The Tampa Bay Buccaneers racked up 426 yards of offense in their Wild Card round win over the Philadelphia Eagles on Monday night, including 307 net passing yards. Quarterback Baker Mayfield was sacked four times, but he generally had time to operate as he threw for 337 gross yards and three touchdowns against no interceptions.
Mayfield got particularly good protection from his bookend tackles. The Eagles' leading sack artist during the regular season was Pro Bowler Haason Reddick, who had 11.0 QB takedowns, but Reddick didn't get a hand on Mayfield on Monday night. He primarily rushed against Luke Goedeke, and the Bucs' right tackle won the night. According to NFL Next Gen Stats, Goedeke faced Reddick on 21 pass-rush play, including 19 that were one-on-one matchups, and he didn't allow the Eagles edge rusher a single quarterback pressure.
On the other side of the line, left tackle Tristan Wirfs saw a lot of Josh Sweat, who had 6.5 sacks and 23 quarterback hits during the regular season. Those two went at it on 25 pass-rush snaps and, according to NGS, Wirfs only allowed one quarterback pressure on those plays. In contrast, Sweat had seven other pass rush plays against other Bucs' blockers and turned two of them into pressures.
When he was pressured, Mayfield was still able to do some damage. NGS counted nine of his throws as being made under pressure, of which he completed four for 84 yards and a touchdown, with a passer rating of 115.0. His average air yards per attempt on those plays was 14.9, the second deepest of any quarterback in the opening round of the playoffs behind Green Bay's Jordan Love.
Mayfield – and play-caller Dave Canales – helped the offensive front by dialing up a lot of quick-release passes. On the 27 throws on which Mayfield was not pressured he got rid of the ball at an average of 2.29 seconds after the snap. Only Buffalo's Josh Allen, at 2.18 seconds, had a quicker release on unpressured throws during the Wild Card weekend. Despite four of his passes being dropped, as determined by NGS, Mayfield had a 121.4 passer rating on those plays, with a total expected points added (EPA) of 14.3. Only the Rams' Matthew Stafford (23.5) and the Lions' Jared Goff (23.4) had better EPAs on unpressured throws over the weekend.
Of course, Mayfield's numbers were boosted by his pass-catchers getting yards after the catch. Trey Palmer and David Moore led the way with catch-and-run touchdowns of 56 and 44 yards, respectively, as the Bucs' skill-position players combined to record a YAC total of 219. That was the most of any team over the Wild Card weekend. That was also the highest YAC total for the Buccaneers in any game this season, topping the 190 they had in a Week 15 win at Green Bay.
Good blocking on the edges combined with an effective game plan and Mayfield's on-target passing led to a big night for the sixth-year quarterback and the Buccaneers, who live to play another weekend.
