Transcript of Eagles-Buccaneers Preview

Back on NFL Daily, Tom Brady's out of jail. No longer asked to commentate on Dallas Cowboys' blowouts. Although they made it interesting. I was actually happy for Tom that he had a fun fourth quarter at the end. But no, he's heading to Tampa.

Yeah, the broadcast willed it into existence when they showed a fan that was obviously a plant wearing a 28 to 3 T-shirt at the Cowboys Ravens game.

Wait, really? I missed that.

It was coming back from break, and there's this guy in a 28, 3 T-shirt. It's like, All right, who'd you all put that shirt on? I'm throwing a flag on that. But yeah, Tom braided will be in the stands. A lot of us will be watching as the Philadelphia Eagles are two and a half point favorites at the Tampa Bay Bucaneers who just lost to the Broncos. These two teams have playoff history. Jalen Hertz, two and one against the Bucaneers in his career. I mean, one and two against the Bucaneers in his career in the playoffs. But this is the regular season, Greg. They've got a whole lot of injuries. Don't know if it's A. J. Brown or Devante Smith. It may just be Saquon and Jalen Hertz. Is that enough?

Maybe because this Bucs defense isn't what they've been in previous years. You think Todd Bulls defense, you think, Oh, well, those are some of the best run defenses of all time, literally, and great every year. This year, they really struggle on the ground. Part of that is Vita Vea has been banged up. It was back at practice on Wednesday. They also get Luke Getake, their right tackle back at practice on Wednesday, which are really positive because if you watched that Bucks game last week, they couldn't stop the run consistently enough, and they really couldn't protect Baker Mayfield. So that would be big for them. Yeah, this is another like, what's real about this team? Eagles get pushed around for two weeks, then suddenly they show up in New Orleans, and they're wrecking shop against this great running game, like setting the edge, playing really fierce. And then what's real about Baker? Because, not to celebrate here, Patrick, but you were talking MVP last week for Baker. I'm Let's calm down. And he played one of his worst games as a Bucaneer. I thought he was the problem last week for the Bucs. It was a lot of old Baker stuff of leaving the pocket early, just missing some throws, some crazy decisions.

And then it collapsed on him in the second half. But the first half, it was actually, I think a lot of it was on Baker. I was surprised to see that because he had been really consistent throughout the course of the end of last season and certainly to start this year.

Yeah, we see the Eagles, they're two and a half point favorites. I like the number. I I like the Bucks to beat the number. I just think that Tampa, if they get V2V back, it's going to help out in the run defense. But you look at the Bucks' secondary, I don't know if Winfield is going to be back yet.

He's only running on the side at practice. It sounds like he's at least a week away.

Yeah, I just... The Eagles offensive line is good. They're going to have to run it. They look very good defensively against the Saints. They're able to stop that outside zone, and the Saints didn't have left hand, so to speak, of where they could go, but they didn't score. I mean, they had 15 points against a pretty good defense. I think the Bucks at home in this one, Philadelphia just doesn't seem like a type of team to me that's going to all of a sudden rip off three or four great games. Yet.

You mentioned the Bucs-Herts matchups in the past, Patrick, which I think is for Eagles fans is a big part of this game that he's had the two most embarrassing moments of his career against Todd Bulls' defense. Do you think this is a different Hertz, maybe? They've been good against Blitz this year.

Yeah, they've been much better against the Blitz, and we saw last year, they had no answers. They had absolutely no answers against the Blitz. Now, Kelen Moore He was in. There are some questions about nick Seriani saying that he's going to step in and call some plays in some situations. That eyes popped out reading that this week.

Well, you talked about the fourth. He was talking about that fourth down I wonder if he was just taking the bullet for Kelen Moore and trying to be a good leader or something. Maybe. I don't know.

That'd be a cool guy move. Like, shout out to nick Seriani if that's the case. We'd have to wait for a book after his career or something if things go the other way. But a lot is going to depend on the statuses. Like, AJ Brown and Devante Smith are so much of this passing game. They're both there. I'm picking the Eagles regardless.

So they were both out of Practice. Generally, a guy coming off a concussion who misses practice entirely on Wednesday, that's not a good sign for them. You don't know for sure, but both him and Lane Johnson. Lane Johnson, I'm a little worried about longer term because of some history that he's had with concussions and seeing how it's really affected him and his mental health. Those are two situations. They were both out of practice. Aj Brown was also out of practice. I I think this was the week where maybe he could come back and maybe not if it was next week.

Yeah, I mean, again-That's a lot of talent. That's a lot of talent. Again, with concussion protocols, you see different guys handle different ways. Some guys maybe out on Wednesday, Thursday, they're back. Friday, they pass all the protocols and they have a full practice.

They're good to go.

That's just something you really have to keep an eye on.

Yeah. Devante played every single snap, which is not out of the question. Before he got hurt in week three in the game against the Saints, he's always out on the field. He's always a big part of that passing game.

I do want to make one note here about the Bucks. I just want to give some pop to Zion McCollum and Taiki Smith. They're not getting mentioned on a lot of shows. Zion McCollum is playing his ass off in the secondary. Todd Bulls can coach him up. And Taiki Smith, who's, I think he's a rookie nickel, he's playing pretty well, too. So they got some young players to keep an eye on.

Mccollum has more passes defended than he does completions right now. That's a pop. That's a pop. For Zion McCollum, Z-Y-O-N. By the way, good shot by Greg Rosen. Yeah, big time.