Buffalo Bills at Tampa Bay Bucs week 14: From Darth Sidious to Darth Vader.
Mike D: Overdue Bills Senior Writer
People have been saying “take me back to 2019” ever since the Pandemic started. Well, I guess the Buffalo Bills decided to go back in time as well. Not in my wildest dreams did I see this coming. We thought we had more time. We thought we had more time not to worry about the Patriots. We thought Mac Jones would take time, and the Patriots would be a middle-of-the-road team. But our thoughts about the Patriots were incorrect. More importantly, our thoughts about our team were wrong. They are an inconsistent mess, with a real chance to miss the playoffs. But a big win over the Bucs would restore some life into the team and the fanbase. Let’s get into it.
Buffalo has a tough game ahead of them. The Buccaneers will give them fits on defense. Let’s start with the main reason, TB12. He has terrorized the Buffalo Bills for 20 years. Obviously, this was when he was a Patriot, but he is just as good as he was then. And now he has some serious weapons. Even in the absence of Antion Brown, he still has a dynamic duo in Mike Evans and Chris Godwin. But I am more worried about the hometown kid, Gronk. He was known to give us the business every time he played us. Just like the Bills have turned back the clock, so has Gronk. He’s been Brady's main man when he is on the field Lastly, we must talk about the running game. Our losses have come from teams that control the line of scrimmage. With the big beast Leonard Fournette, Sean McDermott, Leslie Fraizer, and the entire Bills defense will have a long day.
With all of that said, I am not worried about the defense. Even with them giving up 200+ yards on the ground, they only gave up 14 points. My biggest concern is the identity of the offense. It appears as if the head coach and the offensive coordinator aren’t on the same page. McDermott is constantly talking about the need to establish the run, but Daboll spreads the offense out and throws it. But who can blame him? Giving the ball to the running backs are essentially wasted plays. And for some reason, they refuse to run our best runner, #17. Passing has even been tough. We go halves of football without throwing the ball to Diggs for some reason. It appears that father time is catching up with Cole Beasley and Emmanuel Sanders. I don’t feel comfortable trusting Dawson Knox because you never know when he is going to have butterfingers. Isaiah Mckenzie has been relegated to the bench for some beef McDermott has with him. The only person I am looking forward to seeing more of is Gabe Davis.
As I mentioned in my last article, Buffalo is on a bad pattern of winning a game, losing a game, for the past 8 weeks. But, I wouldn't be upset if that pattern kept going for this week. If Buffalo wants to win the division, getting a win here would be a huge boost. You are playing catch up, and you can't donate any games, especially to the likes of Carolina and Atlanta. So here we are, in the thick of it, in a position a SuperBowl contending team doesn’t expect to be in at this point of the season. But when the going gets tough, the tough get going. Let’s hope for a big day from Josh (air and ground), Stef Diggs, and a Coach of the Year performance from our coaches. Because if we don’t get those things, the season will be at a DEFCON 2. Talk to you next week.
Betting Information
Spread: Tampa -3.5
Over/Under: Over 53.5