Turnovers have been killing the Bucs and they had four more in a 16-3 loss to Washington on Sunday.
Quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick was at the center of that, throwing two interceptions and losing a fumble on second and goal from the Washington 4-yard line.
Despite those mistakes, coach Dirk Koetter said Monday that Fitzpatrick will start his third consecutive game and his seventh overall Sunday against the Giants.
"We're going to go with Fitz this week, and that's how it's going to stay," Koetter said.
Fitzpatrick hasn't done a good job of protecting the football lately. He had two interceptions in a loss at Carolina.
There was some speculation that Koetter may turn back to Jameis Winston, who had 10 interceptions in 3 { games since returning from his three-game suspension.
"Turnovers are killing us right now," Koetter said. "We're minus-19. We're last in the league, 13 in the last four games. Thirteen turnovers and no takeaways. That's by far the No. 1 thing that's hurting our team and you and I have talked about it many times, every turnover has it's own story. If there was one thing to it, it would be easy to fix. As a team, we're turning it over too much and not getting any takeaways on the other side."
Winston, the No. 1 overall pick in 2015, is more than halfway through his fourth season. The Bucs have picked up his fifth-year club option of nearly $21-million that is guaranteed only against injury for 2019.
Why not turn back to Winston with seven games remaining so the organization can see what to do moving forward?
"I understand that," Koetter said. "I understand that, but we're right in the, just barely past the halfway point in the season and there's a lot of football to be played. And just as a follow up to the question you just asked, I mean, I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that we can turn this thing and get on a little bit of a win streak. We got to play better football. More consistently across the board. Our defense took a nice step in that direction yesterday. I still think if we can put it together on both sides of the ball, we'll be all right."
