Buccaneers: “Extra Points”: A Week 3 to Week 4 Review

BUCCANEERS PASS DEFENSE

Without the Buccaneers number one corner, Brent Grimes, in week 3 against the Viking the Buccaneers secondary was lit up allowing career backup quarterback Case Keenum to complete 76% of his passes for 369 yards and three touchdowns with zero interceptions. Allowing Stefon Diggs and Adam Thielen to catch thirteen of 19 targets (68% catch rate) for 271 yards and two touchdowns.

Also allowing the Vikings to catch seven of their ten (70% catch rate) deep passes for 221 yards and two touchdowns providing little to no resistance for Keenum to basically stand and complete any pass he threw, and allowing him to complete eighteen of 23 (78% catch rate) short to mid-range dump off passes.

The Buccaneers in week three couldn’t stop anything allowing Dalvin Cook to catch all five of his targets for 72 yards with the Buccaneers linebackers having a hard time keeping up with him.

In week four against the New York Giants the Buccaneers number one corner Brent Grimes returned to the starting lineup, and the Buccaneers secondary as a whole was much improved with him in the lineup.

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Allowing Eli Manning to complete 61% of his passes for 288 yards for two touchdowns but zero interceptions, but with Grimes in the lineup Eli did have a much lower completion percentage than Keenum (76%) did the previous week.

The Buccaneers secondary held the Giants top four targets (Beckham, Shepard, Marshall, and Engram) to 24 catches on 41 targets (59% catch rate) for 252 yards but zero touchdowns. Eli short to mid-range targets were caught by the remaining six receivers who caught seven of the eight targets (88% catch rate) for just 36 yards but two touchdowns.

The most noticeable of the return of Grimes was when he covered Odell Beckham JR and basically shut him down with Beckham only catching two of seven targets for ten yards, catching six of 80 against Vernon Hargreaves and others with most of his yards coming on one catch of 42 yards.

Eli did have plenty of time to find receivers but the Buccaneers secondary played the receivers much better than they did in week three against the Vikings, and Grimes return from injury helped give life to the Buccaneers secondary allowing them to play better as a whole.