Todd Bowles didn’t sugarcoat it after Tampa Bay’s preseason finale, and he didn’t need to. The Buccaneers like their starting offensive line, but the picture gets a lot murkier once you look beyond the first five.
Friday’s 19-0 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars put that issue right back in the spotlight. Tampa Bay was sacked five times and finished with just 120 total yards, a rough ending to a preseason in which the depth up front never really settled in.
Jalon Daniels took three sacks before Jake Browning entered and was dropped twice more. The run game never found traction either, with the Bucs limited to 36 rushing yards outside of Daniels’ scrambles.
“I like the first five and when everybody's healthy,” Bowles said. “I'll look at the tape.
If you judge by tonight, yeah, there's concern. I'll look at the totality of the tape and see where it came from.”
That’s the heart of the problem. Tampa Bay can feel good about Tristan Wirfs, Ben Bredeson, Graham Barton, Cody Mauch and Luke Goedeke as a starting unit.
That group has the look of one of the stronger lines in football. But the team has spent the preseason searching for dependable answers if the lineup gets disrupted, and those answers haven’t shown up often enough.
Benjamin Chukwuma has had an uneven summer at tackle. Marshall Foerner had a rough outing against Kansas City, including a sack that led to a big hit on Browning and briefly knocked him out of the game. Justin Skule brings experience and has filled the swing tackle role before, but Tampa Bay still hasn’t found anyone who has clearly separated himself behind Wirfs and Goedeke.
The interior isn’t locked in, either. Dan Feeney gives the Bucs experience at guard and center, and rookie Billy Schrauth appears to have a spot on the roster. Beyond that, the depth chart gets thin in a hurry.
That’s a familiar place for Tampa Bay. The Buccaneers went through nine different starting offensive line combinations down the stretch in 2025 because injuries kept forcing them to patch things together. Players who weren’t supposed to matter much ended up becoming essential.
Bowles isn’t rushing to make a sweeping call off one preseason game, and he shouldn’t. But after three exhibition games, the Bucs still haven’t seen enough from the reserves to feel comfortable. With roster cuts coming around the league, the waiver wire could become Tampa Bay’s best chance to add help before Week 1.
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Bucs Just Reopened An Uncomfortable Draft Question At Edge
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Braswell appeared in 34 games for Tampa Bay, but never turned that early investment into a starting spot or much meaningful production. His exit leaves the Buccaneers with another reminder that the edge rush room still has questions, especially when it comes to how much certainty they actually have behind the top of the rotation. [Read more 🡒]