Sunday, 3 a.m.
Sometimes, maybe the job doesn't look as daunting. Sometimes, maybe the flaws don't seem too deep.
Ask Bruce Arians, whose thought his team had a great practice on Saturday night.
"Again, like I told the team, Bucs win tonight," Arians said afterward. "That was a heck of a practice. You roll the dice when you're tackling each other, but we've got to see it, we've got to get better at it. I thought the tackling was much better this go-around than it was the other day. I really liked the way the offense started that period. But, again, it was a really good ebb and flow. Our twos and threes — obviously with Caleb (Benenoch) and Dot (Demar Dotson) out — those young tackles are getting exposed rather than getting exposure. It's going to happen one way or the other — either you're going to get exposed or you're going to have nice exposure. They're getting exposed. That leads to some of the non-success for those quarterbacks, but overall, I loved the speed and tempo of the practice, again."
The Bucs are less than a week away from their first preseason game, in Pittsburgh on Aug. 9.
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On other topics, Arians said:
(On the toughest position to cut): "Oh, gosh — receiver, defensive backs, inside linebackers, outside linebackers, even tight ends because a couple of guys are really showing up each week. It's a good problem to have."
(On Jameis Winston throwing the deep ball): "He's thrown some really good ones but he's measuring them a little bit, trying to throw too many jump balls. Just throw it out there — if you overthrow it, you overthrow it. I don't like the jump-ball stuff, unless it's in the end zone."
(On Winston's deep touchdown pass to Mike Evans): "That thing is in rhythm, really good rhythm. I hate that he missed Chris (Godwin) on the one. He threw him a jump ball, thinking he'd go up and take it away. Just hit him in stride. He's doing a really good job with (Breshad) Perriman. So, I think, yeah, that's part of it. I'm tired of seeing Scotty (Miller) jump up with his damn body; just catch the damn thing because you can make people miss. I kind of jumped on his ass a little bit because he's great after the catch but he's not using that."
(On second-year guard Alex Kappa): He's doing a heck of a job. He's gotten better and better every practice. He's going against some studs in there, so yeah, he's holding his own."
(On Ronald Jones scoring on a goal-line drill): "Oh yeah, he had the ball out, I saw it. It was a great, great job. I thought the short-yardage period was excellent — we moved the ball. At the goal line, it was a give-and-take. When you can run it in, that's nice, but the passes were like stealing. It's really cheating in that drill to throw the ball."
(On what he wants to see Monday after day off): "Well, that's the thing. The last time we had a day off, the night practice was the worst practice we had. Now we're coming back at eight in the morning and we've talked about it. We can't come out here and be lethargic. We should be outside, which will be nice [to be] on grass and hopefully the weather will continue next week. But yeah, that's been huge. We should be jacked up with the national anthem and the military guys here, so it should be a good practice."
(On the kicking battle): "It's all about games. It's not what you do in practice. Heinz Field is going to be one heck of a place to test them. He’s (Matt Gay) obviously got the distance, but he missed the extra point because he got lazy with it. Cairo (Santos) had a heck of a day yesterday and inside he hit a 54 (yard field goal], so it's been a good battle."
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