Throw The Damn Ball!
December 9th, 2012
Bucs coaches say they have confidence in their quarterback, and they pay one of the best and biggest wide receivers in the NFL an eight-figure salary. Then why the hell did the Bucs play chicken crap football at the end of the game?
It was 3rd-and-8 on the Bucs’ 33 yard line with 2:55 left in the game, and Mike Sullivan, or more likely Greg Schiano, opts to run Doug Martin up the middle.
C’mon. Throw the damn ball!
What was the rationale there Coach? To set up your award-winning secondary to win the game for you? The Bucs have weapons all over the field, and running up the gut was wasting every last one of them.
The Bucs punted and never got the ball back. Game over.
Joe was somewhat soothed to hear former Bucs tight end Anthony Becht on the Buccaneers Radio Network hating that call after the game. Joe didn’t feel alone in his anger.
That’s just weak football, and it tells Joe the head coach isn’t as confident in his quarterback as he states publicly.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:03 pm
What did Atlanta do to us just a week ago? 3rd and 6 and they threw for first down. Playoff team vs non-playoff team!
December 9th, 2012 at 8:05 pm
Playin not to lose and not to win… Still bitter as hell hours after the game.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:05 pm
Prevent offense….innovative like blowing up victory formation and the 4th and 15 kickoff idea. Epic fail…
December 9th, 2012 at 8:07 pm
and BTW…Atlanta even has a secondary. Point being, the less confident you feel in your pass defense, the more you want to convert 3rd down. It makes very little statitical sense, much less common sense.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:08 pm
They’re playing not to lose. Coaching staff and players have shown enough this year to ensure that this group will never win meaningful games in January. They all suck. Lack passion for the game. And it was sad to see it especially on this day with the Super Bowl reunion at halftime. Now that was a team that cared bout winning. Freeman is a robot. Lacks instincts until the end of the game, then he wakes up. By then it’s too late. Horrible. Absolutely horrible.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:10 pm
Gosh Freeman 41% completion. Franchise qb, no. Trade him to KC for their 1st rounder. Would be a great move for the Bucs. Do not re sign Gosh
December 9th, 2012 at 8:10 pm
FINALLY…AGREEEEDDDD !!!!!!! THank you Anthony !!
December 9th, 2012 at 8:10 pm
And why should he be confident in his QB? Freman (in a return to his throw off the back foot days) couldn’t hit parked Humvee today. We all know the corners are awful, but I’d bet on a eight yard Martin run against the odds of Freeman hitting short pass allday long…and retire on the profits.
Plese no reup for Freeman…he’s boob
December 9th, 2012 at 8:13 pm
we had already punted 9 times….why not make it an even 10…(odd numbers may drive Schiano NUTS)
December 9th, 2012 at 8:15 pm
lol @ the Freeman haters….check his TD to int ratio….A decent play call maybe a pass to Martin on the flat would of been the right call…..bunch of BS
December 9th, 2012 at 8:16 pm
Totally agree that Freeman is not cutting it. I’m not sure he can get much better. I don’t see much improvement from year to year. I understand Freeman has had numerous offensive coordinators to learn from which probably is slowing his progression. But I don’t like the fact he complains to the rest of his teamate’s every time is pass is 10 yards off target.
I’m concerned with turning on our QB. Tampa has run many great quarterbacks out of town. Hope I’m not wrong here but Freeman appears to be just an average QB. I wouldn’t bench him but I wouldn’t want to pay him big bucks and get us stuck with a guy who doesn’t appear like he can get us to the big game. With this being said, I’m really starting to lean towards let’s just move on from the Freeman. Starting to lean on trading him after he has a good game. This may take some time with our upcoming schedule.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:29 pm
Raphael i totally agree with you. Freeman while not having a great game,did enough to score 21 points in the second half to build a 11 point lead. If we had anybody playing cb worth a dam in the final 7 min we win.So put the blame where it belongs on the defence.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:38 pm
I love my Bucs! But Karma might of bit us on the ass today. Not the classiest move to hold the Superbowl reunion today and rub the Eagles nose in it.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:40 pm
FREEMAN SUCKS,THIS IS WHO HE IS,HE HIT HIS CEILING,SORT OF LIKE RAPHAEL DOES WHILE LOOKING AT GOSHS PICTURE AT NIGHT!
December 9th, 2012 at 8:40 pm
I have come to Freeman’s defense several times over the last couple years, but in the back of my head I really know the truth just like everyone else. All who support him throw up the TD/Int ratio, but we know that its garbage. How many Ints were dropped by the eagles D today? Josh could have easily had a 3 Int day and actually deserved to the way he has been off target. Unfortunately, the book is out on Freeman and if the pressure is turned up just enough, he can’t a target for his life. It’s frustrating because I really like the kid, hopefully next year he can step up.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:41 pm
Joe,
The onus has to be on Josh Freeman for this one. I am sick and tired of the media coddling this QB. I was at the game ( and every game) and can see why no one trusts Freeman to throw the ball. He missed a BUNCH of passes today. Like he had contact cement on his finger tips. Freeman is NO franchise QB. He is no ELITE QB. He failed to run when he could except for one great run…Josh is not good.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:43 pm
not to mention that Greg Shiano did not utilize Blount AGAIN…very sad knowing his proven potentials and still dont get it why the coach is being STUBBORN!
December 9th, 2012 at 8:46 pm
Freeman does not suck, but he did have a bad game. However, it’s next to impossible to decide why. Like I said prior, the routes seem to take forever to develop. It almost seems as though we send everyone on a deep route, which leaves him nothing to check down too. I bet 60% of his passes were over 20 yards in the air. He’s damn lucky to not have any INT’s with that many long passes.
I agree with Joe, you have to throw the ball there. I like Schiano and think he’s a fantastic coach, but I hate the play call. Does anyone think NO or Atlanta would run the ball there? If you are going to be a playoff team, win the game by playing to your strengths. Our strength is our offense. We have a $55 million receiver who played fantastic all season – throw him the damn ball!!!!! Schiano deserves a ton of credit for all he has done for this team, but he deserves the blame for that play call. I’m sure he would agree 100%.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:49 pm
Some people here thought that the Bucs would win the final 4 and beat out the Seahawks for the wild card. A good team would have beaten the Eagles like a bad dog, kind of like the Seahawks beat the Cardinals today (58-0).
Seattle is a good team, with a rookie QB. Tampa is a bad team with veteran QB. Seattle will win out, TB doesn’t win again.
A quality QB will be available with their top 10 draft pick.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:49 pm
Last week Booger said Freeman would be getting about 6 years for $60 million after the season. After today a lot of fans would hate that idea but that’s most likely roughly what’s gonna happen. It’ll be 5 or 6 years with somewhere between $45-$60 million. Count on it.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:54 pm
I do find it amazing how people’s feelings towards Freeman change like the wind with each week. Now everyone thinks he’s garbage. A few weeks ago, he was elite. Fact is, he’s somewhere in the middle. Listen to what Lynch said – he’s not going to have a high completion % in this offense, but it’s not as high as it needs to be. You are not garbage with the numbers he’s putting up. You aren’t elite with the numbers he’s putting up either. As of right now, he’s a decent QB, but not great. I would be hesitant to give him an extension, but I sure as hell wouldn’t cut or trade him either. But to say he sucks is completely stupid, just as stupid as calling him elite.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:57 pm
Freeman doesn’t deserve a contract extension until he actually GETS us to the damn playoffs and learns how to beat good teams!
If we strengthen the defense a lot in the offseason, then maybe Freeman can be our franchise quarterback. A game manager.
December 9th, 2012 at 8:58 pm
Freeman did not score 21 points. 1 TD was a run by Martin. Looking at the options. You had an idiot that can’t hit short passes, nearly picked off about a dozen times today. So If the run does not work your kicker is the best, most of the day you have had pressure and sacks. lesser of 2 evils. Lesser being no pick 6.
December 9th, 2012 at 9:10 pm
Maybe the rationale was that freeman was playing like crap and they wanted to make the eagles use a timeout?
December 9th, 2012 at 9:11 pm
Sign Freeman now…this loss is soley on the head coach and our vaunted secondary !
December 9th, 2012 at 9:37 pm
Freeman does suck. He’s never been an accurate QB and it’s insane to think that is going to magically change. Four good passes a day won’t cut it in the NFL. If we had a QB that was accurate and hit receivers in stride-the way all QBs seem to do to us-we would have an unstoppable offense. Instead the vast majority of Freeman’s completions are under or overthrown and the receivers have to stop where they are and get tackled immediately after almost every catch. It also doesn’t help that he can’t look at more than one target a play. Completion percentage matters – I don’t care what you say- and his sucks. Show me a Superbowl QB with a percentage like Freeman’s.
And what is all this crap about Freeman putting up 21 points today? That’s garbage. The Eagles turned the ball over way inside their territory. Freeman couldn’t drive us anywhere. We were in the third quarter and Freeman had four completions-four freaking completions. Give me a break. Vincent Jackson – who routinely bails out Freeman – is the only reason we’ve put up the numbers we have this year. And it should be a hell of a lot more. Take away Jackson and Freeman is statistically the hands down the worst starting QB in the league.
December 9th, 2012 at 9:39 pm
Did anyone notice that 3 of his completions were dumps offs that any semi-intelligent QB couild see were destined for a loss if not a pick? Better to have thrown them away. Again the guy is brain dead….time to get over Rah’s man crush that has been perpetuated by calling the BOOB the FRANCHISE and get a real NFL QB
December 9th, 2012 at 9:41 pm
As soon as I saw that play I said to my wife ” I know we are about to lose” if u go for the first u control yur fate… How could we believe the D could save us?
December 9th, 2012 at 9:42 pm
Completely agree. Do it for what? To get them to use a timeout at 2:50 left? So they get the ball back with 2:40+ and the 2-minute warning? That timeout was ALMOST irrelevant.
Go for it with a pass and worst case you give them the ball back with 2:40+, the 2-minute warning, and a timeout…. big deal. The upside of getting the 1st down outweighs that timeout…. by alot.
Get the first and game over or the Bucs have to punt with under 30 seconds and no timeouts for them… THEN I would trust the DBs.
December 9th, 2012 at 9:47 pm
I Blame Mike and Josh. Mike for calling it and Josh for not oping out of the play. Josh was bad today, but the offensive line didn’t help much with penalties. Freeman won’t get a contract untill the end of next season. Then I hink if he does good with another year under his belt with Sullivan and Jackson. They will just put the Franchise tag on him just to get one more year to see if they really want to invest in him. He’s not bad just need to be a little mor accuate at times.
December 9th, 2012 at 9:52 pm
For the Freeman haters:
Eli was extremely inaccurate his first couple years as well. Still is not that great. Farve was always fairly inaccurate. Big Ben is inaccurate too. I am sure someone will pull out stats…. Don’t care, I watch the games and I see what’s what. Basically no one is accurate like Brady, Manning (P), and Brees. Rogers is not even as accurate as them. It is a matter of being in the same offense for years and not having to think about a thing.
For those claiming he is the worst and EVERY other QB hits his WRs in stride….. you must be watching nothing but highlights.
The biggest issue I have noticed is, when he is pressing, he tends to stare down his primary instead of looking over the entire field.
The other issue is Mike Williams has to learn to run better routes as does Stocker.
That said, I don’t know if Freeman will be The Man, but he is very young and if he stays in the same system for the next few years , the way he works at it, I would bet money that he becomes pretty elite. He is growing up in this offense this year and has had some setback games, he has also been very good at not being a turnover machine and he has gotten smarter and smarter with his decisions.
December 9th, 2012 at 9:53 pm
“Franchise”. Ha. What a joke. Freeman’s the same quality first round “franchise” player as Gaines Adams, Keith McCants, Eric Curry, Charles McRae, Reagan Upshaw and Marcus Jones.
December 9th, 2012 at 9:56 pm
This year is a learning curve for Schiano and a cushion between the Raheem error and future success. Schiano is learning his players, who he trusts and who he doesn’t, and also learning about the coaches he hired too. Today was a bitter pill to swallow, but I am counting on Coach learning you cannot play not to lose in this league.
Oh, and BTW Jglazer, the trading deadline was 2 months ago…
“Starting to lean on trading him after he has a good game. This may take some time with our upcoming schedule.” Josh is deciding his own fate out there. He is Raheem’s guy, not Schiano’s, so there definitely could be changes made, but not till the offseason.
December 9th, 2012 at 10:52 pm
Freeman doesn’t see his WR until open, by then it is to late. Shakey pete QB play, and has been from the beginning. All his throws within 20 yards are late, slow delivery, combined late reads.
He is a cross between Chris Simms, and Leftwich, LOL.
Just want to dump some frustration also, he could get better with consistant coaching, and confidence in his reads.
But lets face this fact, this Defense sucks donkey nuts. Shiano should be reminded the NFL stands for “Not For Long”, and he will go if he can’t fix that D, and next year. Worst bucs D to ever grace a NFL field. That run by the rookie fleagle QB for a TD was a complete meltdown.
December 9th, 2012 at 11:05 pm
is the “joe” that wrote this also write in the prevous article:
“Joe Says:
December 9th, 2012 at 7:43 pm
yeah….stupidity and way too much faith in our vaunted defense…
ooorrr… since your quarterback couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn all day and thereby killing the clock — or worst, throw a pick — go with your best player the Muscle Hamster.”
What a novel concept, huh?
if both joes are posting at the same time, 1 needs to be joey, or joe 2.
December 9th, 2012 at 11:25 pm
Joe I completely agree with you on this one. we throw the ball there and get the first down games over. I was shocked to see a run.
December 9th, 2012 at 11:45 pm
what did we have to lose, why not go for it? Freeman was bad for most of the day guys for sure. So was our o-line, play calling, etc. For those of you that think he’s sucked this year, that’s so far off it’s ridicoulous.Like every NFL QB they have bad games, news flash..
For people that want to draft a QB in top 15 of this class, please watch more college football. Geno? speaking of beating a good team? Ditto for Mr Pick Barkley. Need a lot of things, this team in defeat this year is so much better then this year.
December 10th, 2012 at 3:03 am
Freeman is going to finish with close to 4000 yards passing, 30 TD’s, and probably a better than 3-1 TD to INT ratio. Yet, he sucks? Granted he has weapons, but what good QB doesn’t? Aside from Williams and Jackson, who else does he have as receivers (this offense basically ignores TE’s) to throw to? Underwood couldn’t get on the field on any other team he has played for, and he is our #3. Not to mention the fact that he’s not a slot receiver. We don’t have half as many weapons as some of you believe.
I know the stats can be deceiving, and by no means am I calling him great. He played horrible today. There’s no arguing that. His biggest problem is consistency, but anyone can see his talent is through the roof. He’s only 24, and his best football should be ahead of him.
December 10th, 2012 at 8:17 am
lurker…perfect..lol. Which Joe is it. !
December 10th, 2012 at 8:37 am
You can SAY anything you want but your ACTIONS speak louder than words.
Speak: “We have faith in our QB”
Actions: “Give the ball to the muscle hamster on 3-7.
December 10th, 2012 at 9:42 am
I agree to give the ball to your best player in the most crucible point in the game. The problem was the way it was done. Schiano next year will have to have a slight change in mentality. He needs to think less about being more physical and more about out smarting teams. Bill Bellechick does it ever week. That is how you get a consistant winner in this league
December 10th, 2012 at 1:26 pm
You have an 11 point lead with 4:00 left it’s pretty dumb to blame the QB. He had a bad game…yes, but he did enough to win if the defense does it’s job at the end. As for running instead of passing on the 3rd down….you all have said how off Freeman was but now suddenly the smart move was to throw it??? Logic is not your strong suit. I don’t think Schiano trusted Freeman to make the throw.