentioned. But his deep ball to Josh Pearson was just as pretty. Right on the money, but Pearson couldn’t haul it in. It would’ve been the completion of the night if he had made the catch.

2 BOLD PREDICTIONS

PREDICTION 1: Trask Will Play More Than Griffin Next Week

Trask, Tampa Bay’s second-round pick, outplayed Griffin on Saturday night and deserves the chance to work with a better supporting cast next week. Instead of throwing to the likes of Pearson, Jonsen and McElroy, the Bucs should give Trask guys like Johnson, Scotty Miller and Tanner Hudson, who led the team with five catches for 50 yards, to throw to.

Hudson, who continues to be “Mr. August” for the Bucs, would surely make Trask look even better. And the Bucs should put Josh Wells in at tackle instead of either Chidi Okefe or Brad Seaton to buy Trask another second to throw the ball.

PREDICTION 2: The Bucs Will Get A Sack Next Week

Bucs OLB Joe Tryon – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Bowles has to be beside himself that the Bucs didn’t record a single sack on Saturday night. As a defensive-minded guy myself, I’m miffed that nobody got to the Bengals quarterbacks other than Tryon – and that sack didn’t officially count.
Bowles sent some blitzes, but the Bengals were prepared with quick throws to hot reads and screen passes.

I bet Tryon gets another sack against the Titans, in addition to sacks by defensive tackle Khalil Davis and defensive lineman Pat O’Connor and outside linebacker Quinton Bell. All three of those Bucs played well in the trenches against the Bengals and nearly got to the QB.

Bucs Pay Tribute To Mark Cook

And finally, a big thank you to Bucs communications director Nelson Luis and the communications staff, and to chief operating officer Brian Ford for the amazing in-stadium tributes to legendary Pewter Reporter Mark Cook, who passed away on Thursday.

Thanks also go out to Bucs TV announcers Ronde Barber and Chris Myers, who had some touching words about Cook on the News Channel 8 broadcast.

And finally, a hat tip to Arians, who was nothing but class in recognizing Cook at the start of his post-game press conference.

To donate to the Cook family GoFundMe page to help with bills and expenses, please click here.