It's hard to pinpoint exactly what went wrong for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Thursday night because so much of what happened was awful.
The offense mustered up 18 points, which nearly matches the total it scored over the last two games, but it wasn't enough to leave Buffalo with a win. The offensive line was bad again, the run game failed to get going, and even the defense looked shaky.
Everything went wrong, yet the Bucs were inches away from pulling off a miracle Hail Mary at the end of the game.
The Bucs might not have needed that prayer answered had it not been for a truly bizarre decision before halftime. With the ball on Buffalo's 41-yard line, the Buccaneers ran their field goal unit out onto the field and sat in that formation for a handful of seconds before purposefully taking a delay of game penalty.
What in the world just happened?pic.twitter.com/JMA9R73AnL
— Pro Football Network (@PFN365) October 27, 2023
It wasn't as though the Bucs rushed the field goal team onto the field to create a frenzy, they sat there with enough time to have attempted the kick but chose not to. Nobody could figure out what the Buccaneers strategy was, and Todd Bowles didn't offer up much of an explanation after the game.
Todd Bowles tries to explain bizarre 4th-and-3 play before halftime
After the game, Bowles was asked about the weird sequence of events and didn't exactly give an answer that makes anyone feel much better about it.
"It was too much for a field goal," Bowles said. "Sitting there and going for it but if we don't get it, they have a field goal in mind. It was a 17-10 ballgame at the time, we figure we come out and we still have a ballgame instead of giving away the first half."
Huh?
Making matters even more confusing, Bowles was asked by ESPN's Jenna Laine if he intended to draw the Bills offsides, to which the coach answered no. When asked if he intended to kick the field goal, Bowles said the plan was to try and draw the Bills offsides.
"We sent them out there to try and lure them offside," Bowles said. "We got discombobulated communication-wise so we just punted."
Somehow one of the messiest plays of the night got even messier.
Bucs coach Todd Bowles’ explanation on what happened on the fourth-and-3 just before halftime when they took a delay of game penalty… pic.twitter.com/q0sLZupJ5U
— JennaLaineESPN (@JennaLaineESPN) October 27, 2023
To be fair, it would have been a career-long kick for McLaughlin and he has never hit a kick longer than 60 yards. This 59-yarder was right on the edge, so Bowles not having him kick makes a little bit of sense.
That's about all that makes sense in this, though. Bowles not having a great answer for a simple question doesn't exactly fill anyone with a ton of confidence about the team, especially after three straight weeks of mistake-riddled football that has dropped the Bucs to 3-4.
A lot needs to be figured out over the next 10 days, but hopefully the answers to the questions everyone has about the team are better than the one Bowles gave on Thursday.