Need more than NFC South titles.
When the Bucs boast they have been the beasts of the NFC South in this decade (but have done little else), Joe can hear Bucs fans groan from Bartow to Venice.
NFL owners love winning divisions for obvious reasons. It’s an extra home game and all the rivers of revenue that come with it. NFL people, from coaches to suits, like to say winning a division is hard.
Joe doesn’t dispute that. But fans, rightly so, don’t care after maybe one division title.
For fans, a division title is not something to brag about. If a team can’t do anything but win a division, that’s not a humble brag for fans, it’s an embarrassment.
A division title is nothing more than a stepping stone for fans. If a team can’t do more, then fans believe there is something wrong.
At SI.com, Nicholas Selbe ranked each NFL division. He has the NFC South as the worst.
Joe agrees and also believes Selbe described the Bucs’ plight of many division titles but zero NFC championship appearances since 2020 to be spot-on.
The Buccaneers are talented, but they usually play down to the competition level of the teams in the weakest division in football, which might explain why the NFC South seems to constantly come down to the final weeks of the regular season.
The Bucs often play down to opponents. How often in the last four years have the Bucs blown out an opponent? Not nearly as much as they should have.
Too often, the Bucs play close games (6-6 in one-score games last year). And when you play close games, guess what? You keep the opponent in the game. And when you keep an opponent in the game, you are setting yourself up to lose.
Playing close games isn’t a quality brag. If anything, team leaders often should hang their heads in shame for allowing a lesser opponents in a game, or worse.