Buccaneers bench Jake Camarda and send a clear message about his future

It only took the Tampa Bay Buccaneers three weeks to sense some serious trouble brewing with punter Jake Camarda.

Usually reliable, and one of the best punters in the league when he's on his game, Camarda has been awful in his first three games and the Bucs aren't wasting any time sending him a message that things need to improve. It doesn't get any clearer than a benching, which is what Tampa Bay is doing to try and get things fixed before it's too late.

Camarda was made a healthy inactive for Sunday's game against the Eagles, which came as a pretty big surprise given the number of actual injuries the team is dealing with. Antoine Winfield Jr., Calijah Kancey, and Luke Goedeke were all ruled earlier in the weekend with Jalen McMillan joining them after suffering an injury on Friday.

All of those are based on healthy, where Camarda is being benched for performance issues. It's a bit stunning, but is also deeply concerning given just how important he is to the team's success.

Buccaneers are 'unhappy' with Jake Camarda, which led to his benching

Hearing that the Bucs are reportedly 'unhappy' with Camarda isn't really that much of a surprise given he's been struggling since the preseason. What is a bit surprising is that the team actually benched him, which sends a pretty clear message about his future and how it now appears to be in doubt.

There was talk of the Bucs potentially carrying a second punter on the 53-man roster, but that didn't happen. That's how badly Camarda struggled in August, but it seems he was given a chance to prove himself over the first three weeks of the season.

He failed to do that, and now he's found his way to the bench and possibly the edge of the roster bubble. It's still a bit early to cut bait on Camarda, especially since we've seen how good and important he can be when he's firing on all cylinders. There were games last year that he single handedly helped keep Tampa Bay in with his leg and his ability to flip the field has proven to be extremely valuable.

We haven't seen that from him yet this season. Trenton Gill will have a chance to potentially take Camarda's roster spot, which is a stunning development given how fast everything is happening but the message Tampa Bay is sending is about more than just Camarda.

Like we saw last year with the benching of Devin White, Todd Bowles isn't going to allow underperformance to be tolerated. Camarda is being benched for poor performance, but it's a signal to the rest of the team that nobody is safe if they aren't going to give full effort and show up for the team when they're needed.

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