Receivers, Timing And Losses
January 1st, 2026
Timing with Baker Mayfield good, Bucs say..
A lot of football folks smarter than Joe can’t figure this out.
Everybody and their brother thought if the Bucs could just keep their heads above water until the cavalry arrived in the form of players healed from major injuries, the Bucs would then throw the offense into overdrive and the rest of the league better buckle up.
The opposite happened!
The Bucs seemed poised to make a run at the No. 1 overall seed in the NFC playoffs with a foundation largely built without Mike Evans, mostly without Chris Godwin and fully without Jalen McMillan.
Since, Evans and McMillan made big impressions immediately when they returned from the injured reserve list against Atlanta. But Evans hasn’t matched what he did against the Dixie Chicks and McMillan has made modest impact.
Bucs offensive coordinator Josh Grizzard insisted yesterday that the lack of Baker Mayfield practice time this season with McMillan has not thrown off their chemistry.
“Not at all,” Grizzard said. “Mayfield’s “timing with ‘J-Mac’ (Jalen McMillan) is fantastic. He found J-Mac – and we’ve talked about pure progressions in here a little bit – to start the game.
“The one and two reads were not open on a couple of those concepts. J-Mac is really third and fourth in the progression, where he’s going right across the board and throwing it to J-Mac and had really two big-time conversions, whether it was second down or third down to continue those drives and get seven points.”
Grizzard said when Mayfield has thrown to McMillan — as McMillan is often down the totem pole of progressions — the timing is sharp.
What Joe found interesting is that Emeka Egbuka and McMillan had nearly the same number of snaps against Miami. Egbuka had 39 snaps. McMillan had 35. So are both splitting time?
Chris Godwin had 53 snaps and Evans had 50 snaps against Miami.