Buccaneers Beat Seahawks 38-35 and I Might Not Survive if Every Game is Like This

Both the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Seattle Seahawks need to go back to the drawing board and figure out what the hell went wrong on defense.

The Creamsicle clad Buccaneers defeated the Seattle Seahawks and their 12th-Man 38-35.

My dad gave a prediction at the mid point of the game during the endless scoring onslaught that the defense would step up for the final play. I looked at him like he was insane. Well, he had the last laugh.

I predicted this game would be a slog because of the great defenses. Well apparently this was a throwback to the 2018 Rams/Chiefs game because no defense showed up.

I’m going to break tradition and go with what was bad first. The whole defense. All of it. It was despicable. No one player truly had a good performance. Yeah Lavonte David had the game sealing pick, but he once again missed a lot of tackles. Tykee also didn’t look good in coverage but he had the fumble recovery. None of the DBs looked like they played football before. The few times they were in position, their hands stopped working or Sam Darnold somehow threw the most perfect pass imaginable.

Oh, and speaking of hands, would you be shocked to learn the defense failed to catch interceptions. Zyon McCollum whiffed on a pass at the end of the first half that would’ve gone 100 yards the other way. He had two hands on it and still only managed to knock it away. And Yaya deflected a ball that instead of being picked, led to a catch and eventually a 99 yard TD drive.

The pass rush also had zero interest in taking Sam Darnold down. The few times they were close to him, he just slipped out of it and threw a perfect pass. It was a truly perfect mixture of terrible coverage and no pass rush.

With all that said, Seattle’s defense was probably worse. At least sometimes the Buccaneers DBs were on screen when Darnold dotted up JSN and Cooper Kupp. The Seahawks just kinda let Baker Mayfield do whatever he wanted. There were so many guys open in the middle of the field I thought we traded them Sirvocea Dennis. Baker is legitimately making a case for MVP. Near perfect on the day. 29/33 for 379 yards and 2 TDs. Masterclass performance. And Emeka is making an easy case for offensive rookie of the year. He had 7 receptions for 123 yards and a TD. He’s a big reason as to why Baker’s average depth of target was over ten yards. Hell even Cade Otton and Tez Johnson made big plays as receivers. Play action was also a big reason why as Baker had over 120 yards on PA plays.

Rachaad White also showed why he is the most underappreciated player. He legit does so much little stuff right. I’ve said it before, but he needs to be more of a focal point even when Bucky comes back. His stats don’t look impressive, but he gave it his all and still had two TDs at the end of the day. Which was good as Sean Tucker looked completely dead. What few chances he had he looked pretty ineffective.

After this game, I have no idea what to think of this team. They have grinded through a hard stretch of the season barely winning these games. Usually the defense is the reason why they’ve stayed in them, but today it was all offense. Grizzard and Baker bailed out the complete incompetence that the defense showed outside the turnovers. I guess we just have to hope getting Dean and Morrison back will solve most of the problems, but then you’re still left with a pass rush that can get pressure, but not sacks. Bowles has managed to keep the Buccaneers afloat, but hopefully he can get the defense working. Because not every team will equal you in injuries.