Tampa Bay Buccaneers Have 'Sluggish' Practice on Friday Per Bruce Arians

Arians was "not pleased" following Friday's practice and did not hold back when speaking with the media.

Friday marked the fifth day of 2021 training camp and Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach Bruce Arians was "not pleased" with how his team practiced.

"I thought we were really, really sluggish," Arians said after practice. "We talked about it before we left and took the day off. We came out – I don't know if our receivers caught a pass. The same thing defensively – we didn't stop anything over third-and-nine. It was just a horses--t practice."

Arians continued to be brutally honest when asked if there was anything he didn't like besides the dropped passes from the Bucs' receivers

"The whole practice," the veteran head coach explained. "Guys walking around – it wasn't what our standard is."

With the temperature in the upper 80s, lower 90s Friday morning in Tampa, perhaps the Florida heat had something to do with the poor practice performance. According to Arians, the Bucs are handling the heat "much better," compared to the first day of training camp.

"We don't do the extended water breaks anymore," Arians said. "We just have the one water break. Guys are in good shape."

So, if the heat isn't a big problem anymore, why was practice so rough? Bucs quarterback Tom Brady shared his thoughts.

“Just communication, execution, missing throws, missing reads – just overall a poor day," Brady explained.

According to Arians, Brady was "in there with them," in terms of his performance during Friday's "sluggish" practice.

"Well it wasn’t our best day," Brady said. "We’ve got to watch the film and correct it and I think that the important part is - we realized we’re starting at the bottom with everybody else, and we’ve got to climb our way up."

"It’s training camp, it’s a grind," Brady continued. "We’ve got to grind through it. We’re going to have bad days, we’re going to have good days. We have to come out tomorrow with more urgency and get the job done.” 

Tomorrow, Saturday will be the first day the Bucs will practice in full pads during this training camp. Brady shared what Arians told the team regarding practicing in pads.

"Coach said a good thing today he said, ‘Soccer practice is over after today,’ which means we really haven’t played any football," Brady said. "There’s [been] no pads, no tackling, no run-force, no run-fits, no breaking tackles, no play-action response, so things will change quite a bit tomorrow.”

When asked if his team will do better when it puts on pads for the first time on Saturday, Arians kept his answer short.

"Damn sure better."

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