A rollercoaster of emotion!

Who Dat? Oh, it’s a Bucs roster that put up arguably the greatest offensive performance in franchise history against a hated division rival.

Tampa Bay’s 51-27 victory over the New Orleans Saints looked really good at first, then cataclysmically bad, then ground-shakingly great. Typically, when you go up 17-0 early on, you’re set for the day, and that did end up being true but in one of the most interesting ways possible.

Between many turnovers, penalties, and a whole lot of yards and points, we got the 2024 Bucs in a chaotic little package in Week 6. There are plenty of questions to answer, especially against top-tier opposition, but for now the team is 4-2 and staying resilient.

Let’s shout out some top performers, and there are plenty to go through!

Offensive Top Performer: the Entire Run Game

I could really cheat and say the whole offense and not be wrong, but we NEED to stress how incredible this rushing attack performed.

After the passing offense continued its torrid start to the season early, featuring NFL touchdown leader Baker Mayfield (yes, you read that right), an entire mess of bad decisions, penalties, and interceptions allowed the Saints to mount a 27-point second quarter. In danger of it all completely slipping away for the second consecutive week, offensive coordinator Liam Coen unleashed the ground hounds.

Did anyone expect the best Bucs rushing performance of the last 7-8 years or so to come from Sean Tucker? If you even toyed with the notion of saying yes, you’re a dirty liar. Tucker completely dominated, averaging 9.7 yards per carry (!!) as he toted the rock 14 times for 136 yards and a touchdown. He paired that with 3 catches for 56 yards and another score.

He overshadowed Bucky Irving, who racked up “only” 105 total yards and a touchdown on 16 touches. He also channeled his inner phantom by seemingly phasing across the field through multiple defenders on a highlight-reel, 31-yard jaunt.

The run game was humming so well that even Sterling Shepard carried the ball four times for 31 yards — which helped offset his horrible, no-good day with the zebras.

Mayfield tallied some of his trademark hero scrambles as well with three carries for 29 yards. Oh, and he also tossed 4 touchdowns and 325 yards on 24 completions. Three interceptions is rough, yes, but two of them were very bad deflection luck to be fair so we’ll give him some slack.

And finally, we must mention Chris Godwin, who put the Saints’ defensive backs in hell all day with 11 catches for 125 yards and 2 touchdowns. A whopping 105 of those yards came after the catch, which matched his career high from 2021 (also against NO), and that put his season total at 335 to lead the entire NFL.

Pay the man.

Defensive Top Performer: DB Tykee Smith

This list will be significantly shorter than offense for obvious reasons, but we need to give the rookie nickel his flowers.

Tykee Smith posted a monster day, gathering 5 total tackles, an interception, and a forced fumble — it probably should’ve been two but again, the officiating for this game was, uh, less than ideal. The Georgia product has made waves early in his career, routinely displaying his fantastic football IQ and instincts.

In the secondary, Zyon McCollum added another tally to his missing receivers list by blanking Rashid Shaheed, who was completely ineffective downfield and caught just one pass for 11 yards. Even better, McCollum nabbed an elusive interception to continue adding some statistical oomph to his resume.

Once Todd Bowles finally realized that he doesn’t need to call plays like a coward against every single quarterback in the league and started blitzing rookie Spencer Rattler, tons of other guys started to shine.

Lavonte David continued his string of great performances with 9 total tackles and a sack. Vita Vea notched a sack as well, marking the third straight game he’s done so. Calijah Kancey finally made his season debut and took Rattler down as well.

Five sacks total is more in line with what should be expected from this defense.

Special Teams Top Performer: K Chase McLaughlin

Obligatory post.

McLaughlin nailed his only field goal attempt, a chipshot 26-yarder, and all SIX of his extra points to make his contribution to the team’s second 50-burger in club history.

I wanted Jake Camarda to make his triumphant return after being benched for two games but sadly a terrible punt that was returned for a touchdown has to disqualify him. Sorry, Jake.