Baker Mayfield Makes Concerning Admission After Loss To The Patriots

Baker, Bucs lacking 'killer instinct'

Speaking to reporters after Tampa's five-point loss, Mayfield spoke on the Buccaneers' mindset and what went wrong during Sunday's interconference tilt.

“Like I said, lack of execution. There is a certain point — we are a good team, but to be great, when you score on the opening drive, you know what it looks like, you set the tone, you’re not satisfied with it. You come back and in your head, it’s 0-0 and you go do it again," the former No. 1 pick explained (via NBC's ProFootballTalk).

"Right now, I think we are lacking that on offense and it comes down to me — that is my job to get that fixed and I will do that.”

Mayfield: 'Guys should be pissed'

Continuing to field questions following the defeat, the two-time Pro Bowler went on to challenge his team going into their next game.

“Offensively, I’m hoping our guys do get pissed off about this,” he said. “This isn’t the end of our season. I know that. We still have very important games ahead of us. Games like this, when you don’t win them, it should sting. It should really, really hurt,” the QB said.

"You have to have some pride about you,” Baker continued. “You’ve got to have the fear of that failure of messing up for your teammates. When we talk about something, you’ve got to have that responsibility and accountability for the guys around you and get it fixed. In tight ball games like this when you play a good team like the Patriots, little things will get you beat.”

The Bucs travel to Buffalo next week for a 1 PM ET game vs. Josh Allen and the Bills who are coming off an extremely disappointing loss to the now 3-7 Dolphins.

Tampa Bay still has a decent lead over the Carolina Panthers and the rest of the division. But they definitely have some things to clean up before they're able to reinsert themselves into the NFC contender discussion.