Often charismatic second year defensive tackle Gerald McCoy offered up some entertaining, if not embarrassing, insight as to why the Tampa Bay Buccaneers were so badly outplayed by Tom Brady's New England Patriots on Thursday night.
Speaking to reporters post game, McCoy said that they were not prepared to play at the same tempo as New England and that the Bucs were treating this game more as practice while the Pats were in full regular season game mode. The Boston Globe's Greg Bedard transcribed the remarks.
They did not treat this like a preseason game. That’s why they are who they are. And then you come out, (Tom) Brady played until halftime? Yeah. When they came out in two minute I said, ‘Hey! 12 is still out there.’ They came out and they were like, 'This is not a preseason game for us,' at least not in the first half.
The Buccaneers were reportedly playing a lot of base defense, just running their plays, while the Patriots had clearly game-planned specifically for the Buccaneers and were in attack mode from the opening whistle, and it showed. Brady was repeatedly exploiting weaknesses in the Bucs defense while having little trouble picking up their blitzes and pass rush. McCoy expounded on their struggles, pointing to the tempo that which Brady led his team.
Man, I’m telling you man, they came out, they’d turn around huddle, snap, oh, 'There’s the Mike, Go!' I was like, ‘Dang! Um, Mr. Brady, can we line up?’ He didn’t care. He was like, ‘You’re not going to line up.’ When we turned around one time I checked back around and my hand was going to the grass and they were like, ‘Hut!’ And I said, ‘Noooooooooooo!’
After receiving mountains of praise coming off their victory over the Kansas City Chiefs last week, McCoy thinks this may have been exactly what the young Buccaneers team may have needed; a big serving of humble pie for a team riding too high. McCoy also didn't think to highly of Chiefs backup, Tyler Calabaloo... er, Palko.
(Linebacker) Mason Foster? He needed to see Tom Brady. He didn’t see to see Calabaloo from last week, whatever the dude’s name was. I’m sorry if you can hear this. I don’t know who you were, I’m sorry. It’s nothing personal. (Tyler Palko?) Falko, yeah, the replacement. He needed Tom Brady. That’s what he needed. Now he knows that the preseason is a glorified scrimmage. Now he knows when those live bullets start flying when Detroit comes here, now he knows what to expect. And I’m glad he got to experience that. (DE Adrian) Clayborn came to me and was like, ‘Oh my god, it was so fast!’ I said, ‘I know! That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you!’ It was a reality check, we needed that.
Let's hope they can put this game in the rear-view mirror and correct their mistakes in the preseasons final two exhibition contests.