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Pewter Report’s Scott Reynolds answers your questions from the @PewterReport Twitter account this week in the Bucs Mailbag. Submit your question to the Bucs Mailbag each week via Twitter using the hashtag #PRMailbag.  Here are the Bucs questions we chose to answer for this week’s edition.

QUESTION: The remaining schedule looks pretty favorable for the Bucs. Can they run the table the rest of the regular season?

Bucs RB Bucky Irving – Photo by: USA Today

ANSWER: The rest of Tampa Bay’s schedule does indeed look favorable – from the win-loss column. But a closer look at the 3-8 Panthers, whom the Bucs play on Sunday in Carolina, shows that Dave Canales’ team won two in a row and then tied Kansas City late at home at 27-27 only to lose to Patrick Mahomes and Co. at the very end by a field goal.

Without starting quarterback Dak Prescott, Dallas improved to 4-7 on the year thanks to two touchdown passes by backup Cooper Rush. The Cowboys upset the Commanders, 34-26, and looked formidable doing it. Tampa Bay plays at Dallas in Week 16 on Sunday Night Football.

This is the NFL and there aren’t many easy wins in this league. The Bucs will be favored in possibly five of their next six games with the probable lone exception being the game in Los Angeles against the 6-3 Chargers. But as Washington found out – and Kansas City almost did, too – being favored and having a better record does not guarantee a victory.

Can the Bucs run the table? Theoretically, yes. But I don’t know if this team could pull off a seven-game winning streak due to the injuries that always seem to strike. The Bucs got wide receiver Mike Evans and cornerback Jamel Dean back in Week 12 but then saw safety Jordan Whitehead and outside linebacker Joe Tryon-Shoyinka leave the game with injuries.

The last time Bucs won a similar amount of games was in 2020 when Tampa Bay won eight straight coming off the bye and a 7-5 start en route to winning Super Bowl LV. That was a more talented team and a healthier one. The Bucs beat a bad Giants team on Sunday and did so in convincing fashion. That should provide a boost of confidence, but that may not translate into wins each week. I still think there’s a chance the Bucs lose at least one – if not two – down the stretch. I hope I’m wrong.

QUESTION: Why does Todd Bowles continue to play his most valuable players late in blowout games?

ANSWER: I assume you are talking about leaving quarterback Baker Mayfield in the game in the fourth quarter, 30-7, after he suffered a stinger in his neck and shoulder area while trying to recover a fumbled exchange with running back Rachaad White. This coming after the Bucs lost wide receiver Chris Godwin for the season with less than a minute left of the Ravens game in Week 7 with Tampa Bay trailing by 10 points.

I tried to tell Todd Bowles to take Mayfield out of the game with a fourth quarter post on X, but I don’t think the Bucs head coach was checking social media at the time.

If the Bucs lose Mayfield to an injury, their playoff hopes are absolutely dashed. So I don’t see the sound strategy in playing him late in a blowout game. If it’s a one-score game or even a two-score game, I can see Bowles leaving Mayfield in. But Tampa Bay was up by 23 points. The safer play was to get Mayfield out of harm’s way, especially after he suffered that stinger.

QUESTION: Why can’t Kyle Trask get a little playing time in an obvious blowout?

Bucs RB Bucky Irving and QB Kyle Trask – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

ANSWER: I would have loved to have seen backup quarterback Kyle Trask enter the game in the fourth quarter with the Bucs beating the Giants 30-7. There was no reason to subject Baker Mayfield to potential harm after building a 23-point lead. That would have been the perfect time to put in Trask to get him some valuable snaps considering how few snaps he’s taken in NFL regular season games. It was a wasted opportunity because blowout wins rarely occur in the NFL with most games coming down to the final possession.

Just look at the experience that swing tackle Justin Skule gained during those four games where he replaced Luke Goedeke at right tackle. Skule had a rough start in Detroit in Week 2, but then got better each week. That playing time paid dividends for him when he had to replace Tristan Wirfs at left tackle against San Francisco and again in New York against the Giants.

Skule played well because he was used to playing. If the Bucs would have to turn to Trask to win games this season in case something were to happen to Mayfield, wouldn’t you want the most experienced version of Trask possible? That only happens with him getting some actual playing time. That’s hard to do in the regular season unless the starter gets injured. The only other opportunity is in garbage time, which is a rarity in the NFL given the close nature of most games.

I think the Bucs missed an opportunity to get Trask some reps against the Giants. There is value in him with operational things like just taking snaps from center Graham Barton and turning around and handing the ball off to the running backs. Hopefully the Bucs won’t need Trask down the stretch because Mayfield stays healthy.

QUESTION: Why at the end of the game are they not running Sean Tucker instead of Rachaad White? It makes no sense.

Bucs RB Sean Tucker – Photo by: USA Today

ANSWER: I agree with you, and I wonder how much Sean Tucker’s goal line fumble and his muffed kickoff return played a role in him not seeing action at the end of the game. Tucker only finished the game with three yards and a touchdown on four carries. Granted, two of those carries were at the goal line, so that’s going to hurt his average. Tucker also had a seven-yard catch after he fumbled, so it was good to see offensive coordinator Liam Coen go back to him after the fumble.

But three of Tucker’s carries came on the first drive of the game and he was seldom used after that. I’m not sure that he played much in the second half and certainly wasn’t used to close the game out. I would have liked to have seen Bucky Irving get some carries at the end as he was 13 yards away from his first 100-yard game. Irving finished with 87 yards on 12 carries, which is an astounding 7.3-yard average. He also ripped off a career-high 56-yard run, which tied White for the longest run of the season in Tampa Bay.

White also finished with 12 carries, with six of them coming on the final handoffs of the game for Tampa Bay. Irving didn’t get a carry after his fumble late in the fourth quarter, but replays showed that the ground caused the fumble. Perhaps Coen thought Irving fumbled it and that’s why he turned to White. Or perhaps he wanted to pad White’s stats a bit, but that wasn’t really successful as he finished with just 37 yards, a 3.1-yard average and a touchdown on the day.

I wish Tucker had been in there at the end. He needs more experience and that would have been the perfect environment to allow that to happen up 23 points late in the fourth quarter. Especially since White didn’t pick up a third-and-2 and then a fourth-and-1 on Tampa Bay’s final offensive plays.

QUESTION: How do we see our defense adjusting with Jordan Whitehead out moving forward? I feel like he’s been off this year but hate to see that.

Bucs SS Jordan Whitehead and Giants QB Tommy DeVito – Photo by: USA Today

ANSWER: Well, it’s a good thing the Bucs claimed safety Mike Edwards off waivers last week. Edwards spent his first four years in Tampa Bay playing in Todd Bowles’ defense after being a third-round pick in 2019. He helped the Bucs get to and win Super Bowl LV in 2020 but wasn’t re-signed after the 2022 season.

After spending the 2023 season in Kansas City helping the Chiefs win another Super Bowl, Edwards tried his luck in Buffalo and then Tennessee before being waived and landing back in Tampa Bay. That’s a good thing because Jordan Whitehead may have suffered a serious pectoral injury trying to make a tackle on Giants quarterback Tommy DeVito. If it’s a pec strain, then Whitehead will miss a few games. If it’s a torn pec, Whitehead could be out for the year.

In either case the Bucs are fortunate to have Edwards who is capable of filling in at strong safety. He’s better in coverage and a better ballhawk than Whitehead, but he’s probably not as good in run support. Bowles heaped a lot of praise on Edwards in his first game back with the Bucs. He filled in for Whitehead at the end, but also played in a three-safety dime defense that Bowles deployed on third downs and obvious passing downs on Sunday in New York.

“I think it all starts with Mike Edwards,” Bowles said after Sunday’s win over the Giants. “You know Mike allows us to do certain things. He allows Antoine to be Antoine and Jordan to be Jordan. He allowed the ‘backers to free up some things for us, and it gets the D-line to tee off when you know you’ve got a safety valve back there that can see a lot of things. So it really helped us. And I know it doesn’t look like it helped us because he was in the back, but he really helped us up front and let those guys go.”