Each week after every Bucs game, we’ll take a closer look at the snap count distribution for the Tampa Bay offense and defense. We’ll assess what we can learn from who played the most and least from the game.

Here is a closer view of of which players received the highest and lowest number of snaps in the Bucs’ 23-17 overtime loss on Sunday against the Browns in Week 12.

Bucs Offense

With Leonard Fournette out with a hip injury, the Bucs rode Rachaad White for the majority of the game. He played 62 out of a possible 69 snaps, which was good for 90%. This was the most playing time of his young career and White was involved often, rushing 14 times for 64 yards and making nine catches for 45 yards. Despite being the No. 2 running back, Ke’Shawn Vaughn only participated on nine offensive plays. He played just five snaps in the previous game, so this was not much of an upgrade even with Fournette unavailable. Giovani Bernard, who was just taken off of injured reserve, did not get a snap.

Bucs RB Rachaad White and QB Tom Brady – Photo by: USA Today

It’s evident that the Bucs don’t see Cade Otton as a true No. 1 tight end like we do. After out-snapping Cameron Brate 46-34 in Germany, they were essentially even in playing time on Sunday with Otton getting 36 plays (52%) to Brate’s 35 (51%).

Otton wasn’t a factor in the passing game despite being the better receiver than Brate. He couldn’t get a target while Brate made two receptions for 15 yards. Even Ko Kieft made an impact on the game, catching his first-ever touchdown on a goal line play-action pass from Tom Brady.

While there are a lot of problems to address with Tampa Bay’s offense, it’s good to see a healthy Julio Jones playing. His snap count increased again as he was on for 62% of snaps. Jones has a role with this group and had another solid game with three catches for 40 yards and one rush for 15 yards. It would be best to keep him in this role of around 35-45 snaps per game so he can stay healthy.

Offensive tackle Josh Wells had a small number of snaps, but one of them came in replacement of Tristan Wirfs late in overtime. We’ll see how the prognosis looks, but Wells might be your starting tackle moving forward because of Wirfs’ injury.

Bucs Defense

The Bucs’ secondary had brief injuries all over the place. Carlton Davis got hurt but didn’t miss time as his played happened on a third down stop. Antoine Winfield Jr. was in concussion protocol for a bit and Mike Edwards hurt his knee, but both were able to return. Jamel Dean was tackled on an offensive pass interference that required trainers to look at him, too. These are all players who typically play 100% of the snaps, but only Davis, Devin White and Lavonte David hit that mark this time because of the injury situations.

We saw a combo of Sean Murphy-Bunting (32%) , Dee Delaney (14%) and Zyon McCollum (13%) all involved after the injuries. SMB missed a sack on Jacoby Brissett while McCollum was called for an illegal contact penalty. You also had this play where he and safety Keanu Neal ran into each other.

It wasn’t known if defensive tackle Vita Vea was going to play as he dealt with a foot injury all week. After playing one fewer snap than Akiem Hicks in their previous game, Vea’s numbers were around the same percentages this time around, but Tampa Bay used Hicks much more with 57 snaps at 72%.

There was roughly a similar amount of playing time for the other defensive tackles and outside linebackers. One thing to note was that Carl Nassib had an increase in play, going up from 10% to 33%. He played very well, too, with three tackles, a half sack and a tackle for loss in the game.