Buccaneers lose another key starter ahead of important stretch

The Buccaneers will wish Mike Edwards made some better decisions ahead of playing on Sunday without Jordan Whitehead. 

In a week where everything was looking up for the Buccaneers with more key players coming back from injuries, the news over the past day has taken all the wind out of the sails in Tampa.

The first of the bad news reports came from the NFL. Antonio Brown and Mike Edwards are both out for the next three games after admitting to using fake COVID-19 vaccine cards. Brown was unlikely to play during the next three weeks anyway and Edwards technically isn’t a starter (although his production is the same as one), but there is still a major problem.

Edwards being suspended leaves the Bucs without a backup safety on par with the two starters, and now, the Buccaneers won’t have Jordan Whitehead for the foreseeable future.

According to Greg Auman, Whitehead’s injury is very bad, which could mean that Tampa could be without one of the best safeties in the NFL through the end of the regular season and the playoffs, and there is no Mike Edwards to step in to help.

It’s too bad that Edwards would’ve stepping into that starting role with authority. Now, the Bucs will have to rely on Andrew Adams or Ross Cockrell in that spot, which isn’t the same as the best third safety in the NFL.

The Buccaneers will also need to start looking into additional safeties for their depth chart through the remainder of the season. It’s too soon for the Bucs to know anything about Whitehead, but the one quote from Arians doesn’t make it seem likely that this will just be a multi-week injury.

The injury luck is clearly not turning around. While the corners look like they could be back to full strength, the safeties have taken two dramatic hits. The Bucs are good enough to push through and win at least two of their next three games, but this mess only highlights how much Tampa has had to overcome this season.

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