Bucs “didn’t improve.”
Here we go again.
Last year at this time there were two constant reasons folks who live and type north of the Florida-Georgia line (in most cases, way far north) gave for the Bucs to have a tailspin last season. It was parroted so often Joe heard the two excuses in his sleep.
\* Damaged goods Kirk Cousins will lead the Dixie Chicks to the Super Bowl!
\* The Bucs didn’t do anything in free agency.
The latter irked Bucs AC/DC-loving general manager Jason Licht. He couldn’t understand how bringing back key starters from a division winner was somehow a bad thing.
Rewind the tape.
In doing sort of a power ranking of teams after free agency, Jeff Kerr of CBS seems to be taking a page from last year. Kerr has the Bucs as the 10th-ranked team in the NFC — nine teams better in conference including the bungling Bears and the 49ers!
(Wait a minute, a division winner who keeps its stars — bad! But a non-playoff team that lost seemingly a half-dozen of its stars — good! That’s a headscratcher.)
Kerr did confess the Bucs are still kings of the NFC South but [“didn’t improve.”](https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/ranking-nfc-teams-after-first-wave-of-nfl-free-agency-eagles-on-top-despite-losses-lions-commanders-behind/)
> …The best team in the NFC South is still the best team in the NFC South. The Buccaneers didn’t improve, but kept key players like Chris Godwin, Lavonte David and Ben Bredeson. Tampa Bay will end up getting a home playoff game and will be a tough out for any team.
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> This team is better than its ranking, but are the Buccaneers a Super Bowl contender? They’ll have to make a playoff run in 2025 for that to happen, but there’s plenty to like about this team in this division.
Kerr is right in that if the Bucs think they are a contender, then win some playoff games. Who can disagree with that? However, if the Bucs are better than he ranked them, why did he rank them at No. 10?
Joe’s hangup with Kerr’s analysis revolves around the word “improve.” Joe thinks the Bucs have for a few reasons.
The first is the Bucs didn’t have Chris Godwin for the final two months of last season including the playoff game. Think a healthy Godwin might have been a positive factor against the Commandos?
So yeah, that’s a major improvement right there (assuming Godwin is 100 percent).
The second area improvement Joe sees is three rookie starters on offense, two of which were major cogs, are no longer rookies. Don’t think that won’t help the offense?
Then, of course, is the signing of Haason Reddick. The Bucs had zero edge rush last year. If Reddick is close to the same guy he was with the Eagles, Joe thinks he will have a major impact up and down the defensive line. That’s not an improvement?
However, to be fair here, the hidden curveball is Kerr is also an Eagles beat writer for CBS Philadelphia.
Maybe Kerr knows something about Reddick that the rest of us don’t?
But yeah, get ready for more analysis from afar that the Bucs didn’t do anything in free agency, didn’t improve and will have a setback as a result.
How did that narrative work out last fall?