ESPN’s “Football Power Index” has picked the Buccaneers to finish last in the NFC South and have a worse record than 2016.
Can’t people make up their minds? We have half the experts picking the Buccaneers to be a playoff team, contend for the NFC South crown, or improve on last season’s 9-7 record. Then, we have the other half saying the Bucs are going to do worse than last season, maybe even have a losing record, and that they aren’t as good as Bucs fans think they can be/want them to be.
The latest in the latter half of those is the ESPN Football Power Index (FPI) picking the Bucs to go 8-8 with a 14.2% chance of winning the division and have them ranked 16th on their power rankings.
Hank Gargiul’o explains the South predictions as the Falcons and Panthers being the top two teams while, “The Saints and Buccaneers are also reasonable threats, at roughly one-in-six and one-in-seven chances, respectively.”
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Look, we aren’t going to give this a rest. Not one bit. The Buccaneers are a better team today than they were New Year’s Day when they clinched their first winning season since 2010. Yes, their schedule is somewhat tougher, but that’s all relative, isn’t it? I mean, the Cowboys were supposed to be an “easy game” based on the way 2015 played out and they went on to win the NFC East. Yes, the Buccaneers will face the defending NFC Champion Falcons twice as well as the defending Super Bowl champion New England Patriots. Add to that the Green Bay Packers in Lambeau and the rest of the NFC North and yes, the Bucs’ schedule isn’t pretty.
On paper.
Jameis Winston is in his third year with head coach Dirk Koetter and they’ve loaded him up with more weapons than I had as a kid playing “DOOM” with all the cheat codes enabled. The defense – which people apparently want to forget about dominating the second half of the season – has Mike Smith returning, giving the team another year in a system that they truly only executed for half of 2016. You have Jacquies Smith returning, Keith Tandy looking to build of his emergence last season.
This is not a .500 team, no matter how many doubters don’t want to buy in.
Buccaneers fans are all in. The coaching staff is all in. The owners are all in. This is finally the season Bucs fans can be optimistic – not cautiously, but 100% full-blown optimistic – that they have a contending football team.
Next: Buccaneers' Cornerbacks Listed As The Biggest Weakness
I’m not the first one to say it, I won’t be the last one to say it – anything less than playoffs is a disappointment. And Dirk Koetter is not in the business of disappointing.