Sad pass rush.
Well, this sort of pops the balloon on the perception that Bucs coach Todd Bowles is a master of scheming up ways to create sacks.
First, storytime from Joe.
We go back to the 2018 combine. There, behind the drapes near the interview room where general managers, coaches and players at various times through the week would take to a podium to speak with assembled #NFLMedia from around the nation, the Tampa Bay pen and mic club sat at a circular table where then-Bucs coach Dirk Koetter also sat.
Koetter sat to Joe’s left at the table, separated by one person. Joe cannot specifically remember the exact question he asked Koetter, but it was related to rushing the quarterback, which, at the time, the Bucs were truly pathetic at.
While Joe doesn’t exactly remember the question, Joe will never forget Koetter’s response. Koetter leaned over slightly and gave Joe one of those glares that the eyes go right through you and Koetter said in a very, very firm, slightly raised voice, almost in a controlled anger:
“We cannot have just 22 sacks!” Koetter said.
Unknown to anyone in that drapes-for-walls room, with the possible exception of Koetter, was that Bucs AC/DC-loving general manager Jason Licht that very week began setting the groundwork for acquiring Jason Pierre-Paul from the Giants for a third-round pick.
It was and may forever be Licht’s greatest heist. Three seasons later, JPP was shedding tears, and Licht was spilling Stella Artois on the Vince Lombardi Trophy.
Koetter’s anger about the lack of sacks that cold day in Indianapolis is still fresh in Joe’s memory. Joe never got the impression Bowles had ever been half that upset about this same subject.
Why does Joe bring all of this up? Because NFL.com editor Gennaro Filice documented that the Bucs’ 38 sacks last season was the worst for the Bucs since that dreadful 22-sack season of 2017 which Koetter referenced in a minor fit of frustration.
And for all the people that scoff at a lack of an edge rush and try to tell you Bowles is a master at designing schemes to get sacks, Filice detailed, perhaps that Bowles magic is a bit overblown. At least it was last season.
Buccaneers’ biggest draft goal: Snag a sack artist
Tampa Bay hasn’t had a single player record double-digit sacks in any of the past four seasons. In fact, no Buccaneer has even reached eight sacks during that span. Todd Bowles has a reputation for scheming up sacks via exotic blitzes, but considering the team just posted its lowest sack total (37) since 2017, it’s high time to find a true QB hunter. Jason Licht knows it: “We need to get more pressure on the quarterback,” Tampa’s general manager said at the NFL Scouting Combine. No wonder everyone is mocking Akheem Mesidor to the Bucs at No. 15.
Joe has been screaming this for years. But whenever Bowles is pressed about an edge rusher, Bowles answers almost without fail about how the Bucs ask their edge rushers to do other things.
Maybe it’s time to let an edge rusher focus on the one reason why he was drafted in the first place?
But you know what, if you want to absolve Bowles of all of this like some believe and horsewhip Licht over this, consider the last time the Bucs drafted a stud edge rusher was the very first draft pick in franchise history, Lee Roy Selmon in 1979.
Selmon is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
So for whatever reason, this Bucs franchise in the draft consistently whiffs in the first round on the two most important players on a football team: Quarterback and edge rusher. For 50 years, with the exception of Selmon, who was also the No. 1 pick in his draft class.
Here is one thing that concerns Joe about the Bucs drafting an edge rusher at No. 15: Whether the pick is Ahkeem Mesidor, Rueben Bain, Keldric Faulk or pick your favorite pass rusher. Who among us is willing to bet $100 that this guy gets 10-12 sacks this year and helps save Bowles’ job?