It’s no fantasy: Bucs boast NFL’s top offense
TAMPA — You want Jason Licht as your general manager. Let him pick your players. He’s absolutely going to crush it.
For your fantasy team.
Isn’t that what the Buccaneers have become?
The Bucs have the No. 1 offense in the NFL, averaging 449.5 yards per game. Kansas City? The Rams?
Puh-leeze. The Bucs have the league’s best passing offense, averaging 376.8 yards per game. It doesn’t seem to matter who plays quarterback, either. Ryan Fitzpatrick set an NFL record with three straight games of more than 400 yards passing and at least three touchdowns. Even that wasn’t enough to keep him from losing his job to Jameis Winston when his three-game suspension ended.
Credit Licht for providing coach Dirk Koetter the kind of skill players that any offensive-minded coach would love.
Mike Evans. DeSean Jackson. O.J. Howard. Cameron Brate. Adam Humphries. Chris Godwin.
“You’ve got five guys with over 20 catches and everybody has touchdowns and produce vertically down the field,’’ said Bengals coach Marvin Lewis. “So yeah, they’re doing a great job spreading the football around and guys are taking advantage of their opportunities.’’
In fact, the Bucs are on pace to produce an astonishing 7,192 total yards of offense. That would put them within striking distance of the Greatest Show of Turf, the St. Louis Rams in 2000, when they compiled an NFL record 7,335 yards. (Since broken by the 2011 Saints at 7,474).
“I remember. Kurt Warner, Marshall Faulk, Torry Holt, Issac Bruce,’’ Bucs quarterback Jameis Winston said reeling off the play-makers for the Rams.
“I say every week it’s a blessing to have the people we have on this team. Really at every level of this offense, football starting with the offensive line, in the backfield and guys outside on the perimeter. That’s a credit to the guys upstairs, Jason Licht. It’s a blessing to be a quarterback in this type of offense and to have those types of weapons.’’
For years and years, the only identity the Bucs had was defense. From Lee Roy Selmon to Derrick Brooks and Warren Sapp. And what happened?
They lost 9-0 to the Rams in the NFC Championship game to end the ‘79 season. Twenty years later, Tony Dungy’s team led the Greatest Show of Turf 6-5 and were 4:44 from the Super Bowl when the Rams’ Kurt Warner found Ricky Proehl for a touchdown.
Even the Bucs’ Super Bowl XXXVII championship team was driven by D. Five interceptions spearheaded the 48-21 victory over the Raiders.
But now? The Bucs are a fantasy fanatic’s dream.
The Bucs should finish in the top 10 in the NFL in total yards for the third time in four seasons since Koetter arrived. Prior to that, they did it three other times in franchise history.
Evans has become among the most productive receivers. He is 10th in the NFL with 591 yards on 40 receptions, a 98.5 average, with three touchdowns.
“I think he had a great off-season, a great training camp,’’ offensive coordinator Todd Monken said. “He’s playing at a very high level. Playing fast. He really is concentrating on yards after catch. He’s doing a better job there. His releases. We try to move him around a little bit, but there’s such comfort in him in the positions we put him. So having the weapons we have, we never look at it as a mismatch for us.’’
Jackson got off to an incredibly hot start. He still leads the NFL with a 22.9 yard average. Jaccpot was putting up 106 receiving yards per game until Winston returned. In standard league scoring for fantasy football, he’s scoring about 13 points per game. Evans is just behind him at 12.3 per game.
Both Fitzpatrick (26.25 points) and Winston (22) are pretty productive. By comparison, Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes is at the top of the food chain at 28 points per game.