Where has Sack Barrett gone for the Bucs?

TAMPA — Shaquil Barrett is sacked out. He’s had trouble getting a quarterback into his arms, much less to the ground.

A year ago, Barrett burst onto the scene as a Broncos free agent to lead the NFL with 19.5 sacks and was named to his first Pro Bowl. He also earned $15.8 million as the Bucs' franchise player.

Even with all that money, he can’t buy a sack right now. Barrett has three at the halfway point in the season, including two against his former team in Week 3 at Denver.

“Me, just personally, getting after the quarterback, it’s been a little different going against different (blocking) sets,” Barrett said. “I have to work on my strength and power moves. I’ve been working on new moves and still getting pressure. But pressures don’t mean nothing if you don’t have sacks to go with it.”

No one expected Barrett to duplicate his sack title. From the first game this season, he knew he would be a marked man.

Barrett’s greatest asset as a pass rusher is his speed. He explodes from a three-point stance the way Usain Bolt shoots out of the starting blocks. He has an uncanny knack for anticipating the snap count, if not jumping it by a heartbeat or two.

In his first five seasons with the Broncos, Barrett produced 14 sacks playing behind the likes of DeMarcus Ware and Bradley Chubb. Then he arrived in Tampa Bay on a one-year, $4 million contract and his career took off.

Suddenly, he was Sack Barrett, compiling nine through the first four games of 2019.

It wasn’t a fluke. While playing the apprentice for Ware and Chubb, Barrett developed his craft. He has a deep tool box of pass rush moves to pull from. Unfortunately, teams have made the adjustment to Barrett, and now it’s his turn.

Offensive tackles are cheating, setting up deeper and deeper, play after play, to negate Barrett’s patented rush off the outside edge. Not much has worked. Fortunately for the Bucs, they have a lot of players who can get to the quarterback.

That may be hurting Barrett’s value as a player in this league, but it’s helping the team. With tackles, tight ends and running backs focusing on Barrett, other players are getting home.

Linebacker Lavonte David has 1.5 sacks this season. Fellow linebacker Devin White has five.

That’s not to suggest that Barrett hasn’t been productive in a Bucs defense that is third overall and ranked first against the run. Some players are situational pass rushers, but Barrett has become equally adept at dominating his position against the run or the pass.

Already this season, he has six quarterback hits and five tackles for a loss.

It’s all setting up for a breakout game, and there’s no time like the present. On Sunday the Bucs host the Saints and quarterback Drew Brees, one of the hardest players to sack year after year because of his quick release.

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But Barrett has gone back in the lab. He has studied the Saints, he has watched how he has performed in big games this season.

What he concluded from all that self-scouting is that he needs a better counterpunch. Barrett says he has conjured up a set of options against Saints tackle Ryan Ramczyk.

“There’s a different move I’ve been working on as well,” Barrett said. “I should get the perfect opportunity to bring it out this week. I got it from a guy who played against Ramczyk and I saw it earlier this year as well, but I never tried it until this week in practice and I think I’ve got it down pretty good now.”

Of all the plays the Bucs needed to beat the Giants 25-23 on Monday night, none was bigger than Barrett twice crawling onto the back of quarterback Daniel Jones and forcing an errant pass.

The first one was intercepted by Carlton Davis and the next was Sean Murphy-Bunting’s first interception of the season.

Now comes another primetime game, against a division foe.

“Oh, we’ve been itching for this game,” Barrett said. “They’ve had our number the last three games we played. We’ve got to step up, we’ve got to do something different to give ourselves a chance to win this game. We’ve got to get some sacks, some turnovers. But we’ve got to still maintain that strong defensive front where we don’t allow no rushing or passing yards and we’re getting the job done. It’s a big time for us.”

And time for Barrett to start piling up the sacks.