TAMPA, Fla. – The Bucs have two days of joint practices with the Titans in Tennessee along with preseason game 2 Saturday night and they’ll be without Tom Brady.
No one inside the Bucs organization has talked about Brady being gone since head coach Todd Bowles and GM Jason Licht made the announcement last week after practicing against the Dolphins.
Right now it’s all about trying to get the young players much-needed game-like repetitions, especially 2nd year QB Kyle Trask.
“It’s a lot about the development of what he’s (Kyle Trask) learned and seeing what we have,” Bowles said. “We hadn’t seen him under pressure. We hadn’t seen him get knocked down and throw an incomplete pass and get up. We hadn’t seen him throw an interception and we hadn’t seen him throw a touchdown in a preseason game to date, other than practice.”
In the preseason opener against the Dolphins, Trask completed 25 of 33 passes for 258 yards with one touchdown and one interception.
Blaine Gabbert got the start at QB and went 5-for-5, 56 yards, and a 23-yard touchdown pass to Jaelon Darden,
“He (Blaine Gabbert) definitely throws a hard ball, but Blaine’s my guy,” Darden said. “he kind of took me under his wing and helped me with the offense for sure.”
So will Trask play as much as he did vs the Dolphins?
I can’t say it’ll be 80 to 75 (percent of the snaps) or whatever the case may be,” Bowles said. “But he will play a lot. I know what Blaine (Gabbert) can do. I know what Griff (Ryan Griffin) can do, I want to see what Kyle can do. he made some mistakes in the game the first time out, but I thought he handled the situations well.”
As far as the rest of the starters on the Bucs how much they play in Saturday’s game depends on how these two days of joint practices go.
“Some of them will play more this week,” Bowles said. We’ll see how practice goes, but all of them won’t be out.”
Injured Bucs receivers Mike Evans and Russell Gage are not making the trip to Tennessee, but WR Chris Godwin is progressing nicely coming off of knee surgery. Godwin on Tuesday performed in 7-on7 drills for the first time since his injury.
As far as Tom Brady’s absence, the Bucs are still planning on Brady returning sometime after Saturday’s game. Bowles and Licht said Brady leaving were for personal reasons.
“He’s (Tom Brady) gonna deal with some personal things, ” Bowles said. “This is something we talked about before training camp started.”
There has been no word from Brady at all or where he is at this time. Based on Brady’s meticulous work ethic and routine, it’s very out of character for the 7 time Super Bowl Champion QB.
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