The Fumblerooski Podcast - Homecoming- A Fumblerooski Special

Episode Date: October 2, 2021

In this special episode, we preview the highly anticipated matchup between the Patriots and Buccaneers. We will discuss all the storylines, angles, and keys to each team coming out with a victory.

Good evening and welcome to this special edition of the Fumble Rooski podcast. Tonight we will be giving you a special preview of the Sunday night football game between the New England Patriots and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I'm your host Adam Wright. Justin Tucker is out tonight, but we do have a special guest and a possibly new member of our team. Making his debut on this show, we have CJ Medeiros, a classmate of mine and a fellow sports broadcasting major at Dean College. So, CJ, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself? Hey, everyone. Thank you. And Adam, just let me say thank you for the great introduction. Thanks for letting me on.

Like Adam mentioned, I'm a sports broadcasting major. Love the Pats. And so I might be a little bit biased, but don't tell anyone. And I also run the blog known as CJ's Patriots Opinions for all your news that you need regarding your New England Patriots. So what we usually have on our show. So Justin and I, we're going to be the main hosts. That's going to be, that's going to be the state. We're the staple of this, this podcast. Justin's just out with this weekend because he has a football game,

but CJ might, CJ, there's a possibility that he's going to be on our team and we're going to see how he likes it here. We're going to have him on as a guest every now and then. He could help us out with social media. And he's a great football mind. And another thing is he's a Patriots fan, unlike Justin, who is a Ravens fan. Not that fan affiliation is a bad thing, but we're going to be on the same page on a lot of different things.

It's going to be interesting having another Patriots fan on board. Yeah, maybe I could help 2v1 you against Justin, but we'll see. We could do that. Just have three of us on and then just tag team. Hey, if it works, works all right well let's get into everything so we have um so we have the new england patriots uh hosting the tampa bay buccaneers so uh looking at this matchup take away all the storylines in it, and if you look at it, it's easy to look at this and say this is just another regular season game.

You have the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who are the clear Super Bowl favorites, or at least one of them, and then you have this Patriots team, who's kind of just a borderline playoff team. They're off to a slow start. They've been having some growing pains early on with all the signings that they've had. But, I mean, looking at that, what do you think the keys are to each team for winning this game, CJ? Now, for Tampa Bay, I'll start with them, you know, save the best for last here. Now, for Tampa, what I think the key is, is that the injury report. So you don't have Gronk, that's big. Jamel Dean, you know, you're starting like the corner, your top guy is out.

And your emerging star in Giovanni Bernard is also out. So I would, if I am Bruce Arian slash Tom Brady, what I would do is I would move completely away from the ground game as the Patriots do not have Stephon Gilmore and JC Jackson appears to have been banged up in camp battling a knee injury. So I would air it out because brown is coming back you already have evans and godwin and who's gonna stop them i mean if jackson if his knee injury is actually serious that could spell certain doom for the patriots and you know they already don't have gilmore and they would be down to jonathan jones who is no, not by any sense of the imagination, but then they would

probably have to slot in Adrian Phillips and Jalen Mills, which personally, I would favor the Bucs, you know, over those three, you know, the Bucs receiving core, that is. And I would just have Brady air it out, let him take out his frustrations. And on the defense, the trick is pressure. Now, I've noticed that on the Pat's injury report, Trent Brown and Isaiah Wynn are listed as questionable. And Trent Brown has missed every game since week one. And so that and, you know, you have Isaiah Wynn, who's now just on the injury report. And so both their tackles are banged up. So I would just say bring the pressure. Blitz the rookie.

Make him uncomfortable. So that's what I think is Tampa's keys to victory. So you still want me to do New England, right? Yeah. Okay, just checking. So for New England, get Mack time, because ideally you're going to have Trent Brown, Mack, and that's a big boy that you have on the offensive line, and he could easily swallow up somebody like Shaq Barrett. And Jason Pierre-Paul, I hear,

is a game-time decision, and you say he's out. I haven't heard that, but let's just assume he is. Then that's going to be a huge loss for Tampa. And like I said, you just need to get Mack time because teams are, like, blitzing him right out the gate. They've been hitting our backup linemen. But if our line stays healthy, that should give us, you know, that should give us some semblance of hope, as we just have to buy Mack time and get the tight ends involved. I mean, Hunter Henry's been decent. Jonu Smith has kind of been a non-factor, but's shown flashes so literally get the ball to the tight ends

i mean mac seems to favor the short slants with jacoby myers and nelson agalor so i would say move away from that and use the two tight ends who we paid handsomely in free agency to just knife into the belly of the defense, bludgeon them. Oh, and also, Ramondre Stevenson, anyone? You want to talk about a bludgeon? There's your guy. Basically like a bargain bin version of LeGarrette Blunt. Just keep running him right up the middle.

Tire them out. And finally, on offense, get creative. I mean, we have a speedster in Kendrick Bourne, and we saw how good he was against the Saints. Get him involved. Do some sweeps, like flea flickers, something. Get the Tampa Bay defense off their game, and especially since their secondary really isn't that great. And defensively, Pressure Brady.

We have a very underrated duo of Matt Judon and Josh Uche, and we also have Lawrence Guy and Davon Gadchow, who just can crash through the middle. We have a special group of linebackers with Hightower, Van Noy, and Bentley, who can just run everywhere. And we have McCourty playing safety, and Bentley who could just run, you know, everywhere. And we have McCourty playing safety and whether or not Jackson plays is still to be seen. And even if he doesn't, Adrian Phillips isn't too bad either. So, but long story short, pressure Brady, make him make mistakes because I know the Bucks have a good O-line, but our pass rush is not something that you should underrate,

especially since Uche and Judon both have three sacks thus far. So it seems like what you're – in a nutshell, your take is – so get to the opposing quarterback. This is the key for each team. Get to the opposing quarterback and protect yours. Is that correct? Actually, yeah, that's pretty much it. That's basically what it boils down to.

Get to the opposing quarterback, protect yours. Games like this are won and lost in the trenches. This is something that I said about the Tampa Bay Buccaneers all last season, which was that if you kept Tom Brady upright and you got to the opposing quarterback, you win the game. That was plain and simple. If you look at every game last year, if the Buccaneers failed to keep Tom Brady on his feet, then they lost, and the team just crumbled.

But if they kept him upright against the Rams, I thought he played a good game. But the issue was the defense just failed. The problem was the defense didn't get to the opposing quarterback. They didn't do it enough. So that's just the way it is and i mean this is also a smaller thing but they weren't ever able to get into the end zone very much the buccaneers last week i mean i turned it on towards the end but those garbage time points rarely count for much but here's the thing both secondaries are depleted. Their number one corner in Jamel Dean. Actually, two of their three corners.

I forgot the other guy's name. Two of their three starting corners are out. Is it Sean Bunting? It could be. Or is it I don't have the name of the other one, but I know you're thinking of. I would have to look it up. But you look at and then you look

at the Patriots side and you're going to be missing – you're obviously going to be missing Stephon Gilmore. And now there's a possibility that J.C. Jackson could be out. Oh, Carlton Davis? Is that who you're thinking of? I think that's it. Yeah, that's it. Yeah, so Carlton Davis and Jam of the three starting corners and the Patriots secondary is banged up itself. Now, both secondaries depleted, it comes down to which team can get to the quarterback better. front sevens in the league that are as good as Tampa's front seven. They'll be without Shaq Barrett, but they'll still be able to get to the quarterback. They have plenty of weapons there. I thought Shaq Barrett was playing.

Yeah, sorry, JPP. So Tampa Bay has a better ability to get to the quarterback, and Tampa Bay also has a better ability to exploit your depleted secondary. So, this could be a more high-scoring game than we anticipate it to be. I mean, at least on both sides, because Mac Jones is going to be able to throw the ball all over the field. However, Tampa Bay is just better than you in just about every way. So you look at this, there's no way, I just don't see any way the Patriots come out with a win. They can make it close. I'm hoping they keep it close, but the key, like, I

mean, I mean, we could, in a smart ass way, I could say, well, the keys to Tampa Bay winning is show up basically. Just show up and everybody be healthy who is, who is expected to play right now, because even with the depleted roster they have they're not going to uh i don't see them losing this game just this patriots team is not the patriots team of old especially since uh your or your old quarterback is on the other sideline now it's just there's no way it happens i mean i went a little bit less in depth than you did going up and down the roster but it's just quite it's I went a little bit less in depth than you did going up and down the roster, but it's just quite, it's plain and simple. They're head and shoulders better than you.

And all they have to do is play like it, really. Yeah, that's true. But I think we both know when the chips are down, Bill Belichick teams have a knack for playing up to competition. And that's the thing. Tampa, I know Brady's going to be upset and he wants revenge, but I wouldn't, this is hard to say, but if Josh McDaniels opens up the playbook just a tiny bit more, i feel like the patriots could perhaps take advantage of a very banged up tampa secondary also do we know if richard sherman's going to be playing last time i checked he's playing yeah he's playing so he doesn't really know the system so i would just put someone like kendrick bourne on and then try to expose him through speed. So, I mean, I'm pessimistic about this. Perhaps not as much as you are, but I still am.

But I feel that the odds are greatly stacked against us. But, hey, what else? I mean, but I'm not going to say victory is completely unattainable, because what do they say? Any given Sunday. But I really believe that if we pressure Brady, that is still our best chance. Yeah.

I don't see him winning, but like you said, anything can happen. Like I said, this game can certainly be close, but I mean, come on. This game is going to – they're going to lose.

And I just hope it's close. And I hope Mac Jones plays well. And I hope we can get maybe a moral victory out of this. But I mean, that's basically about sums it all up. But anyways, we're going to go, we're going to move on. So we went and we dug, we kind of scratched the surface a little bit about the Patriots and Buccaneers injury report, but we didn't go into who is sick. The Buccaneers quarterback is possibly a little bit under the weather, and we're going to discuss that next. You're listening to the Fumble Rooski Podcast. Welcome back to this special edition of the Fumble Rooski Podcast. I'm Adam Wright. I'm here with new co-host, just fill in for now, CJ Medeiros, diehard Patriots fan

And we are discussing all of the keys to this matchup between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the New England Patriots And so, Tom Brady has had a couple of interviews or a couple of press conferences lately. And if you heard him, he just does not sound like Tom Brady. He sounds like his voice just sounds so sick. And you wonder, I mean, Rob Gronkowski is out for the game. A lot of players are going to be out. Do you think there's a possibility this guy has COVID? Well, it's possible because you know how the state of Florida is.

They're not really too mandate-friendly. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But I think it's very possible, especially in a place like an NFL locker room where you have a bunch of sweaty people in close proximity. There's a very real chance. But make no mistake, if he does have COVID, there's no way in hell that the media is going to hear about it. Because this is Brady's big revenge game and they're gonna they're gonna have them play regardless I agree they can't make like not I'm not saying that it's right or it's not right but um there's no way there's if even if he does have COVID there's no way they're going to let that get to the surface.

He's going to play. And if he torches you for five touchdowns and lays a 50-burger on you, this is going to be known as the game where he wasn't 100%. He came back in, but he just went to town and torched you. This will be like the Michael Jordan flu game where he's just going off and he's just absolutely motivated. And I'm actually very excited for it. Even as a – I'm very – I'm just excited for this game. Obviously, I'm a Patriots fan. I'm going to go back a little bit back on what I said on my last episode when I said I'm rooting for the Buccaneers.

I don't think that's right. But at the same time, like, I don't – I'm going to say it'll be silver lining if they lose because it'll be a nice kick in the ass that they need. And I think Tom Brady torching you will be a nice little reality check for Bill Belichick to say, okay, it's time to put my ego aside. We need to get going. Obviously, I want the Patriots to win. So for any of you who were very upset about my take last week, I apologize. I'll clarify a little bit more and kind of backtrack on that on that take wasn't the best take but i i still

don't think it won't it'll be the worst thing in the world if they lose or maybe perhaps even when they lose but anyways if brady plays uh so brady brady's going to play. And make no mistake, too, if this does surface, that he did have COVID, or if there's rumors about it, we're going to hear about it for months. And it's going to be another big scandal. At least the scandal won't be on our end this time. Yeah, at least it won't be like that. So Brady took the scandals with him. He took the winning with him, but he also took the scandals with him.

So it'll be something like that. But anyways, so there's a lot of emotions that have been going on on both sides of this whole thing, between Brady's camp, between Belichick's camp, both sides. I mean, obviously Brady's side has been a lot more vocal, with Alex Guerrero making comments, with Tom Brady's dad making comments. And then there's, I mean, on Belichick's side, it's mainly just a lot of Patriots fans just going on.

But there's a lot of it. So we're going to discuss a lot of the emotions, a lot of the different feelings that we will be going through during this game, which has been discussed a lot, but we'll go into it for just this game. But that'll be next. You're listening to this special edition of the Fumble Rooski podcast. Stay tuned. You are listening to the Fumble Rooski podcast. This is a special episode. I am here with CJ Medeiros, who is just a fill-in for Justin Tucker for tonight. So as I've said before at the end of last segment, there's been a lot of different storylines.

This whole thing has been a massive soap opera between Alex Guerrero making his comment saying that Tom Brady was mistreated by Bill Belichick, that you can't treat a 40-year-old like he's in his 20s. And I'm forgetting what his dad said. What did his dad say? Tom Brady's dad, at the beginning of this season,

said that he expects the Bucs to win by at least 20 and that it should serve Bill Belichick right. Yeah. Things like that. And there is something that I actually am forgetting. I'm going to try to look it up to verify this. There was also Seth Wickersham coming out with his book. It was, what is it, It's Better to be Feared.

And there were a lot of different things in there. Like it explained why Malcolm Butler was benched, went into depth. We might actually knowcolm butler was benched went into depth we might actually know why malcolm butler was benched now it explained that tom brady wanted to leave in 20 wanted to leave as early as 2017 and there was just a lot of different there's a lot of different things um so what how do you think what do you think Brady should be feeling we know we how how do you think how do you think he will be feeling during this game do you think he'll be angry do you think he'll be do you think he'll be actually more emotionally moved from all from the history here what do you what do you think Brady will be feeling during this game? And how about Belichick?

On both sides, I think it's going to be somewhat conflicted because Brady still knows he has a home here. He knows that he hurt a lot of fans by leaving. And, you know, like I said, you know, there's history. On the other hand, he's going to be determined to beat belichick he's going to go up and say yes that is entirely me who did this i am the greatest without belichick i mean i'm still great without belichick belichick on the other hand it's always been kind of hard to gauge what exactly he's feeling.

But I feel like he has all the respect in the world for Tom and he still likes Tom to a degree. But at the same time, Belichick, I don't feel maybe like if Belichick has something to prove. I feel like Belichick is like also determined to like beat tom brady so i feel like both are like kind of like emotional but they're like really determined to uh win basically they're like and especially belichick more than brady is going to be more than willing to put his emotions to side and and don't and don't be shocked like if belichick has some tricks up his sleeve or something because knowing Bill, he's going to want to rattle Brady early and often. And this may sound like a slight, and I do not mean it as such,

but we all know Bill's a bit more cold-blooded than Tom is. Oh, 100%. He is. So Brady's going to be bloodthirsty coming into this game, and I think Belichick is too. But I think by the end of this contest, I think Brady's – I think they're both going to be regretting those feelings, and I think they're going to be going – they're going to be backtracking a little bit um because i just think the fan reaction is going to be so heartwarming that just think about i don't think fans will be able to help themselves when they see when they see brady coming up when they announce his name and they just remember all the everything that he's done for this team and i i'm, I'm sure the stadium will be playing some sort of tribute for him. They absolutely will. And the fans will be going nuts for it. And I just don't think, I just don't think the hard feelings will last. I think Brady and Belichick, that relationship

between the two will be strained for a little while it's just going to be and they probably won't they probably won't be friends again until like 10 years from now that when they're doing like a special on ESPN or something together and they're explaining their emotions but for now that's not gonna that's not gonna last but like his relationship with New England is not going to stay as bad as it is. Honestly, I feel that once we see him pregame, that stadium's going to be cheering for him. And once, you know, while he's warming up, everyone's going to be like, ah, Brady, Brady. But mark my words, once it gets to game speed, every Pats fan in that stadium is going to be against him. That's just the feeling

I get. Once the actual game is afoot, they're going to want Brady to get destroyed. It's kind of like when Adam Vinatieri left, and while he was warming up as a new member of the Indianapolis Colts, everyone was cheering for him, but he got booed and heckled every time he stepped on that field during the game. That's just the nature of the beast, frankly. It is. It is. And I think Tom Brady understands that. I think that's a mutual understanding that they'll have. You know, it's not personal. It's just, well, you're on the other team. We are as passionate fans as they come, and he knows that that and he knows it's going to be loud there it's more i think that's going to be more of a respectable thing rather than like we hate you

it's like no we're you're on the other team now we loved you we're we appreciate what you did for us but now you're a buccaneer and let's let's go exactly Couldn't put it any better myself. But it's going to be an unbelievable matchup. I just can't wait. I don't, like, I'm slightly conflicted in this game, and I love every bit of it. I'd rather lose, like, I mean, it sucks losing to this team, but it's nice to see Tom Brady doing so well.

And it's going to be so enjoyable watching both teams just fight it out. And I just hope it's not a bit – I just hope it's not a – I just hope this isn't a blowout. Yeah, I pray it's not. If we lose by less than 10, I'll be happy. But honestly, I'm not conflicted. I'm not. I want us to beat the pants off brady i really do that way i may sit and laugh but you know because i've always i mean i will admit that belichick wasn't responsible for the dynasty but brady wasn't either i honestly

think it's a healthy mix of the two and and one is nothing without the other. But that being said, I've always leaned ever so slightly towards Belichick, and as a Pats fan, I want us to go out and whip him. I know it's more than likely, like, 99.9% chance not going to happen, but on the off chance we do, oh, I will be happy. I've leaned towards Brady. I've leaned towards Brady. I've leaned towards Brady. And it's not to say that I'm rooting for the Buccaneers tonight. Or, sorry, tomorrow night.

It's more so to say, like, this got, like, it's tough love. Because I think they completely botched the whole situation. If you're going to trade Brady when you had Garoppolo do it, but don't, don't trade Garoppolo. Then let go Brady. And like two years after you trade Garoppolo, you get, you get rid of Brissett.

I mean, he's just, I know he's just a smaller, but he at least did something. He's better than Cam Newton. When we had him. And now you spend a 15th overall pick on this kid, Mac Jones, who just threw three picks last week.

I'm really hoping. Interceptions are interceptions. Yeah, I know, but it's not like you're making bad reads. Two of them hit the receivers right in the hands. They're still a mental thing. They're going to get to his head, and now he has to face this loaded Tampa Bay Buccaneers team. But we're talking about their emotions, not our emotions. But we should get into our own game predictions for this week. So we're going to conclude the show with some predictions

on how we think the game is going to go. We're going to do some who wins, score predictions, all of that. That's all next on the Fumble Rooski podcast. Stay tuned. You are listening to the Fumble Rooski podcast. This is a special episode that we are going over. And I am here with CJ Medeiros who's filling in for Justin Tucker for the day so we're reaching we're reaching towards the end of the show but we will

we're going to give you some predictions that we have for this game uh so CJ what do you what do you think's going to happen through the game what do you think who do you think's going to win all that stuff well And we'll finish with a score prediction. I hate to say this. I really do. But I think Tampa's going to win. I can't tell you by how much, but I don't want it to be a blowout. However, I do have a sneaking suspicion that it's going to be relatively close-ish. But I would say maybe something like 30-24, maybe 33-24, somewhere in that ballpark. Yeah, so I think this is going to be a higher scoring game than people might think. I think Tampa is going to have a much better time getting to the quarterback, and that's ultimately what's going to separate the two of them. And what's also going to separate them is their ability to is Tampa's ability to

exploit the other team's depleted secondary as we mentioned earlier both both secondaries are very shorthanded right now meaning they'll be able to pick they'll be able to pick you apart so I say it'll be a high scoring gameoring game, but Tampa is going to put some distance between you. I think it's going to be Tampa Bay will score, say, 35 points. And let's say New England scores 21, 24 points. Maybe 35, 2424 Tampa Bay and that's ultimately what's going to win the game hey I mean it's it's possible I mean these things are always hard to predict especially in a game as hectic as that. Absolutely. And, like, I mean, this isn't just a regular season game.

Like, there's so many storylines that are attached to it. There's so many. Like, this is such a hyped-up game, and this is going to be – this is the most highly anticipated regular season game, possibly in Super Bowl history, maybe in football history. It's incredible. Yeah, I mean, I honestly... Yeah, I feel exactly the same way. This could very well be one of, if not the greatest game of all time,

provided it's not a blowout. Absolutely. All right, you have any other thoughts before we finish the show? Honestly, no. I said everything I need to say, and I stand by everything I said. Same here. What are you doing for the game? Well, for those who don't know,

Dean College has this place called the Boomers, where there's a lot of TVs you can go and watch. I'll probably go there with some friends and watch. What about you? I'm going to find a way to watch this with some friends. I want to get some wings and I want to get some drinks and just watch and just go off watching this game. I want to drink, and I want to eat wings,

and I want to root for Tom Brady to play well, and I want to root for the Patriots to win and hope that both things happen. And the only way you can do that is if you've had a few drinks, just saying. Hey mean i mean i'm not saying on air that i'm going to be drinking heavily but but that's i mean it is what it is uh i mean personally that's not something i do but like i'm also drinking i'm also drinking age, so I'm not like – Oh, fair enough.

I am not. Yeah. Yeah, you're not, so I wouldn't – and I wouldn't say it out loud if you were either. Like I can if I wanted to, but I'm also trying to stay professional. Yeah, I hear you. I'm a diehard passionate Patriots fan. I can't help it. All right, guys.

Well, that will do it for us tonight. Thank you for listening to this special episode. Make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel. Check us out on Spotify, Spreaker, and Google Podcasts. Also, be sure to follow our Instagram at FumbleRooski underscore podcast to keep up with our podcasts

and the latest coverage on the NFL. Otherwise, we will see you in next week's regular episode. Over and out.