Tampa Bay Buccaneers Quarterback Baker Mayfield ‘Not The Guy’?

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have had a fairytale start to the season. Their new offensive coordinator, Dave Canales, has led this team to a rather exciting start to the post-Tom Brady era. Brady’s successor is Baker Mayfield, who was a free agency signing at the time, and, honestly, one of the cheaper signings available at the time. It was a low-risk, high-reward signing. Either Mayfield would return to his old form, the Heisman-winning, No. 1 overall pick, or he would remain the quarterback seen in years past when teams have given up on him. Evidently, Mayfield has succeeded early in his Buccaneers tenure. They’re 3-2 through five games, though coming off a bad loss to the Detroit Lions after their bye week. In the loss, the Buccaneers failed to reach the end zone, losing 20-6.

“I think a bad game or two is not going to get anybody to think Jared Goff is not the guy for the Lions,” King said. “A bad game or two by Mayfield would make people think, and I believe even internally people think, ‘Uh, maybe he’s not the guy.’” Not only could one bad game ruin Mayfield’s reputation with the Buccaneers, but it’ll take plenty of good games to secure a long-term role in Tampa. “This is not necessarily about Baker Mayfield proving in Week 6 that he’s the long-term quarterback for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers,” King said. “He’s gotta stack a lot of really good games together for them to not be looking for a quarterback this offseason. It’s very, very simple.”

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The Tampa Bay Buccaneers continue their 2023 campaign on Sunday afternoon in an NFC South divisional matchup against the Atlanta Falcons. Following a disappointing showing in a loss to the Detroit Lions, the Buccaneers are looking to put the past behind them and bounce back in a game where they can continue to build on their lead in the division.

The Falcons have dropped three of their past four games with their only win in the stretch being a fourth-quarter comeback over Houston. The offense has struggled during the downward spiral, failing to reach 20+ points in all of the three defeats. Quarterback Desmond Ridder has been sacked 14 times while throwing five touchdowns to five interceptions over the last four weeks. This is a perfect opportunity for the Buccaneers after being held to a season-low six points last week. Offensive coordinator Dave Canales and quarterback Baker Mayfield have a chance to flip the script and get the team moving back in the right direction.

Even though I predicted the Lions to win last weekend, I didn’t expect it to be the type of dominant showing that the game turned out to be. To say the least, it was a disappointing performance for the Buccaneers with the spotlight fixed on them. It’s not the first time this season that the moment has looked too big for this team as I’m sure everyone remembers what happened when Philadelphia came to town a few weeks ago. What concerns me is that the play-calling was very vanilla against the two best opponents on the schedule to this point of the season. Plus, quarterback Baker Mayfield simply missed a couple of throws that could’ve kept the Buccaneers in the game.