What’s Wrong With The Buccaneers Defense?

Look at these stats from the Buccaneers defense and let me know if you think this is good. 28th in points allowed, 31st in yards allowed, and 28th in yards given up per play. All for a defense that is ranked 22nd in epa.

—

The only good news is that two of the teams worse than the Buccaneers in epa are in division with the Falcons and Panthers. But something has gone seriously wrong with this defense, and quite frankly, that should not be true. We have far too much talent to be ranked 28th and hard questions need to be answered. I excused it at first in the Falcons game especially because of injury, but right now, this defense cannot be relied upon for anything of value.

—

It’s hard to solely blame one man for the defensive woes, but an exception can be made here. The man known as KJ Britt. JT Olson referred to him on Twitter as a traffic cone. I have to disagree with him here unfortunately.

—

To call Britt a traffic cone is an insult to the hard working traffic cones of America because a traffic cone while not imposing does convince people usually to not go where they are placed. Britt is the opposite of that. At this point, opposing QBs should do nothing but look towards where Britt is and throw in that direction. KJ Britt cannot play linebacker. He just can’t do that. And I mean that almost literally. PFF, while not being perfect in everything, does a pretty decent job generally of grading players. KJ Britt is graded as the 86th best LB. That is out of 86 eligible players. It’s really bad. And unfortunately, it gets worse.

—

Bend don’t break defense has worked for this team. However, the strategy fails when the defense bends and then breaks. The red zone defense has been ranked at 13th, which is by no means bad, but over the last three weeks, but was ranked 19th for the last three games. And the Ravens game, they allowed a TD 80% of the time. Just for comparison, the Bucs in 2023 had allowed the 20th most yards, but their red zone defense was 3rd best. Not saying that they can’t get back to that; there’s a lot of season left and they are still 13th overall. But the Bucs in 2023 were the epitome of bend don’t break and it did work. You can allow all the yardage in the world, but if the opponent is stymied at the goal line, you can still win games.

—

Then there is the oh so minor problem of our scheming. When the blitz doesn’t hit home, God help us all. Lamar saw the blitz and treated it like a child who threw away a toy they no longer desired. Then there was the soft zone, again being treated like nothing by Lamar. Whenever the Buccaneers are outschemed by the opposing offense, you can really see it. It is almost catastrophic. It’s a good thing they won’t be Facing offensive geniuses like Andy Reid or Kyle Shanahan soon.

—

What’s the solution to all this? Prayer might be a nice start. Truth be told, there really isn’t that much they can do. Benching K.J. Britt might help, but we really don’t know if JJ Russel is any better (how he can possibly be worse fills me with existential dread). But it really is down to either the players playing better or the coaches calling a better game. For right now, the offense will have to carry the load. Not an envious position considering they lost their two best playmakers. But we have to believe Liam Coen can do it.