OT: Buccaneers, Rays & Other Tampa Bay Sports Teams

[Point21]

Congrats KK! One of only two reasons why I even gave the Rays any of my time. Dudes a badass.

i would love him back in Tampa but think that ship has sailed

 

[These Are The Days]

At least the Magic are showing their first real sign of promise since the Dwightmare

 

[DMB06]

People are so used to the Bucs losing they don't even comment on it anymore. Team is a joke. They have only one winning team left on their schedule and since they're only one game back for the division lead this putrid team still has a chance at a playoff game. The league needs to do something about that, not one team in the NFC South deserves a playoff game, much less the home game they're guaranteed for whoever wins this crap division.

 

[Hoek]

Yeah after this game I was like time to tank but we're only one game out of it that's so stupid lmao. We've only won one game out of our last 7 good lord. Can't wait til they fire this garbage coach

 

[LightningStorm]

At least the Magic are showing their first real sign of promise since the Dwightmare

7 wins in a row! I like this young and deep team they got this season. Nice win on Saturday over the Celtics.

For NBA fans among Bolts Nation (and the Tampa Bay area in general), what's the general split among the Magic and Heat? I'd imagine there's more Magic fans for how much closer Tampa is much closer to Orlando than Miami.

 

[Hoek]

Not a big NBA fan but after the Penny and Shaq days in the 90s it's felt like all the Magic fans disappeared in Tampa. There was no buzz here whatsoever in the Dwight Howard era. Not that many Heat fans either for that matter but I've seen more stickers on cars of them than the Magic at least. I'm sure the more recent success and Lebron factored into that.

 

[These Are The Days]

7 wins in a row! I like this young and deep team they got this season. Nice win on Saturday over the Celtics.

For NBA fans among Bolts Nation (and the Tampa Bay area in general), what's the general split among the Magic and Heat? I'd imagine there's more Magic fans for how much closer Tampa is much closer to Orlando than Miami.

Well everyone was a Bulls fan because of Jordan in the 90's. But for me I wasn't so young that I didn't know who Shaq was nor that he played on a team very close to home. And I vaguely remember the buzz of the Magic making the Finals. I started again following basketball around 2006ish and just sort of went back to the team I knew.

 

[Point21]

 

[Major4Boarding]

5 years - $135M. Ol' Stu just keeps on Stu'ing

 

[These Are The Days]

Sell the team. I've had enough of the poverty franchise BS

 

[Hoek]

How about them Bucs? Just need one more win

 

[These Are The Days]

Well at least the Bucs are finally getting their act together. It should never EVER have gotten to a 4-7 record. But objectively speaking 10-7 is something I could have lived with if you had asked me before the year started.

For the love of God just keep winning

 

[DrMartinVanNostrand]

Well at least the Bucs are finally getting their act together. It should never EVER have gotten to a 4-7 record. But objectively speaking 10-7 is something I could have lived with if you had asked me before the year started.

For the love of God just keep winning

As much as I'm conditioned to not want to give Todd Bowles credit for anything, the overall truth is that he deserves a lot of credit for getting the ship back in the right direction. Canales now looks like a good OC hire after all, and Byron Leftwich should be tried at The Hague for what he did the last season or two...he might just be the worst playcalling-OC to be a Super Bowl winner ever. At 4-7, I never thought we'd see the north side of .500 again this season.

All of this with over $60M in dead cap space, too. We had entirely committed to biting the bullet this year to clear cap space ahead of 2024; finding out that we might have something in Canales and Baker alone makes this year a good win for the organization. Biggest thing after the season is making sure Mike Evans isn't going anywhere. He has a better rapport with Baker than he did with Brady.

 

[These Are The Days]

As much as I'm conditioned to not want to give Todd Bowles credit for anything, the overall truth is that he deserves a lot of credit for getting the ship back in the right direction. Canales now looks like a good OC hire after all, and Byron Leftwich should be tried at The Hague for what he did the last season or two...he might just be the worst playcalling-OC to be a Super Bowl winner ever. At 4-7, I never thought we'd see the north side of .500 again this season.

All of this with over $60M in dead cap space, too. We had entirely committed to biting the bullet this year to clear cap space ahead of 2024; finding out that we might have something in Canales and Baker alone makes this year a good win for the organization. Biggest thing after the season is making sure Mike Evans isn't going anywhere. He has a better rapport with Baker than he did with Brady.

I overwhelmingly agree. To every last word. I honestly think those first 2 years with Brady saw Bruce Arians influence almost all of the play calling on both sides of the ball. We had weeks where our offense suddenly ceased to exist. I would sit there and think "We are trying to coach Tom Brady" and suddenly we would hear about locker room drama regarding coaching and "Tom Brady was frustrated with Bruce Arians taking out the red pen and X'ing everything out" or so the radio people would say on the WDAE talk shows. I don't know what Bowles did, but I think they whethered the storm of this year. This is the first time in 2 years the team has been in a good place emotionally. Yesterday afternoon was a catharsis game. Like you could see the bad juju leaving an entire team as the game went on.

Move on from White. Sign Evans to a retirement deal. Franchise either Wirfs or Winfield and sign the other. I think Godwin may be due another deal? I sure hope not but I'll have to check. Mayfield needs a new deal too no one is going to pay him $40+ million a year. The Bucs can probably get away with offering him half of that. Oh yeah. And keep drafting offensive linemen. We have had a couple good weeks but we suck at running the ball.

Merry Christmas

 

[Hoek]

Bowles is certainly the type you expect to do well with this young sort of roster so it's good it finally seems to have turned out that way when it seemed he was being ignored or not having an impact before. They're actually doing great not taking penalties now too which used to be such a huge problem. Guys are learning and improving which is all you can ask for in this kind of situation.

 

[DMB06]

You can't control the teams on your schedule, and the goal is just to win. But I can't shake the feeling that we're simply benefiting from playing weaker teams. Jacksonville was the first team with a winning record that we beat this season and even they came into the game on Sunday on a three game losing streak.

The soft schedule makes it really difficult to determine what's really going on with this team. Being one of the better bad teams in the league still makes you a bad team, so I guess we'll have to see how we perform in the wild card game. If we win or are at least competitive then it's safe to say the team has improved and Bowles probably gets another year. If it's a one sided loss then it will be clear we were simply the benefactors of a weak schedule and Bowles has to go.

 

[LTIR Trickery]

I've never been happier to be wrong about Baker, at least for now. You see bits of progress from the offense each week, the defense is still/always concerning but hey, just get into the playoffs and see what happens.

 

[DrMartinVanNostrand]

This right now is shaping up to be a miserable sports weekend around here.

 

[CupsOverCash]

Disappointing game for the bucs at home in a huge division game.

 

[Hoek]

We really jinxed these guys. Just no desperation at all to match the Saints. Acting like we have the playoffs wrapped up. Next week against the Panthers is not a given.

 

[DMB06]

Probably the worst first half we've had in years, but this is why Mayfield is on his fourth team and why Bowles has never had a winning season. You never know what you're going to get out of them.

 

[Hoek]

Even Camarda decided to f***ing suck today.

 

[Hoek]

The offense finally woke up and then White just fumbles it. Lol

 

[These Are The Days]

I didn't think it was possible to give a shit less than the Lightning. I need to find something else to do than watch Tampa sports

 

[These Are The Days]

Why do images literally not ever work anymore? By some miracle I am suddenly able to click the imbed images icon again instead of it bring mysteriously grayed our and now it still doesn't work