It was already going to be a huge week for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, but things got a little harder thanks to what happened on Monday night against Baltimore. Any injury conversation begins with the loss of Chris Godwin and Mike Evans, neither of whom will be available on Sunday against the Atlanta Falcons.
The loss is impossible to overstate, as the Bucs are in the midst of perhaps the toughest and most important stretch of their schedule without their best two players on offense. Liam Coen has already come out and said that there isn’t a one-to-one replacement for Godwin, who was placed on IR earlier this week after undergoing season-ending ankle surgery.
Evans not being on the field is a blow as well. Both players have been featured as focal points on offense and we’ve seen them used to jumpstart things over the last few seasons. Now the pressure falls on Baker Mayfield, who has been in a situation where he doesn’t have name-brand receivers but hasn’t faced the sort of stakes that Sunday’s game presents.
Full inactives list for Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week 8 vs. Falcons
So much of the week was overshadowed by the injuries to Evans and Godwin, rightfully so. They anre’t the only players everyone was keeping an eye on as to whether they’d be healthy enough to play against th Falcons.
Bucky Irving popped up on the injury report with a toe injury that held him out of practice most of the week. He was limited on Friday, but Todd Bowles said that he’d try to give it a go pregame to see where exactly he was at.
Being down three of the team’s top offensive players in a must-win divisional game is less than ideal.
Player | Position | Injury |
|---|---|---|
Mike Evans | WR | Hamstring |
Chris Godwin | WR | Ankle (IR) |
Greg Gaines | DL | Calf |
Tykee Smith | S | Concussion |
Jose Ramirez | OLB | Healthy Scratch |
Royce Newman | OL | Healthy Scratch |
Michael Pratt | QB | Emergency 3rd QB |
With some extra roster space, the Bucs are calling up rookie Michael Pratt to serve as the team’s emergency third quarterback. He’ll dress but will only play if both Baker Mayfield and Kyle Trask are hurt — which would be a nightmare scenario.
Tampa Bay will also be without rookie safety Tykee Smith, which is a potentially big blow considering how thin the team is in the secondary. Lest we forget what happened the last time Kirk Cousins went up against Bucs’ defensive backs.
Lost in the shuffle of last week was the status of punter Jake Camarda. He had been a healthy inactive for most of the season thus far but isn’t popping up on the list this week. That’s because he was unceremoniously released after Monday night’s game, with the team citing his struggles and the need to figure things out quicker than he’d be able to as the reason.
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