Four Verts: Bucs need to think about big changes at QB, while the Colts are doing WHAT

Quarterback is the most important position in the NFL, and one perennial winner needs to rethink its approach there, while another is getting super desperate. This week’s edition of the Four Verts column hits that, plus a coach with a defensive reputation who needs to start living up to it and a look at the division races heating up down the stretch.

Tampa Bay needs to hit a quick reset

It’s time. The Super Bowl honeymoon appears to be over in Tampa Bay as their once-great offense has come to a sputtering stop, and now their playoff hopes are on the line as the Carolina Panthers move within striking range of the NFC South crown.

Since starting off the season 5-1, including a blazing offensive performance against the stalwart Seahawks’ defense, the Buccaneers are just 2-4 and have completely cratered to the point they’re barely functional on offense. Whether they make the playoffs or not, it’s clearly time for things to really start changing in Tampa Bay, because they don’t have enough to be a real threat to win another Super Bowl.

In the immediate aftermath of the brief Tom Brady era ending, Baker Mayfield was the perfect quarterback to sign. A quality option to plug in at quarterback in an attempt to stay competitive while the team tried to figure out what was next as they stared at their Super Bowl rings. It was a good move! They’ve made the playoffs both years with Mayfield as the starter. But there’s an expiration date on everything, and this appears to be headed toward a situation where at the very least the Buccaneers need to make a sizable quarterback investment to compete with Mayfield going into next season.

Unlike last year, the Buccaneers haven’t been able to survive a litany of injuries that have caused the team to struggle. Since they’ve hit this bout of losing starting in Week 7, the Buccaneers rank 29th in success rate (36.8%), 30th in expected points added per dropback (-0.21) and 24th in points per drive (1.62) — despite having the third-best starting field position in the league over that time (roughly their own 33-yard line). They’re also converting 23.2% of their third down passing plays, good for 30th in the league over that time. The run game has been above average during that time span, providing them enough to have a decent offense if the passing game could do anything.

Mayfield just is not the guy that can really carry an offense on his shoulders when the injuries start piling up. He’s capable enough to have a respectable season in the right circumstances, but that was true in Cleveland as well. Ultimately, this stretch of play shows why he’s been a journeyman quarterback since leaving the Browns. They don’t need to get rid of him this offseason or anything, but it’s definitely time to start looking and taking a swing for their next franchise quarterback.

The defense needs to improve their down-to-down consistency against the pass, but this is an above-average unit that’s ninth in points per drive (1.65) during this span of games since Week 7. There’s still enough here that they can boom back to the top of the conference with a savvy offseason in 2026, but they clearly need to make some changes — winning the dismal NFC South isn’t enough anymore.

Hey man, what are the Colts doing?

Look, it’s hard. Accepting reality is never fun, especially when it started with arguably the greatest offensive start in NFL history and has been whittled into a lost season that puts the entire future of the franchise in doubt.

However, the Indianapolis Colts have got to get a grip. With their season on the line, and really the blueprint of the current organizational setup on the line, the Colts have turned to a familiar face. No, not Carson Wentz. Gardner Minshew? Nope. Wasn’t Joe Flacco or current CBS broadcaster Matt Ryan, either. The Colts turned the page all the way back to 2020 and called 44-year-old Philip Rivers out of retirement for the final month of the season. OK, sure.

Without even a millisecond of critical thinking, it’s easy to see why the Colts wanted to improve their quarterback room. Even though the last month of football has been a complete disaster, 8-5 still (technically) gives them a good amount of control over their playoff push. They have one of the best running backs of this era in Jonathan Taylor and a capable coaching staff that has far exceeded expectations this season. Injuries have completely decimated their quarterback room, leaving the team with journeyman backup Brett Rypien as the only healthy option going into the weekend. They needed a quarterback and pickings are SLIM in December. Free agents are the only choice, and this is the one the Colts chose.

Rivers hasn’t played since the 2020 season, when he finished his career with a one-year stint with the Colts prior to his retirement. Rivers has been coaching high school football in Alabama since then. Almost five full seasons away from the daily rigors of NFL life, he’s jumping back in the fold with a chance to play against the ravenous Seattle Seahawks defense this weekend. Given head coach Shane Steichen is still a branch of the Frank Reich/Doug Pederson tree — Reich was Rivers’ head coach in 2020, and coached him with the Chargers for three seasons — Rivers might actually not be too far behind when it comes to learning the offense.

But command of the offense isn’t the issue here. THE ISSUE IS HE’S 44 YEARS OLD AND HASN’T PLAYED IN FIVE SEASONS. Rivers even wanting to do this himself is baffling given how long he’s been away from the game. Maybe he just wanted to see if he could hop off the couch and do what the Colts would like him to do, which is save the season.

A record of 8-5 with an elite offensive performance for most of the season doesn’t really scream organizational panic, but remember: The Colts have been all-in on this season. They traded away two first-round picks for Jets star cornerback Sauce Gardner (who’s also hurt) and now sit in no man’s land draft-wise. With no first-rounder to fall back on, trying to stay as competitive as they can makes some sense. But not like this.

The truth is this season is cooked. They started hot, sputtered to a stop and suffered too many injuries along the way. This team is not winning the Super Bowl and the desperation to go ahead and make this move suggests they think that is still an attainable goal. Good luck to everyone involved here as 44-year old Philip Rivers potentially will suit up against the Seahawks and Texans to close the season.

Commanders defense is apocalyptically bad

This season has been an objective disaster for the Commanders, with their most recent performance putting a bow on their struggles. A 31-0 loss to the Minnesota Vikings, in a game that felt far worse than even that score would suggest, officially eliminated them from playoff contention and continued their now seven-game losing streak. The offense has been riddled by injuries, but most basic and advanced statistics have them pegged as an average-ish unit on the season. Marcus Mariota has done a decent job this season as a backup and things should improve next season when franchise quarterback Jayden Daniels has a full offseason to heal from his various injuries. The biggest problem, by far, is a defense so bad that it’s really hard to describe.

This team just can’t play defense. The current Commanders resemble the defenses that Dan Quinn oversaw in Atlanta — jarringly unprepared. Each week Washington has coverage busts and poor run defense, and the players are routinely put in poor situations to succeed. The Vikings, who haven’t been able to do much of anything on offense this season, just went up and down the field with ease and made life incredibly easy for J.J. McCarthy. Since the Commanders’ seven-game skid started, they’re allowing opposing offenses to score 3.2 points per drive, easily worst in the NFL. Almost every single defensive stat over the last two months is ranked dead last in the league. They have been DICED.

Quinn has already pulled play-calling duties from Joe Whitt Jr., but it didn’t seem to matter even a little bit this past weekend. At times, it felt like the Vikings were just playing on air with no defense out there. At some point, Quinn has to prove he can run a defense without first-ballot Hall of Famers playing in their prime. Since leaving Seattle and the Legion of Boom, the only successful run Quinn has had has been with Micah Parsons and the Cowboys. That simply cannot be the bar for being able to run an effective defense.

It’s hard to get a great feel for how some of the defenders are progressing because they’re routinely put in poor spots (see Mike Sainristil’s game against the Vikings), but one thing that’s clear as day is they desperately need an upgrade at middle linebacker. Bobby Wagner has turned into a marked man on defense and teams are routinely able to get him into spaces that he’s no longer able to defend. With a weak middle of the field and defensive backs failing to execute coverages, the Commanders don’t have a chance right now — especially if their pass rush is still going to collect pressures at a bottom-five rate in the league.

This season is over, and if it stays this bad, there may be some tough conversations in Washington. At some point, Quinn has to prove he actually can coach a defense without super-elite players, because the evidence that he can’t is piling up over the past 10 years of results. It doesn’t make sense to have the same coverage issues that he did in Atlanta, but Quinn has four games to figure something out so his defenses can stop getting shredded by the most basic concepts in the league. It’s time to evolve or improve the staff, because right now this defense is just lost, which at this point is a staple of the scheme.

Every division headed toward a dramatic finish

One of the good things about a massive consolidation of losing teams for the second year in a row is that it creates more drama among the winning teams as the season comes to a close. Nine teams have already been eliminated from the playoffs with four games to go, setting the stage for playoff positioning for the top teams in their division. There’s a bit of intrigue with every division right now, with a handful of massive games this weekend.

AFC East

The Patriots and Bills play a huge game this weekend that will decide the fate of the AFC East. With a win, the 11-2 Patriots can lock in a playoff berth and clinch the AFC East. Buffalo isn’t in real danger of missing the playoffs at 9-4, but they would be forced into a road game if they lose this weekend.

AFC North

Baltimore and Pittsburgh are at the top of the division, with Pittsburgh owning the lead and current tiebreaker over its longtime rival. Neither team seems like they have a real chance to win the Super Bowl, but the Ravens are just one game back for now. The Ravens travel to Cincinnati this weekend (who is technically alive in the race) while the Steelers host the Dolphins.

AFC West

The Broncos are inching closer to clinching the AFC West on the back of their stout defense, but the Chargers and Chiefs are still lurking in the background. The Chiefs are a longshot to make the playoffs now, but the Chargers are only two games behind the Broncos despite a slew of injuries to the offensive line. The Broncos seem destined to win this division, but the Chiefs and Chargers racing into the wild card is going to be compelling as well.

AFC South

Well. The Colts are doing whatever they’re doing over there. Just ignore them. Unless Philip Rivers has turned the clock back to 2012 then this division is down to the Texans and Jaguars. Both teams have had up-and-down seasons, but Jacksonville is currently in the driver’s seat with a 9-4 record. Jacksonville and Houston split the season series, so tiebreakers could get weird here depending on how the next few weeks go.

NFC East

It feels like no one should win this division, but as usual this has come down to the 6-6-1 Cowboys and the 8-5 Eagles down the stretch. Maybe there’s a way for both fanbases to walk away unhappy.

NFC North

Every team is alive here, but the Vikings are probably too far away at 5-8 to actually make a run for the playoffs. Chicago and Green Bay both have nine wins on the season with the Lions still lurking in third place with eight. All of them are alive, but Green Bay is playing the best football right now and has the complete makeup of a title contender.

NFC West

The Cardinals had another forgetful season, but there’s a real chance that the Rams, Seahawks and 49ers all make the playoffs this season. This division has lived up to the hype with the Rams and Seahawks (both 10-3) looking like the two best teams in the sport right now. The 49ers have been hobbled yet again, but they keep churning out wins and sit a game back at 9-4.

NFC South

You’re still reading this?! Stop! Go get those presents before you ruin the holidays for your family. Get some fresh air. Just not this.

Four Verts: Bucs need to think about big changes at QB, while the Colts are doing WHAT

Tags: