NBC Sports’ long-time NFL reporter Peter King has an ominous prediction for the 2022 Bucs. King may be the only NFL reporter to date that does not have Tampa Bay winning the NFC South division title for a second straight year.

Instead, he picks New Orleans to beat Tampa Bay – again. King has the Saints taking back the NFC South crown with a lofty 12-5 prediction. That record is tied with Green Bay, but the Saints claims the No. 1 seed in the NFC due to a tiebreaker.

Pewter Report’s Scott Reynolds picks the Bucs to win one more game than King does to finish 11-6. But Reynolds does have Tampa Bay holding off New Orleans to win the NFC South again. Read all of the Pewter Reporters’ 2022 predictions in the latest PR Roundtable.

The Saints finished 9-8 last year and just missed the playoffs in Sean Payton’s final season as head coach. Defensive coordinator Dennis Allen takes over this year, and King likes his mastery over Tom Brady and Co.

King’s Reasoning For Picking Saints Over Bucs

King writes: “Note of the week: Saints have beaten Tom Brady’s Bucs in all four regular-season meetings, and none of the four has been a one-score game.”

As for Brady and Tampa Bay, King has this to say: “Just too much noise and too many injuries around this team. Talent, and Brady, makes the Bucs still a factor.”

Bucs QB Tom Brady – Photo by: USA Today

King waxes poetic about the Saints: “I’ve gotten smitten with the Saints this summer. I love how they turned a weak wide receiver corps in 2021 into the biggest strength on the roster with a big if—if Michael Thomas can come back to health after two injury-ruined seasons. Rookie Chris Olave and homecoming vet Jarvis Landry give the receiver group a shot of adrenaline that will help Jameis Winston be the best he can be coming off his torn ACL.

The Saints were smart to add insurance in top backup Andy Dalton. It’s unsaid around the team and a bit of an elephant in the room: If Winston struggles or is gimpy, Dalton will be a good guy to bring out of the bullpen, to keep the Saints winning.

One key question is how much the offense will miss Sean Payton’s imagination. He was a bit of a nutty professor in quarterback and offensive meetings. I wrote about this in 2018—Payton once practiced a quarterback-less formation, with Drew Brees and Taysom Hill both split wide, until the last few seconds on the play clock when Hill hustled behind center to take a direct snap and run with it. Will that be missed, or will offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael continue the mind-bending offensive stuff? We’ll see.

Dennis Allen knows he inherited a great situation. As he told me in the preseason: “It’s like walking into your house on Thanksgiving and the table’s set and the food’s ready. All I’ve got to do is carve the turkey.” The Saints think they’ve got a long-term star at corner opposite Marshon Lattimore in the 6-1, 195-pound Paulsen Adabo who is nursing a sore ankle entering the season that’s not thought to be serious. All in all, I like the team that’s 4-1 against the Bucs since the arrival of Tom Brady to unseat Tampa in the AFC South.

King has Tampa Bay claiming the sixth seed ahead of the San Francisco 49ers, who also have a 10-7 record. The 49ers hold the tiebreaker over the Cowboys, which gets them in the postseason.

According to King, the Bucs upset the Eagles, the No. 3 seed, in the Wild Card Playoffs in Philadelphia. Tampa Bay then travels to New Orleans where the Saints beat the Bucs in the Divisional Playoffs. But King has the Packers beating the Saints in New Orleans in the NFC Championship Game before losing to Buffalo in Super Bowl LVII.

King also has Saints wide receiver Chris Olave winning the NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year award, and Allen coming in second for the NFL Coach of the Year honors. Saints quarterback Jameis Winston finishes third in the NFL Comeback Player of the Year award.

Former Bucs Coaches Get Recognition

King also listed three former Tampa Bay coaches as difference-makers around the league this year.

Difference-making assistant coaches

Former Bucs DL coach Joe Cullen – Photo by Cliff Welch/PR

1. Joe Cullen, defensive line, Kansas City. Remember the oddest result of 2021? Jacksonville 9, Buffalo 6, with Josh Allen being totally frustrated all day. That was the handiwork of Cullen in his one season as Jags’ defensive coordinator. Cullen should work wonders with lots of toys on the KC line, buttressed by rookie edge guy George Karlaftis.

2. Rich Bisaccia, special teams, Green Bay. After the Packers lost the divisional game to the Niners on a blocked punt last January, they made Bisaccia (reportedly) the highest-paid special-teams coach in history and gave him the authority to use players from all over the roster to resuscitate the morbid kicking game. He told the players: “The only ‘I’ I want to hear in here is, ‘What can I do to help us win?’” Results should follow.

3. Raheem Morris, defensive coordinator, LA Rams. I documented his coaching wiles two weeks ago in this space, pointing out how he picked out rookie linebacker Ernest Jones to change roles at halftime of the Super Bowl, and his pass-rush in the second half helped unnerve Joe Burrow. Morris will have a major impact on incorporating new blood on a run to repeat.

Cullen was Tampa Bay’s defensive line coach under Lovie Smith from 2014-15. Bisaccia was the Bucs special teams coordinator under Jon Gruden from 2002-08. And Morris was an assistant defensive backs coach under Mike Tomlin in Tampa Bay before becoming the Bucs head coach from 2009-11.

King’s Accurate Super Bowl Predictions

Whether you like King’s predictions or not, he has accurately nailed the last four Super Bowl winners, including the Bucs in 2020.

Anyway, my last four preseason Super Bowl picks in Football Morning in America, followed by the result of the real game:

Super Bowl 56: Rams over Buffalo (Rams 23, Cincinnati 20).

Super Bowl 55: Tampa Bay over Baltimore (Tampa Bay 31, Kansas City 9).

Super Bowl 54: Kansas City over New Orleans (KC 31, San Francisco 20).

Super Bowl 53: New England over Rams (New England 13, Rams 3).