Vacation Man, of BSPN.com, seemingly not a share-the-wealth communist like his co-workers, thinks the Bucs wouldn’t be better off with 2009 Saints Pro Bowler Jonathan Vilma on their roster — this year or last year.

And this is coming from a guy who covers the NFL South for a living.

Joe didn’t realize the Bucs were so awash with talent that Vilma wouldn’t have helped a team whose braintrust had a goal of starting Jermaine Phillips and one-legged Angelo Crowell at their outside linebacker positions in 2009.

But the reflective part of me started thinking, “What if the Bucs had signed Vilma?’’ My first thought was the Saints probably wouldn’t have won the Super Bowl without their defensive leader. My second thought was the Bucs probably still would have gone 3-13, maybe 4-12. We never really knew what their true intent in the Vilma situation was because they already had a pretty good middle linebacker in Barrett Ruud. Presumably, they were thinking about playing Vilma on the outside. Yeah, Vilma might have been an upgrade on Tampa Bay’s outside linebackers last year. But the problems ran much deeper than that, and Vilma wouldn’t have made a big difference, but he would have eaten up some of that salary-cap space.

Call Joe a moron, but Vilma would have helped. Especially if his signing prompted a trade of Barrett Ruud for a good pick in the 2010 draft.