Captain Fear
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- Mar 20, 2019
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Buccaneers receiver Antonio Brown debuted with 39 snaps. That was too many for the liking of coach Bruce Arians.
“His pitch count was a little higher than we anticipated,” Arians during a Tuesday appearance on Buccaneers.com, via JoeBucsFan.com. “But we tried to go two-minute early in the ballgame just to get some life, so his pitch count was up a little bit. But he handled it really, really well. . . . He did everything he needed to do to play well in that ballgame. The guys embraced him. They all helped him. And nobody works any harder than him on the practice field, so that was easy.”
Arians added that he hopes Brown’s pitch count drops in Week 10 against the Panthers, because Arians hopes “we’re not throwing the ball that much this week.”
The Buccaneers set an all-time NFL single-game record in Week Nine with only five rushing attempts against the Saints.
The use of three- and four-receiver sets to accommodate Brown complicates the situation. With one or zero tight ends on the field, it becomes harder to run the ball. Which makes it harder to pass the ball.
It’s entirely possible that Arians, who said in March that he doesn’t want Brown on the team, continues to engage in a push-and-pull with Tom Brady over Brown and, more specifically, Brown’s playing time.
Brady surely wants Brown on the field. Arians clearly doesn’t want Brown on the field as much as he was on Sunday night.