Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Buccaneers Koetter holding on to play-calling duties, DC Smith
TAMPA – Those who want to see Buccaneers coach Dirk Koetter give up the offensive play calling and replace Mike Smith as his defensive coordinator aren’t going to like this bit of news.
Koetter was asked about both possibilities at his post-mortem press conference at One Buc Place on Monday and let it be known that as far as he’s concerned, no changes are on the offing.
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen,’’ Koetter said when he was asked about calling plays. “I probably never should have said (I was considering it) last year. I’m going to be the play caller.’’
Koetter was almost as emphatic about bringing Smith back. He admitted that it’s never “safe to assume anything’’ but that is clearly his intention.
Koetter said the Glazers, who let it be known on Friday that he will be retrained for another year, have given him the authority to bring back his staff and give him a chance to correct what went wrong this year.
“I am very appreciative of the Glazer family giving me and my staff the opportunity to come back and fix the things we didn’t do well enough this year,’’ Koetter said. “I really appreciate that.’’
Again, it’s a controversial move by the Glazers for sure, and Koetter’s decision to continue to call plays and keep Smith around will be controversial as well. But maybe they shouldn’t be.
The Bucs finished the year with the ninth-ranked offense in the league, making this the second time in three years of calling plays for the Bucs that he’s produced a top 10 offense.
The first of those, of course, was in 2015, when Koetter designed the most prolific offensive attack in franchise history, a unit that ranked fifth overall in the league.
Now, neither one of those offenses scored enough points. The 2015 team ranked 20th in the league in points and this year’s team ranked 18th, averaging 20.9 points per game.
That needs to change, but it probably will if the Bucs can develop a better running game and therefore, some offensive balance. As for the defense, it’s obvious what’s needed there, and it’s not necessarily a new coordinator.
Smith was working with a handicap from the very beginning, when all he had for defensive ends was a rebuilt Jac Smith and Noah Spence. When both went down with injuries, the Bucs lost their pass rush and any chance they might have had to be dominant on defense went with it.
So before anyone judges Smith, whom everyone was so fearful of losing a year ago at this time, it would only be right to see what he can do with a defense that has a few pass rushers.
It’s become increasingly apparent, that the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are ready to move on from potential free agent quarterback Jameis Winston. And Tuesday at the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, coach Bruce Arians gave the latest example that he and the Buccaneers front office will look at the other options available first.
Arians spoke at a podium on numerous subjects, but the most prominent is what Tampa Bay will do in the coming days with Winston?
Bruce Arians. Never goes out of style. #NFLCombine @WISH_TV pic.twitter.com/iDor8L1M9D
— Charlie Clifford (@cliffWISH8) February 25, 2020
Arians was asked directly about potential for a franchise tag for his starter a year ago and what the Bucs might proceed to do? But, he refused to endorse that option on the former number one overall pick Winston. And, the Bucs coach maintained that the team will possibly us the franchise tag for defensive end Shaq Barrett.
Further, Arians gave a pointed specific answer on Winston’s poor play last December as the team finished 7-9 and that has the team looking at other options,
Arians on Winston and why it’s still uncertain: “December wasn’t what I wanted to see.”
— Greg Auman (@gregauman) February 25, 2020
Arians has consistently refused back Winston since the off-season began. This included at an NFL coaching seminar earlier this month in Tampa. He said to the media at that time:
“Really nothing has changed,” Arians said. “What’s Door No. 2? You know? Can we make the one we have better? All those things you go through right now.”
“You’re just sitting there waiting to see is there someone available? … Is he a better option?
The Buccaneers faltered in the middle of the season to drop to 3-7 and then, Winston and Co. blew its final two games to finish 7 – 9 with Winston throwing a career-high 30 interceptions.
After their final loss at home to Atlanta in overtime, where Winston threw the game losing “pick six,” Arians was candid after the final game by saying about Winston’s play that it would have to be evaluated pass by pass and game by game in the off-season. Further, he told the media then, that there “was some great and some terrible…. and you have to decide, if the great outweighs the terrible.”
While Winston did throw for a career-high 5000 + yards in 2019, his interceptions and total turnovers continued to be his downfall throughout the season. The Buccaneers finished 1 – 6 in games against teams with winning records and Winston had 17 total turnovers in those seven games. He finished with the 30 picks that included 10 of them in the Bucs final four games.
Tampa Bay obviously will have the opportunity to go after a free agent quarterback or two, as there is much speculation about the likes of Tom Brady with the Patriots. Plus, Philip Rivers will not be re-signed by the Chargers and is available come March. And, now that Drew Brees has announced he wants to play at least one more year for the Saints, their backup Teddy Bridgewater will be in demand on the market.
The Bucs are also continuing the evaluating the QB class for the Draft the next few days in Indy, which could have some interesting names still available in the second and third rounds and beyond.
On Monday, the Bucs confirmed what they have been hinting at, they will have new uniforms in 2020. But the real question is: what does “new” mean in this instance?
We heard you!
New uniforms coming April 2020. pic.twitter.com/e7qNUsNWZb
— Tampa Bay Buccaneers (@Buccaneers) February 24, 2020
The Bucs also released a statement through their website confirming that April will be the unveiling of the new uniforms, as well as, potential new color scheme, logo, etc. and had these comments from co – owner, Ed Glazer:
“We have heard the feedback from our fans loud and clear and have been working with the NFL and our league partners at Nike to usher in a new look as we enter this next decade of Buccaneers football. We look forward to revealing more details in the near future about our official unveiling event which will take place later this spring.”
As we wrote earlier this month, the Buccaneers have been hinting at trying to enhance their uniforms and there is some belief there will be more orange, the original color of the franchise. There is also educated speculation that the team may go back to a white helmet, which will enable them to have “throwback uniform games” that they’ve not been able to have for the last seven seasons.
This is because under league concussion protocol, players must have the same helmet all season and the Bucs primary one has been pewter in color since their chance in colors and logo in 1997,
The Bucs last altered their uniforms in 2014 by brightening the color red and slightly changing the logo and making it bigger on their pewter helmet. Teammates Ryan Jensen and Mike Evans are shown in the current color scheme, etc. above.
NFL teams have to submit changes in their colors and logos a year in advance. So obviously, this has been in the works for the Glazer family that owns the team for some time.
It should be noted that the Buccaneers NFC South Rivals, the Atlanta Falcons, have already made mention that they are changing their uniforms and color scheme. And, it’s believed that they will go back in 2020 to their original base color of red including possibly red helmets and potentially, primarily gray pants that they wore for over twenty years.
The Falcons have had black helmets for the better part of 30 years going back to Jerry Glanville changing the color scheme to primarily black jerseys in his days at the Falcons coach in the early 1990s.
Back to the Bucs. There is no other team in the NFL that has orange as their primary jersey color. The Bengals Broncos and Browns have occasionally worn orange “alternate jerseys” but not full time.
So, if the Glazers are again embracing a change to mostly orange jerseys, it will be unique. The video Monday showed a red jersey on a sewing machine, which could be a clue or could be misdirection of what the team actually intends to unveil in April.