The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are barely hanging onto their NFC South lead so every game is a must-win at this point. Having a healthy Baker Mayfield is the key to winning out and ensuring that the team wins their fourth straight division title but unfortunately, Mayfield has been dealing with an injury this week.
Mayfield popped up on the injury report this week with a knee injury and it was a scary sight for Bucs fans when he didn't practice on Wednesday. The good news is that Mayfield participated in the open portion of Thursday's practice and if there's one thing we know about the Bucs quarterback, it's that he's a dog and will try to play through anything.
Bucs' playoff hopes hinge on Baker Mayfield's health
It was good to see Mayfield taking part in practice on Thursday because that's hopefully a sign that he'll play this weekend against the Cowboys. The importance of this game can't be oversated for the Buccaneers because even though they have a better record than Atlanta right now, they have to stay at least one win ahead of the Falcons.
With the Falcons winning both match-ups between the two teams this year, if the Buccaneers and Falcons both finish with the same record, the advantage would go to Atlanta for owning the tiebreaker. That's why the Bucs have to keep winning and having Mayfield healthy and running the offense makes winning more likely.
The Falcons also have made the switch from Kirk Cousins to Michael Penix Jr., which hopefully won't spark some momentum with the suddenly struggling birds. Cousins was playing so bad that the Falcons finally benched him and now Bucs fans have to hope that Penix doesn't provide them with newly-found confidence.
If Mayfield can't start, it'd be Kyle Trask starting for the Buccaneers. Trask was a second-round pick by Tampa in the 2021 NFL Draft and has yet to start a game. He's appeared in six games since entering the league and thrown 11 total passes with four completions. In other words, if Trask had to step in and start a game for Tampa Bay, winning would be a tougher task.