The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are at home for the first time in three weeks this coming Sunday (two games, but three weeks time). What we know for certain is that they’ll be playing the Carolina Panthers. But, what’s not certain is who they’ll be trotting out to play against them.

Friday is the final key participation day for anyone on the injury report, of which the Bucs have some key players on this week.

These are the three things we learned from One Buc Place on Friday.

Injury Report

When you miss practice on Wednesday, that’s not that big of a deal, especially after a hard fought game.

When you miss practice on Thursday, there starts to creep in a bit of worry for the status of Sunday.

When you miss practice for the third day in a row on Friday (which is a lighter practice), things don’t look good.

That’s where we are with cornerbacks Robert McClain and Brent Grimes. McClain is still in concussion protocol, so we would bet that a third missed day makes him extremely doubtful. Don’t expect him to play.

As for Grimes, this article will likely be published before the final injury report is announced. We’ll update this section on his exact status, but we’re not holding our breath that he’s going to play either.

Looks like it will be Vernon Hargreaves and Ryan Smith on the outside and Javien Elliott in nickel for this weekend.

Winston’s Throwing

I suppose there was a hint of mystery as to whether or not Winston would actually be throwing on Friday, but, in reality, there wasn’t.

Koetter told us earlier this week that holding Winston out for Wednesday and Thursday was just about them following the same schedule as last week because it worked for his shoulder. They repeated things this week, so fully expect Winston to start again – and for the shoulder to not be much of a bother.

Koetter Not Worried About Winston

Though Winston’s prep time seems off, coach Koetter doesn’t seem to be worried. He noted that Winston had one of the best games of his career last week on only one day of practice.

Maybe the limited practice time allows Winston to just be more instinctive instead of overthinking things. Koetter couldn’t say whether this will be the standard practicing schedule for Winston from here on out, but said if it works out for him and for his health, they don’t mind sticking with it. He said that Winston puts in enough work around just getting live practice reps to be ready for games.