Crushing Buccaneers offensive trend continues to kill team

The Buccaneers are one of the best teams in the NFL when it comes to using play-action. Why they refuse to use it is beyond this writer.

The world of data has made it much easier to examine sports and see what works and what doesn’t. Stats tell a part of the story, but having concrete evidence that stems from analytics is an invaluable tool that most teams don’t lean on enough, especially the Buccaneers.

If the Bucs were an analytics-based team, they would probably have the best offense in the league. By ignoring them, Tampa has established itself as one of the worst offensive teams in the NFL in 2022.

One of the biggest mistakes that stands out about this offense is the lack of play-action.

Many fans would argue that the Bucs using this type of passing attack so little makes sense based on Tampa’s inability to run the football, but that argument dies when you see that the Buccaneers are one of the most effective teams in the league at actually running these plays.

The run does not set up the pass or play action.

The Bucs have the second highest epa-per attempt in the league on play action passed. Unfortunately for the Buccaneers, they use it at the 8th-lowest rate in the league.

Interesting strategy by Byron Leftwich.

The Buccaneers refusing to do this is actively costing them points on offense. The run doesn’t have to be established to run these types of plays. The Buccaneers just have to run play action to give themselves a better chance at points, but they decide to do something much, much worse.

At this rate, we have to assume that the offensive coaching staff is always going to do the opposite of what makes sense and what scores points after looking at this data. It’s silly, but that’s an offense under Byron Leftwich.

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