Buccaneers Are In Trouble If Lavonte David Doesn't Play

There stands a possibility that Buccaneers linebacker Lavonte David misses the game Sunday night against Dallas. If he does, the Bucs could be in big trouble.

As the injury report was released Friday, there arose some concern that Buccaneers linebacker Lavonte David might not be able to play against the Cowboys. With such a potent running attack from Dallas and rookie Ezekiel Elliot, losing David would be a crushing blow to this Buccaneers defense, which ranks atop the NFL during their five game win streak.

Despite being on pace for career low numbers, Lavonte David’s play has dramatically improved over the past six weeks. His run stopping and pass coverage has created takeaways for the Bucs defense – and he even scored off of an interception against the Chargers to spark the Bucs’ comeback victory.

Dirk Koetter doesn’t seem too concerned about the captain missing Sunday when he spoke to the media Friday;

“He’s going to be on the injury report and we’re just have to wait until game time, but he’s going to be questionable, is how it’s going to come out on the injury report. Lavonte knows his body well, but the most important thing always is player health. And these guys, especially veteran players, they know if they can go or not, but it doesn’t do us any good to push these guys too hard on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.”

The combination of David and Kwon Alexander will play an integral part in stopping Elliot. If Lavonte misses the game, that duty will fall on Daryl Smith to play run stopper.

The Buccaneers have been fortunate enough to get healthy at the right time. Losing Lavonte for this game would be a big step back that hopefully Tampa Bay can avoid. As we’ve seen with Doug Martin, these hamstring injuries can be quite the nagging nuisance.

All we can do is wait to hear Lavonte’s status come game time. Hopefully, it’s good news.