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Bucs Still Down in Sacks Despite League-Wide Surge

The Buccaneers can't get to the quarterback, and they need to find a way to make that happen quick.

River Wells

Sep 22, 2024; Tampa, Florida, USA; Tampa Bay Buccaneers linebacker Yaya Diaby (0) is introduced before a game against the Denver Broncos at Raymond James Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images
Sep 22, 2024; Tampa, Florida, USA; Tampa Bay Buccaneers linebacker Yaya Diaby (0) is introduced before a game against the Denver Broncos at Raymond James Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images / Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images
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The entire NFL is getting more sacks than usual over these first three weeks of the season. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are a little late to the party.

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have just two sacks on the year, both against the Washington Commanders — one from linebacker SirVocea Dennis and another from edge rusher Joe Tryon-Shoyinka. That's good for dead last in the league, right behind the Atlanta Falcons with three, and quite simply, it's not good enough to win a lot of football games.

And to add even more gloom to your doom, this is a severe anomaly. Because according to ESPN analytics writer Seth Walder, sacks are actually up across the entirety of the NFL at the highest rate in the last five seasons:

“Sometimes they just hadn’t beaten their guy, sometimes they had but the ball had been out," Buccaneers head coach Todd Bowles said of the team's lack of sacks. "We’ve got to keep working. They’ve got to get there. We need more push on the inside to help them out on the outside. We’ve just got to keep working at it.”

Todd Bowles has cited this before — that quarterbacks are simply getting the ball out faster than they can be sacked. But there's something to critique there, too, if that's the case, as time to throw is also up at a historic rate through these first three weeks, per Walder.

As Walder notes, this could likely be attributed to the increased protection deep by NFL defenses, which is causing a slight stagger in operation and forcing quarterbacks to take checkdowns and intermediate throws more often. Many teams are preying on this new development, but the Buccaneers aren't and that's a big problem.

Simply put, the team is running out of excuses. Whether it's a coaching issue for their defensive linemen or something else entirely, Tampa Bay is still having trouble getting to the quarterback, and it'll need to find a way to fix that if it wants to be a real contender in the NFC and beyond. Having two sacks is bad enough, but the fact that only one of those two is from a player on the defensive front should sound some alarm bells in that organization.

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River Wells

RIVER WELLS

River Wells is a sports journalist from St. Petersburg, Florida, who has covered the Tampa Bay Buccaneers since 2023. He graduated with a journalism degree from the University of Florida in 2021. You can follow him on Twitter @riverhwells.

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