The Tampa Bay Buccaneers running game was atrocious in 2023, and offensive coordinator Liam Coen has been asked to fix it. So far, through three games, he hasn't done that — but he knows it.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are currently 27th in total rushing yards (273) and yards per game (91.0). Running back Bucky Irving leads the team in rushing yards with 154, which is 56% of Tampa Bay's ground game. Lead back Rachaad White has particularly struggled, only putting up 66 yards on the ground so far this year.
This lack of success has started a debate among Bucs fans in regard to Irving and White, and it's particularly centered on their usage. Rachaad White has mostly been run with a zone scheme, while Irving has gotten significant snaps in a gap scheme.
To put the difference simply, zone running has linemen responsible for a certain area and typically demands that a running back use good vision to identify holes to run through — if you see linemen block toward the direction of the run, that's usually a zone scheme. Gap scheme is more of a man-based scheme denoting that linemen are responsible for individual defensive players — if you see guards "pulling", or moving from one side of the line to the other during a play, that's a gap scheme. Zone runs are reactive and require some patience, while gap runs are aggressive and focus on giving a numbers advantage to one side of the play.
So far, the Buccaneers have been much better at gap scheme runs, run often with Irving, than zone scheme runs, run often with White. That's something offensive coordinator Liam Coen understands, and he mentioned that the offensive line has had trouble executing the zone-based runs in these first three games.
"We don't really get the zone moving. We're not running off the ball," Coen said Thursday. "We didn't do that. We kind of reverted back to some poor habits at times on Sunday at multiple different positions. I've got to do a better job... being smart about where we call runs, where we call passes to give our guys a chance."
When asked if Coen would consider running more gap-based runs that the Bucs have been better at, he not only said he would be — he said that they probably should have committed more to what was working against the Broncos on Sunday.
"That's definitely a valid point. We definitely have looked into 'Hey, how can we create a balance between the gap and the zone?' These guys have been good at gap as well in the past at times, so it's definitely something we're going to try a balance of. Those guys last week played a little more of five-down front, the gap hit with Bucky [Irving] out the back door — we needed to probably get to some more gap schemes last week."
It's good that Coen is identifying what has been going wrong in this instance and the balance needed between the two different styles. Irving ran gap a lot at Oregon and is comfortable with that style already, but Rachaad White could flourish if given more carries in that system. Likewise, the offensive line has to get better at zone-blocking schemes and White still has to be able to make his reads quick enough to capitalize.
It will be a trial by fire for the Buccaneers to improve on either method, as they'll face a staunch Eagles defensive front on Sunday at 1 p.m. when they try to get back in the win column.
