Tampa Bay Buccaneers Tickets

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers were the victim of a very competitive division in 2008 and likely will have to deal with a similar situation in 2009.

The team signed Byron Leftwich in the offseason, and it appears as though he could actually end up as their starting quarterback. Leftwich was great as the backup quarterback for Pittsburgh last year and could thrive in Tampa.

The Bucs also traded for tight end Kellen Winslow and then signed him to a big deal, which is a huge risk considering his injury history and lack of consistency.

Tampa Bay hasn't had a consistent threat at the tight end position for as long as I can remember, so it appears they were willing to mortgage some of their future to make that happen.

Their schedule is no cake walk though, with matchups against the AFC East and NFC East. The AFC East is improved from last year while the NFC East is always a tough matchup.

I suppose the one bit of good news about that is the fact that Tampa won't have to travel out West very much with 14 of their 16 games being play along the East Coast.

The Bucs get their bye in Week 8, which is also good news. Few teams around the league get the benefit of having their bye at just about the midpoint of the season.

Interestingly enough, outside of an early contest against Buffalo, the team's first five games include all four NFC East opponents. I guess that's just one of those weird scheduling quirks.