Embraces the Bucs.

If you’ve won over Kay Adams, you just may win over America.

The Bucs have long but quietly groused about how they’re overlooked. They won’t exactly say they are dissed, but they feel that way.

If any team in the NFC East, the AFC East, the AFC North or the NFC North had the track record of the Bucs this decade, screamin’ Stephen A. Smith and dopey Mike Greenberg would be camping out in the front yard of Bucs AC/DC-loving general manager Jason Licht.

Could you imagine the airtime the Steelers or Packers or — God help us — the Jets would get if they had the Bucs’ track record this decade? Forget any NFC East team.

The way the BSPN crowd and all the hollering shows on FS1 carry on about teams from the aforementioned divisions, if any team from those divisions matched the Bucs’ output of the past five years, the limited amount of oxygen left in our atmosphere would be so thin, it would be like the Mars bar scene from “Total Recall,” where the evil dictator Cohaagen limited the oxygen pumped into the Last Resort watering hole.

Remember when Conor Orr of SI.com had the Bucs winning two games? That’s how most of the national scribes thought of the Bucs.

That’s one reason Lavonte David never got in a Pro Bowl since America’s Quarterback, Jameis Winston, was a rookie. It may also be a reason why people to this day still scoff at Mayfield, though Joe sees that’s beginning to turn.

In part, thanks to recent sitdowns with Tez Johnson, David and Licht, Adams has warmed greatly to the Bucs, as she stated last week on her weekday show seen on FanDuel Network, “Up and Adams.”

“Who has it better than Baker [Mayfield] right now?” Adams said. “If you look at that room, the offense so deep, so loaded, they’re so overlooked. It makes me love them.

“I think Tampa should be getting a lot more attention in the NFC.”

Adams noted that when she talked to Licht at the owners meetings in March, she got the sense the Bucs liked being overlooked.

Now, Adams said, it’s time for the Bucs to get their due.

“They liked being slept on to a point, though, right?” Adams said. “It’s like, ‘We do enjoy this [but] now it’s time to flex a little.'”

The best way to get respect is to win, and win in the postseason. Right now, the Bucs have a good enough team they shouldn’t be distracted by who and how much folks are talking about them.

This team has a shot to make a run. Worry about winning and the chatter will come. Or at least, it should.

Barring another international celebrity taking over the Bucs at the ultimate glamour position in sports again, they will never get the run like they did when Tom Brady was here.

“Who has it better than Baker?” 💥

Kay says the Bucs' WR room is stacked — and Tampa’s explosive offense deserves way more love in the NFC.@heykayadams | @Buccaneers pic.twitter.com/RsmwX5g8tr

— Up & Adams (@UpAndAdamsShow) June 12, 2025