Today felt like a Tampa Bay Buccaneers practice.

There was heat, heat and more heat, but also some offense to go with it. After a few days in a row where the defense clearly got the better of the offense, head coach Dirk Koetter’s side of the ball showed glimpses of what they were capable of on Friday.

For the M.I.A. report, veterans Chris Baker and Robert Ayers weren’t in pads today. There wasn’t an injury for either during the previous practices, so this was likely just a rest day for both. For Baker, Koetter alluded to the need for him to be in better shape. Baker being out for a second day in six practices proves that to be somewhat true. Baker was absent from most of the voluntary workouts earlier in the offseason, though he was a participant at all three mini camp practices.

Now let’s move on to the main event.

1-Minute Drill

The Bucs started off their scrimmage portion of practice with a 1-minute drill. The team had one minute with no timeouts to get the ball down into field goal range or into the end zone from the opponent’s 20 yard line.

For the first team, their opening play was a big one to new comer wide receiver, DeSean Jackson.

Jackson has had a quiet few days, so to see him get the first look – and convert – right of the bat, in crunch time, was good to see.

On the second play, the team once again went to Jackson, but in a different way. This team has already shown they’re not afraid to expand the route tree with Jackson. They’re looking to use his speed in short, intermediate and long distances. Jackson matched up against any safety or linebacker is a death wish for a defense.

Three in a row? Three in a row.

On three different routes of three different distances, the team went back-to-back-to-back to Jackson on the drive, though he did drop the one shown above.

What we learned from that was that not only is this team not afraid to send Jackson on all kinds of routes, but they’re also willing to feed the hot hand if they’re connecting.

On the fourth play, with not much time left on the clock (no timeouts, remember), Winston connected with Brate over the middle to get his team in the red zone and set up and easy kick for Roberto Aguayo – who nailed it.

Points on the board, and a success in the drill for the first team.

For the second team, which featured Chris Godwin and O.J. Howard, Godwin was the feature player.

Godwin got the first two targets of the drive, the first (shown above) that went for a big gain, and the second which was a short gain off a quick slant route.

The next two passes were incomplete from quarterback Ryan Griffin, who ran with the second team on this scrimmage, and Folk and Aguayo were called upon to make a very long field goals (about 55 yards).

Both made it, and another success, this time for the second team.

Big Names, Big Plays

We’ll start by saying this: the defense is playing Evans tough in practice. They’re treating Evans like the No. 1 option he is, and though he’s had some targets (with some drops), you can tell the defense is keying on him like they would for Julio Jones or Odell Beckham Jr.

Evans had a very nice one-handed catch in warm ups this morning before practice began, and that mood carried on throughout the day. On the play above, Evans took advantage of a longer route that had the defense confused.

Jackson was seen later in the day running that same sort of route with the same kind of success.

Jackson’s route was part of a mesh concept, which is when two routes cross each other in the middle. Usually that kind of route can cause confusion for the safeties, and if your receivers are fast enough to get by the man coverage, it results in ways like we saw above.

Expect to see more mesh looks from this offense as they continue to grow.

Even slot receiver Adam Humphries got in on the deep ball action today. During a half-field, what would be 7-on-7 kind of drill, Humphries took cornerback Brent Grimes down the field, and made a nice catch over the shoulder down the middle of the field.

Humphries is proving he can do it all for the kind of receiver he is.

From the Notepad

• After today, Aguayo is clearly the top kicker in camp. He was perfect on the day (7-for-7), which included two made field goals from the narrow goal posts. Koetter even called him “lights out.” Folk finished the day strong by making his final kick on the narrow goal post, but so did Aguayo. This battle is shifting in the young man’s favor.
• Josh Huff was having a nice day in practice today before leaving with an injury. It was on a deep pass down the middle which he caught through contact and hit the ground along with the defender. The trainers came out to look at him, but eventually he walked up under his own power, so he might have just gotten the wind knocked out of him.
• The team ran a good amount of red zone work today. Though Winston was very efficient and on a roll during the 1-minute drill, he was shaky in the red zone. He still needs to get better with less space – including missing Evans by just over throwing him.
• With Baker and Ayers out today, we got to see who the next in line would be on early downs. It was Clinton McDonald in place of Baker and DaVonte Lamber in place of Ayers.
• Wide receiver Derel Walker had a very nice day. He caught a touchdown in the red zone drill, and had a handful of tough catches and good routes to go with it. He’s one of those players very close to that cut line – in a good way.
• Though we didn’t feature him above, tight end Howard had a strong day. He only got a few targets, but seemed to make the most of them, including this long pass over the middle with a good run after the catch.

From the Stands: Fan Spotlight

After practice, linebacker Lavonte David hosted 20 kids from Big Brothers Big Sisters of Tampa Bay to come out and have some football fun with a few of the players.

David, along with the help of fellow linebackers Devante Bond and Jeff Knox, ran the kids through various football drills.  These kinds of things are always enjoyable for all ages. Some of the kids are playing with a football who haven’t before, and others you can tell really love the game already.

It’s cool for David to put in the time and effort to not only put this on, but put on a smile and be energetic and excited for all of these kids right after a two hour workout.

A selfless and classy move from David – which is expected if you know him.

Practice resumes again tomorrow morning before the team takes a mandatory break on Sunday.