The Tampa Bay Buccaneers insist they never doubted themselves. Not after Tom Brady retired. Not even after the Philadelphia Eagles gashed them in an early-season, prime-time matchup that suggested there was a huge gap between themselves and the defending NFC champions.
The question around Philly — let’s broaden that, the NFL — has been raised, dissected and poked at from a thousand angles since early December. What the heck is wrong with the Philadelphia Eagles? How did a team just months removed from a Super Bowl appearance, one that boasts Pro Bowl and All-Pro talent such as Jalen Hurts, A.J. Brown, Darius Slay, Jason Kelce and Lane Johnson, go from a 10-1 start to this season to a 1-5 finish and enter the postseason limping toward a wild-card matchup at Tampa Bay?