Welcome to SR’s Fab 5 – my weekly insider column on the Bucs that features five things that are on my mind. SR’s Fab 5 is now a quicker read, but still packs a punch. Enjoy!

Please note, there will not be an SR’s Fab 5 column next Friday, May 31, as I’ll be on vacation.

Bucs head coach Todd Bowles has seen his team improve from eight wins in 2022 to nine wins plus a postseason victory last year. What has to happen for Bowles and the Bucs to keep improving in 2024? Here is a list of five things he and his coaching staff must do during the offseason to set Tampa Bay up for another successful year and show even more progress.

FAB 1. Todd Bowles Needs To Be George Edwards’ Shadow

Bucs OLBs YaYa Diaby and Anthony Nelson – Photo by: USA Today

Todd Bowles needs the Bucs outside linebackers to once again be a pass-rushing force for his defense. Shaq Barrett, who turned 31, was released this offseason for salary cap reasons after notching 4.5 sacks last year.

The good news is that the team has a glut of potential with several young, talented pass rushers, including three players with just one year’s worth of experience in YaYa Diaby, Markees Watts and Jose Ramirez as well as rookie Chris Braswell, this year’s second-round pick.

But potential is the most dangerous word in the NFL.

Joe Tryon-Shoyinka enters his fourth season in Tampa Bay and is in a contract year after underwhelming sack production as the Bucs’ first-round pick in 2021. Anthony Nelson enters his fifth year with the team, and the Bucs also added veteran Randy Gregory in free agency. Competition at the position will be fierce this summer – perhaps more than at any other position on the team.

Those seven edge rushers are vying for possibly five or six spots on the Bucs’ 53-man roster, depending on how special teams shakes out. But it’s critically important that whoever winds up starting opposite Diaby, the team’s leading sacker last year with 7.5, that the outside linebackers see an uptick in sack production this season to aid Tampa Bay’s pass defense, which ranked 28th last year, allowing 249.6 yards per game because the Bucs didn’t pressure and sack the quarterback enough.

Former Bucs OLBs Shaquil Barrett and Jason Pierre-Paul – Photo by: USA Today

The Bucs haven’t had a double-digit sacker since Barrett’s second Pro Bowl season in 2021 when he notched 10 sacks. That season, Jason Pierre-Paul, Barrett, Nelson, Tryon-Shoyinka and Cam Gill teamed up to produce 23 sacks from the outside linebacker position. Those 23 sacks out of the team’s 47 that year accounted for 48.9% of Tampa Bay’s sack production.

Ideally, Bowles wants more than half of the team’s sacks to come from the outside linebacker position. In his first year in Tampa Bay, Barrett’s 19.5 sacks led the league and accounted for much of the team’s 35 sacks from the edge. The Bucs outside linebackers accounted for 74.5% of the sacks that season, but that number is a bit of an unreasonable outlier due to Barrett’s Herculean season.

While the collective OLB sack production dipped to just 19.5 in the 2020 regular season and accounted for only 40.6% of the sacks, the unit made up for it in the 2020 postseason. Including Super Bowl LV, Barrett and Co. recorded 7.5 out of the team’s 10 playoff sacks. When factoring in the postseason that year, the outside linebackers accounted for 47% of the Bucs sacks.

OLB Sack Production: 2023
22 out of 48 regular season sacks (45.8%)
1 out of 5 postseason sacks (20%)
 
OLB Sack Production: 2022
17 out of 44 regular season sacks (38.6%)
0 out of 1 postseason sacks (0%)
 
OLB Sack Production: 2021
23 out of 47 regular season sacks (48.9%)
0.5 out of 4 postseason sacks (12.5%)
 
OLB Sack Production: 2020
19.5 out of 48 sacks (40.6%)
7.5 out of 10 postseason sacks (75%)
 
OLB Sack Production: 2019
35 out of 47 regular season sacks (74.5%)

Bucs co-DC Kacy Rodgers and OLBs coach George Edwards – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

The arrival of new outside linebackers coach George Edwards helped last year, as the unit increased its collective sack output from 17 in 2022 to 22. The Bucs outside linebackers accounted for 45.8% of the team’s sacks in 2023 compared to just 38.6% of the sack production in 2022.

Edwards seems like a very capable assistant coach, but if Bowles is going to spend any extra time working with one unit on the practice field during the mandatory mini-camp and during training camp, it needs to be the outside linebacker position. Bowles needs to be Edwards’ shadow this summer.

It’s critical that the outside linebacker unit increase its sack production and account for more of the team’s sacks in 2024 – closer to 50% or more. And it’s also crucial that Bowles and general manager Jason Licht pick the right five or six edge rushers to keep on the roster to help make that happen. Having an up-close look at this unit as often as possible would serve Bowles well.

FAB 2. Stop The Static Platooning, Play The Best Pass Rushers On Third Down

Falcons QB Desmond Ridder and Bucs OLB Joe Tryon-Shoyinka – Photo by: USA Today

Todd Bowles’ annual goal is to have his defense produce 50 sacks or more every season. The Bucs have come close, producing 48 sacks last year and also in 2020, and registering 47 sacks in 2019 and 2021.

But if Tampa Bay wants to get more sack production, especially on third downs which are obvious passing downs when teams are in third-and-long situations, the Bucs need to have the right pass rushers on the field. At outside linebacker last year, that meant Shaq Barrett and YaYa Diaby and at defensive tackle, that meant Calijah Kancey and Vita Vea.

But the way that Bowles and co-defensive coordinator and defensive line coach Kacy Rodgers implement their defensive line rotation it’s akin to hockey line shifts. Instead of having a third-and-long pressure package, too often the Bucs rotate their four-man unit up front in platoons – and that’s not putting the team’s best pass rushers on the field for those critical third downs.

When Kancey and Vea need a breather, Greg Gaines and Logan Hall go in for an entire series spanning three-to-five plays at times. When Diaby and Barrett need a rest, Anthony Nelson and Joe Tryon-Shoyinka would enter the game for the same span.

I’m a firm believer that on third-and-long situations Bowles and Rodgers should deploy Kancey, Vea, Diaby and whoever emerges as the best situational pass rusher this year – whether that’s Tryon-Shoyinka, seldom-used Markees Watts, newcomer Randy Gregory or rookie Chris Braswell. To me it doesn’t matter if Kancey, Vea or Diaby have just come off the field for one or two plays. On third-and-long, they’re back in the game on the most critical down for Tampa Bay’s defense.

Bucs OLB Markees Watts – Photo by: USA Today

Last year, Watts led the Bucs with an incredible 23.1% pass rush win rate, yet only saw 27 reps on passing downs. Meanwhile, Tryon-Shoyinka had a 10.8% pass rush win rate and played 303 pass rush downs with Nelson playing 209 pass rush downs and producing a 10.1% pass rush win rate.

That’s something that needs to change in 2024 to ramp up the Bucs’ sack production.

“Third down defense was our Achilles heel,” Rodgers said this offseason, referring to the fact that Tampa Bay ranked 17th in the league in third down percentage at 38.2% last year.

Scrapping the static platoons and playing the best pass rushers on third downs would go a long way toward increasing Tampa Bay’s success on that critical down.

FAB 3. Get To Know Jayden Daniels – Intimately

Commanders QB Jayden Daniels Photo by: USA Today

The Bucs’ 2024 schedule is out, and the team opens at home against the Commanders. Washington has a new coaching staff and a multitude of new players as a result. Perhaps the most important newcomer in Washington is quarterback Jayden Daniels, who was the No. 2 overall pick in the 2024 draft.

It is critical that Bucs head coach and defensive play-caller Todd Bowles gets to know Daniels, last year’s Heisman Trophy winner, intimately. When I say intimately I don’t necessarily mean that Bowles needs to find out which sock Daniels puts on first, what time he goes to bed or what his favorite cereal is.

What I mean is that Bowles needs to know what makes Daniel tick on the football field and what his tendencies are. That means poring over every LSU and Arizona State game in Daniels’ college career this summer and trying to find any and all weaknesses that Bowles and his defense can exploit.

Too often, defensive coaches will say they need to game plan for the scheme and offensive system and not for individual players – even quarterbacks. There is some truth in that, and that’s why Bowles and his staff will also need to study Kliff Kingsbury’s offense from his days as Arizona’s head coach where he deployed a similarly mobile quarterback in Kyler Murray.

But Daniels is a different cat at 6-foot-4, 210 pounds, whereas Murray is much shorter at 5-foot-10, 207 pounds.

The two had similar final seasons in college. Murray completed 69% of his passes for 4,361 yards with 42 touchdowns and seven interceptions and ran for 1,001 yards and 12 TDs in his Heisman Trophy-winning season at Oklahoma in 2018.

Bucs DT Calijah Kancey and OLB Joe Tryon-Shoyinka and Panthers QB Bryce Young – Photo by: USA Today

Daniels produced similar numbers with 3,812 passing yards and 40 TDs with just four interceptions, while completing 72.2% of his passes. He also ran for 1,134 yards and 10 scores last year to help his Heisman campaign.

Bowles has had some success against rookie quarterbacks, most recently Carolina’s Bryce Young and Tennessee’s Will Levis last year. In three games against those QBs, Young and Levis were sacked a total of 11 times and threw two interceptions with no touchdowns as Tampa Bay won those three outings.

But Bowles’ defense was also carved up by Houston’s C.J. Stroud, who set an NFL rookie record with 470 passing yards and five touchdowns in a 39-37 win over Tampa Bay last year. So it hasn’t been an automatic win for the Bucs when facing a rookie quarterback.

Yet Bowles did torment Justin Fields as a rookie in 2021 when the Bucs beat the Bears, 38-3. Fields was sacked four times and threw three interceptions and fumbled twice in that game. And Fields’ size and mobility is more akin to Daniels, although Washington’s rookie is much more efficient passer.

The last time the Bucs faced a rookie quarterback in the season opener was back in 2015 when former head coach and defensive play-caller Lovie Smith was ill-prepared for Marcus Mariota, the No. 2 overall pick that year. Smith’s defense was “not Tennessee-ready.”

Mariota set an NFL record for most touchdowns in a half of a debut by a rookie quarterback with four. He completed 13-of-15 passes for 209 yards (86.7%) and a perfect 158.3 QB rating in a 42-14 victory over the Bucs, which also ruined Jameis Winston’s debut in Tampa Bay.

Ex-Bucs HC Lovie Smith – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

The beatdown was so bad that Mariota sat out the fourth quarter of that game. It was obvious that Smith only watched Titans preseason footage of Mariota and didn’t spend any time watching Oregon film where Mariota and the Ducks offense used a ton of RPO (run-pass option).

Mariota RPO’d the crap out of Smith’s defense that day. And that was the beginning of the end of Smith’s tenure in Tampa Bay as he was thankfully fired at the end of the season.

Bowles needs to use a myriad of disguised coverages and exotic blitzes to confuse Daniels and treat him like the rookie quarterback he is. The common denominator in all three of the Bucs’ NFC South championship seasons over the past three years is starting off the season with a win. That needs to happen again in the 2024 season opener.

FAB 4. Solve The Puzzle That Is Jared Goff

Bucs head coach Todd Bowles and Lions QB Jared Goff – Photo by: USA Today

The beauty of having the NFL schedule out is that teams can gameplan for the first couple of opponents all offseason. While the Bucs would love to finally beat the 49ers after suffering two straight losses at San Francisco over the last two seasons, Tampa Bay doesn’t host Brock Purdy and Co. until Week 10.

That’s way too far out to start studying 49ers film and putting in a game plan. Who knows which San Francisco players will not suit up due to injury by the time November 10 rolls around?

But closely studying early-season opponents like Washington in Week 1 and Detroit in Week 2 makes a lot of sense for Todd Bowles and his staff. We’ve already talked about the need to get a jump on watching film of Jayden Daniels and the Commanders’ new offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury, who spent last season with Lincoln Riley as an offensive assistant at USC.

The fact that the Bucs have their rematch versus the Lions in Week 2 at Detroit also affords Bowles the chance to really put some additional time in trying to solve the puzzle that is Jared Goff. Not much will change with the Lions from last year to Week 2 of the 2024 season because of the continuity of the coaching staff and Detroit’s roster.

Lions QB Jared Goff – Photo by: USA Today

In a 20-6 win at Tampa Bay last year, Goff completed 30-of-44 passes for 353 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions. He was sacked three times but completed 68.2% of his passes. Then in the postseason, Goff put up nearly identical numbers against Bowles and his defense, which had no answer for him in January.

In the 31-23 playoff win at Detroit, Goff completed 30-of-43 passes for 287 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions. He was sacked just twice and completed 69.8% percent of his passes against Tampa Bay.

The Lions are one of the teams to beat in the NFC if the Bucs want to truly contend for another Super Bowl any time soon. Figuring out a way to slow down Goff and effectively pressure him into mistakes is something Bowles needs to spend some extra time this summer figuring out.

Week 2 and the much-anticipated rematch with the Lions will be here before we know it.

FAB 5. Todd Bowles Needs To Self-Scout His Use Of Timeouts

I can’t remember all of the instances in which Todd Bowles should have called a timeout last year, especially in the first half of games, which was a rarity. But I do remember him seldom calling first half timeouts and taking all three into halftime too often.

Then there was the failed usage of his final timeout at the end of the playoff loss at Detroit, which was a gaffe and drew the ire of plenty of Bucs fans and justifiable criticism from the media.

One of Bowles’ bigger mistakes was not using a timeout strategically and discussing a clock management error with the officials at the end of the Houston game, which could have produced a very different outcome in game in which his defense was the culprit, letting the Texans score a touchdown with just a few seconds left to win the game.

Pewter Report had some fun at Bowles’ expense when he actually called a rare first half timeout in Tampa Bay’s 21-18 home win over Carolina.

And we wondered aloud on social media if Bowles was going to use any timeouts in the first half in the Bucs’ 34-20 win at Green Bay.

Coaches hate burning timeouts to avoid delay of game calls and the five-yard penalty that comes with it. I can’t recall Bowles doing that much at all last year as Baker Mayfield did a very good job of managing the clock.

Bucs HC Todd Bowles – Photo by: USA Today

I believe Bowles wanted to keep his first half timeouts until around the two-minute warning in case he had a chance to save them for his offense to make a last-minute push for a score before halftime. That’s understandable, but that only happened a handful of times in 2023 and there were other instances when he could have saved more time for the two-minute drill by calling timeouts earlier in the second half.

For some reason, Bowles seemed to collect timeouts like little kids collect rocks and put them in their pocket. He needs to spend a full day this summer in his office just poring through last year’s games and looking for instances where he should have called timeout, but didn’t, and analyze why that didn’t happen.

Six timeouts are given to head coaches each game for a reason. Too often, Bowles didn’t call them enough. Part of his growth as a game manager this year needs to be better timeout usage.

BONUS: Don’t Miss The Latest Pewter Report Podcast Episode With Bucs GM Jason Licht

If you’re looking for something to do over Memorial Day Weekend, make sure you watch the latest Pewter Report Podcast from Thursday with special guest Bucs general manager Jason Licht, who joined me and Adam Slivon for an hour’s worth of Bucs talk and discussion about the 2024 season.

Licht even broke some news on the Pewter Report Podcast, so check it out and leave a comment on our PewterReportTV YouTube page.