The 2022 NFL season has been pretty bad for Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Sitting at 4-5 and struggling to score points weekly has become a theme, and you can see the frustration on Brady’s face when things go awry.
While Brady is very demonstrative on the field, he’s been a little more animated this season as the team struggles to move the football. Brady even called the team’s play “embarrassing” at one point.
During his weekly media availability session, the seven-time Super Bowl winner went into further detail about this year’s version of the Bucs.
“There’s only so deep of a hole that you can dig, and you know, if you dig yourself too deep a hole, you got no shot of coming out of it. There’s definitely some things we do well, and some things we don’t do well. Too much of good, bad, good, bad leaves you average, and no one’s trying to be average.
“We wanna be a great team, way better than average. Correcting our mistakes, improving our effort, which that is probably the most embarrassing part of our team, is our effort level on game day, and that’s something we better fix.”
Heading into Week 10, the Buccaneers are tied for first with 19 drops as a team, along with the Miami Dolphins. The difference is Miami is 6-3 and Tampa is a 4-5. But when Brady speaks of average play, he’s calling out his receivers, even former Pro Bowl players Mike Evans and Chris Godwin.
Mike Evans drops a WIDE OPEN 75-yard touchdown.pic.twitter.com/pVG31k0YlH
— Dov Kleiman (@NFL_DovKleiman) October 23, 2022
Shannon Sharpe Takes Brady To Task For How He Handles Drops By Receivers
Sharpe isn’t feelings Brady’s leadership approach when receivers drop the ball, and the loquacious Pro Football Hall of Famer called TB12 out for it on a recent episode of “Undisputed” on FS1.
“Tom had a lot of stuff in there that I don’t agree with, I don’t have a problem with a receiver dropping the ball. And every time somebody drops a ball, Brady goes, ‘What are we doing? Let’s effing go.’ … Stop this, Tom.”
https://youtu.be/YtF-WFTE0Pk
Sharpe is referring to the 2011 spat where former offensive coordinator Bill O’Brien called Brady out for blaming a missed touchdown on the receiver when it was obviously his fault.
Brady Apologist Skip Bayless Comes To His Rescue
In the same argument, Bayless somehow tried to paint Brady in a great light.
“On the dropped passes he called himself out. I make a lot of mistakes pre-snap. I check out of the wrong play. He said, ‘I’m at fault more than they are with dropped balls.’ Now you’re ripping Tom Brady up for saying they drop balls. I don’t get it.”
Tom Brady showing some frustration on the field. pic.twitter.com/HM6CbkHTb1
— FOX Sports: NFL (@NFLonFOX) October 23, 2022
Brady is hesitant to take blame and only does it now when he’s called out on it. The looks and body language he throws his younger teammates is not a recipe for success so far. And Shannon thinks Brady is taking advantage of his status to throw innocent teammates under the bus. Maybe Brady should admit he’s 45 and might have made the wrong choice by coming back. It’ll never happen.
