The Buccaneers have lost four of their last five games and enter Week 15 in a tie with the Panthers at the top of the NFC South, but quarterback Baker Mayfield said on Tuesday that the team’s focus isn’t on what’s slipped away from them the last few weeks.
Mayfield said that the team’s eyes are on what remains in their control. They play the Panthers twice in the final four weeks of the season, which leaves them able to win the division for the fifth straight season.
“We’re still in control of our own destiny — that’s just a fact,” Mayfield said, via a transcript from the team. “We’re tied for the division, we would love to be ahead and in a different spot, but we are where we are and we control our own destiny, win one game at a time and see what happens.”
Mayfield said that a “playoff mentality” has to be part of the equation for the Bucs in those games as well as this Sunday’s matchup with a Falcons team that “would love nothing more than to beat us and screw up our chances.” That was the same place the Saints were in last Sunday and the Bucs will have to be much sharper to avoid another disappointing outcome.
