Offensive Line? “Decent”
August 24th, 2014
The Bucs’ offensive line gets just enough push to allow Doug Martin to score a first half touchdown Saturday. Photo courtesy of Buccaneers.com.
Of course, the Bucs’ first-team offense, after some early, frightening jitters, broke out finally yesterday, actually looking like an offense. A nice catch-and-run down the middle to Doug Martin to set up a Martin touchdown run and a too easy-looking lob to Mike Evans in the end zone showed the Bucs have life on offense.
As Joe stated yesterday, it was fun to watch the running game work. It is nice to have cute plays on a whiteboard or stubborn running plays on an iPad, or for the offense to look sharp on a walk-through, but an offense needs blocking.
Enter Bucs coach Lovie Smith, who gave this brief assessment of the offensive line, typed by Woody Cummings of the Tampa Tribune.
“I thought the offensive line did a decent job for the second week in a row,” Lovie said.
Mmmmmm… Guess you can’t beat up on the offensive line too much if your team has two offensive touchdowns and a field goal in the first half. There were way too many missed and blown up blocks, especially by — guess who? — the guards to stretch the word “decent.” More like, “OK,”at best.
This, Bucs fans, is the hand that is dealt. This is something not only the Bucs are going to have to work around, but for Bucs fans to learn to stomach the rest of the season. The next John Hannah or Larry Allen are not going to be walking the streets looking for work in the next two weeks after being cut.
August 24th, 2014 at 1:24 pm
Heck, I’d be happy with a Charlie Hannah.
August 24th, 2014 at 1:30 pm
Desent…..
August 24th, 2014 at 1:33 pm
doosh…………..was the b 4 or after hannah..crapped his pants!!!!!!!! lol
August 24th, 2014 at 1:34 pm
Descend….
August 24th, 2014 at 1:40 pm
I’d be happy with Daryl Hannah.
August 24th, 2014 at 1:42 pm
G Rishaw Johnson will help us see improvement once again. This might happen next week…
August 24th, 2014 at 1:42 pm
http://bucstop.com/history
August 24th, 2014 at 1:42 pm
so help me Hannah
August 24th, 2014 at 1:46 pm
John Hannah or Daryl Hannah – whoever can play left guard is fine with me.
August 24th, 2014 at 1:50 pm
Game planning against the Bucs OL….will be every weeks DC’s fantasy football dream….
August 24th, 2014 at 1:51 pm
As you said it was ok, and considering the end result, it was decent. Problem is, the Gs are going to get McCown killed – he will not finish the season. That is not good, especially considering the star of the MGM put up 3 points in the 2nd half
August 24th, 2014 at 2:18 pm
@Harry
I certainly cannot argue against your point. I’m sure someone in the MGM will try, since facts don’t matter.
August 24th, 2014 at 2:27 pm
“Decent” is being very kind…
I would say they were a little less crappy then last week…
August 24th, 2014 at 2:33 pm
Cousins spent more time on his knees then on his feet. That dude just sucks
August 24th, 2014 at 2:39 pm
HC can call it whatever he wants. We all know what we saw and it was far from decent.
August 24th, 2014 at 2:46 pm
Season hasn’t started yet. Cuts are coming for all teams so to say this will be the line all season is doubtful.
August 24th, 2014 at 2:56 pm
Cousins got a minus 4.2 from Pro Football Focus. He needs the hook. Collins scored well as a pass blocker but poor as a run blocker. Johnson needs to score well this Thursday so he can replace Cousins. Our RT scored best with a plus 2.0 and still needs to swap with Collins. Omameh got a smaller negative score than Cousins but will improve with more reps. Cousins has lots of experience and has no up side. I blame our inept OL Coach for leaving his pet Cousins starting. I have a feeling Tedford will be excellent as Offensive Coordinator, but he needs to replace Glennon before he becomes a starter and eventually gets Tedford fired, because his production is shameful and the third string Buffalo QB was better than he was yesterday. One touchdown in three games by Glennon is just not good enough to beat anyone on this schedule. It is why I laughed at all the big predictions for their Cannon by the MG8 Mob this year. I hope they will switch to back Josh instead. Don’t want to lose them here when the Axe eventually falls on their untradeable albatross! Worflop needs to get the hook at the end of the season too!!!
August 24th, 2014 at 3:03 pm
That touchdown play to Evans was a thing of beauty. Perfect pocket, McCown pump fakes the safety and Evans with a beautiful move and burst past the DB. Just a great play and hopefully signs of the future.
August 24th, 2014 at 3:05 pm
I still say Glennon will be just fine after developing further this year. We’ll see whose right in the long run, that’s what counts.
August 24th, 2014 at 3:09 pm
How much more can sensible people take of listening to paranoid fans who don’t as much about football as they think they do. All these years with a top o line and garbage offense, how many lineman have we drafted in the last 12 years, people forgot how we found Donald Penn. How many of you step out of college being top performer at your job without going through a learning curve? Same principles apply to football that apply to flipping burgers or surgeons, some are better than others and some learn with experience. ONeill cousins is garbage though. Everyone is paranoid because they think we’re a playoff team otherwise we’d be giving them time to jell. Lower your expectations and you’ll never be disappointed by this team and you’ll be like buc_realist
August 24th, 2014 at 3:09 pm
Our Oline looked better than theirs…….surely practicing against our Defense should be to toughening up our Oline….
It still needs considerable improvement….I think the rest of the weapons are in place with some depth at RB, TE, WR & QB…..
August 24th, 2014 at 3:09 pm
You can scheme and hide Guards –
There will be some missed assignments but it looks to me that L&L refuse to overpay aging or cancerous OL that’s not worth the $$. Also it looks like they are going to start their own depth and farming system for OL and build through the draft. Risky but best in the long term.
August 24th, 2014 at 3:27 pm
Joe is confident the Bucs, after shelling out millions to bring in to Tampa Bay, are going to bench the guy before the first regular season game in place of… um… well… eeerrr…
August 24th, 2014 at 3:31 pm
to stretch the word “decent.” More like, “OK,”at best. – points
August 24th, 2014 at 3:41 pm
I can guarantee Richie Incognito would sign for the league minimum right now.
August 24th, 2014 at 3:43 pm
So why is he unemployed? That should answer all of your questions.
August 24th, 2014 at 4:08 pm
Joe, I back your stance on Incognito. Just because our O-line needs a dominant player dose not mean we should sacrifice ethical standards for an aggressively cruel thug. The NFL is better off without him.
August 24th, 2014 at 4:10 pm
Cam walking with a limp and no weapons. Sam Bradford retore his ACL. Our first 2 games look a lot more winnable now! Guards or no guards, Bucs win!!!
August 24th, 2014 at 4:27 pm
@owlykat
I respect loyalty.
But your right.
Oneil Cousins is being favored by his old O-line coach from Cleveland.
Licht needs to be a GM, make a move and just cut him.
Have some cajones.
August 24th, 2014 at 6:09 pm
Takes time for an oline comprised of several guys who havent played together to gel.
Throw in a new qb too. On some off the sacks Josh scrambled right into the pressure. Hes starting to get more of a feel for the pocket as they play together more.
More at play here than the simplistic “we got bad guards” mantra.
Lovie blew up the oline. Some Dominik/schiano apologists are butt hurt about it.
Thus the premature whining.