Bucs safety Sabby Piscitelli said he learned a lot last year when injured just by observing.

This is good to read:

Joe thought the Bucs had a steal by drafting Sabby Piscitelli in the second round last year. The former Oregon State safety showed why the Bucs thought so highly of him when he returned a fumble 24 yards for a touchdown in the Bucs romp over New England Sunday.

Piscitelli told Roger Mooney of the Bradenton Herald one reason why he thinks he’s better this year, aside from the obvious fact he is healthy, is that he has learned by watching  veterans like Ronde Barber

“It was a great mental approach,” Piscitelli said. “I studied film like I never studied before, watching how other guys prepared for the season, Ronde Barber, Jermaine Phillips. Usually when you’re playing you don’t have time to notice stuff like that. The biggest positive I took out of that was the mental aspect of the game, watching film, studying other players.”

In short, Piscitelli called last year his “redshirt” year.

Call this the Tony Dungy Effect. Piscitelli learning the mental approach of football from Barber is a byproduct of the Dungy era. While Joe wasn’t, and isn’t, a big fan of Tony Dungy as a head coach, Joe recognizes there were a lot of great qualities about Dungy, in addition to him being such a good person. When Dungy was with the Bucs, he tried to surround himself with good people, Barber being an example.

If Dungy has the desire, he’ll make a tremendous VP of football operations for some NFL team.