Not an All-Pro day.
Joe is trying to be disciplined and not overreact. But it is concerning.
Consider KitKat-eating Todd Bowles has never found a way to beat an AFC North team. Never. Not even the lousy, laughable Browns.
Joe thinks that has to do with the AFC North playing rough-and-tumble, old-school football. If you cannot trade punches with the Steelers and the Crows, you simply will not win in the AFC South.
The Bucs still have that soft stench to them, though it has been stifled a bit.
The offensive line got pushed around today. Baker Mayfield didn’t have too much time to throw. When he tried to buy time or fake-pumped a pass, he usually got blasted from behind and fumbled.
Two blindside hits caused Mayfield to fumble twice. A third Bucs’ fumble came by way of Bucky Irving.
The first of Mayfield’s fumbles turned into a scoop-and-score by Cincinnati. A third fumble in the fourth quarter when the Bucs looked to be mounting a scoring drive trailing 30-20, Joe cannot pin that on Tristan Wirfs. Mayfield pumped several times on the play.
Mayfield’s first fumble? He got blasted from behind after Myles Murphy first engaged Wirfs and then ran around him to the outside. Murphy kept up his pursuit of Mayfield and clobbered him just as Mayfield was about to release the ball.
So Joe thought the strength of the Bucs was the offensive line. They got pushed around today like they were a little brother.
Joe’s not going to go nuts because the Bucs often struggle with physical teams like AFC North teams. But that same offensive line for which Joe has high standards really needs to pick up its game to face the Browns in a week.