“Minor League” Football
December 22nd, 2014
Big national voices are piling on
Offensively, whatever the hell that was the Bucs put out on the field and displayed to the free world yesterday was worse than an embarrassment. It was an insult.
If Joe were a season ticket holder in attendance, there would be no way Joe would even think about renewing until or unless the Bucs drafted a first-round quarterback, or acquired a veteran QB with playoff experience.
Yesterday would have been the last straw. Money is too hard to come by and there are far more entertaining games to watch on TV than that pile of cow manure the Bucs called an offense.
Last year, while attending to personal matters in the Midwest, Joe got roped in by friends to go to a Jags-Rams game in St. Louis. As heinous as Blaine Gabbert and the Jags were, that offense was actually able to move the ball on a halfway decent defense and have multiple scoring drives.
And Joe thought that Jags offense was one of the worst he had seen. Sunday at the Den of Depression took the cake.
For Bucs-uniform-frowning, Allie-LaForce-smitten, Big-Ten-Network-hating, pedestrian-bumping, olive oil-lapping, popcorn-munching, coffee-slurping, fried-chicken-eating, oatmeal-loving, circle-jerking, beer-chugging, cricket-watching, scone-loathing, college football-naïve, baseball-box-score-reading, NPR-listening, filthy-hotel-staying, fight-instigating, barista-training Peter King, of Sports Illustrated and NBC Sports fame, the Tampa Bay offense yesterday never met the standard of an NFL offense.
Finally, the Bucs need Marcus Mariota. Desperately. But they also need an offensive identity. That was a minor-league showing against Green Bay. …
Tampa’s 10 possessions ended in: punt, punt, punt, punt, punt, field goal, punt, punt, punt, interception. Now, the Bucs are the NFL’s version of the Toledo Mud Hens, but a 20-3 road win’s a 20-3 road win.
Guess it could be worse. Guess someone could have called the Bucs an arena league outfit.
Joe isn’t so sure the Bucs need a spread-option quarterback like Mariota, but they do need a quarterback. Joe cannot fathom a scenario in which the Bucs do not upgrade their offense – and their quarterback situation — for next year.
Then again, Joe looks at Lovie Smith’s history and doesn’t rule out more of the same.
December 22nd, 2014 at 4:04 pm
We are, at present, best known as being the farm team to the New England Patriots. Guess it’s something.
December 22nd, 2014 at 4:15 pm
I don’t trust Lovie
December 22nd, 2014 at 4:17 pm
Personal business in the Midwest….what was her name?
December 22nd, 2014 at 4:18 pm
Helped cover the Bucs back in 1976……as bad as it was back then, their offense was better than this and there was no free agency back then. They had to play with rookies and castoffs from other teams taken in the “expansion draft”
December 22nd, 2014 at 4:19 pm
Now that Jimmy Clausen has had his brain mashed, look for the ever brilliant Lovie to pick up Clausenen at a bargain basement 3 year contract worth $15 million. Crazy? Absurd? So is any time spent thinking about the Bucs and their owners in diguise.
December 22nd, 2014 at 4:26 pm
This is making me shiver as I remember the first days and the punishment those early QB’s took. This is as bad as I can remember and I was there for a lot of the aforementioned carnage. I don’t think we will have to worry about a loss next Sunday. It will be another seal clubbing from the Saints.
And the whole preseason the front office talked of making us relevant again. I had no idea that by choosing the #1 overall pick, that is what they were angling toward to make us “relevant”.
December 22nd, 2014 at 4:41 pm
I have zero faith in this organization’s ability to evaluate talent.
December 22nd, 2014 at 4:53 pm
Until Lovie is replaced we will be the TB Mud Hens. I hope this is his last game here and he plays McCown the entire game and then either retires, resigns, or is fired, so the new HC can pull his coaches together and shed what needs to be shed, draft what needs to be drafted, and sign what needs to be signed.
Russel Wilson tore the league up his first year, so it can be done if the cast of characters is the right ones.
December 22nd, 2014 at 5:00 pm
It would be nice to see what Licht would do if he was the one calling the shots. Maybe Lovie would not have been his choice. and all these terrible movies would not have happened. I think the Glazers should let Licht fire Lovie and hire his own choice as coach.
December 22nd, 2014 at 5:10 pm
Lovie is talking about the Bucs need to get a win and beat the Saints. Geesh
December 22nd, 2014 at 5:17 pm
Mud Hens.
Hysterical!
Sad too!
December 22nd, 2014 at 5:32 pm
or acquired a veteran QB with playoff experience.
That is what scares me to no end Joe, all the rumors that lovie will trade for Cutler. Please say this is not possible.
December 22nd, 2014 at 5:40 pm
Marty Feldman: “It could be worse.
Gene Wilder: “How!”
Feldman: “It could be raining!”
Whoooooosh!
December 22nd, 2014 at 5:52 pm
They need talent at quarterback. As much talent as they can fit into the four positions they are going to bring into training camp. All I want to see is talent at quarterback, and they guy we want is not on the roster right now.
I’d rather see Josh Freeman than what we have on the field now. At least he has talent. I’m sure people have come back from worse than whatever the heck Schiano did to him, or him to himself.
I’m a Jamies guy. Plays the system, has the gun, moves well enough, has withstood all of the pressure and performs best during crunch time. A huge target has been on his chest all season. And he keeps moving on.
December 22nd, 2014 at 6:11 pm
I will not be back to a Bucs game till Lovie is fired
December 22nd, 2014 at 6:12 pm
Watching Russel Wilson last night makes me really want a guy like MM who can motor when he has to.
December 22nd, 2014 at 6:15 pm
I’m betting Lovie drafts defense #1, as absurd as that sounds.
December 22nd, 2014 at 6:48 pm
A Semi-Pro team, if all they had to do was work out, practice and study film and not work or go to school while playing football could perform better than this crap. It was sad that even the Packer fans looked totally bored at the game and they were winning.
December 22nd, 2014 at 7:10 pm
I will be so pissed if we don’t draft a QB with a number one or two draft pick.
December 22nd, 2014 at 8:08 pm
I don’t know if Lovie wants another QB, but the Glazer boys listen to the radio and read and I can tell you this will go down just like when Mike Shula got canned.
Get a QB or we will get Licht to do it all by himself.
Subordinate heads will roll as well.
December 22nd, 2014 at 8:19 pm
I’ll be hacked if we get another Lovie/Dungy OC. You know the Tedford/Clyde Christiansen. I’m tired of boring defensive struggles. If that’s the route Lovie goes then I give him two years to get us to the SB or else. If I have to watch boring defensive football then I demand wins!!!
So Lovie hire an OC with NFL credentials and a good record. Make it clear up front to the media that you are a defensive minded coach so you realized you needed to find the best, most creative, innovative mind in the NFL to run the offense, And you let this guy pick his OWN QB.
December 22nd, 2014 at 8:24 pm
I just hope and pray that Lovie is going NBA and simply tanjing games for the sake of getting the #1 overall as this year the SOS works in the Bucs favor while last season it did not so the Bucs picked 7th while the Jags with the same record picked 3rd…..
At first I was mad as he!! over the inept losses; I was at the Ram game and simply felt that the special team’s unit must’ve had someone bet on the Rams in Vegas by their play. Luke Stocker doing a bullfight Ole on one blocked FG was laughable if it did not cost the Bucs a W. I count at least 5 games where the players and/or coaches lost winnable games that would have been won 95% of the time by competent coaching and players with a desire to win…..
So now I compare this squad to a 1988 Bucs squad that was not much better than this team. They went 5-11 but 4 of the wins were over 4-12 Detroit and Green Bay and 3 were by a FG with the last W actually being a Buc blowout 21-10 where I suspect the Lions were tanking and the 5th was a 10-5 upset of Buffalo with a goalline stand by the Bucs which I have to admit was the ONE Bucs’ highlight from 1983 until 1996… The Bucs ended up at 6 in the ’89 draft and got Bust Broderick Thomas. FOUR of the 5 guys taken before him were Hall of Famers; Aikman, Derrick Thomas, Deion Sander,and Barry Sanders (who the Lions picked with the 3rd pick that would have been Tampa’s if they lost that last game vs Detroit)….. The one miss was Tony Mandarich. So in hindsight; too bad Ray Perkins did not tank a couple of those Ws vs Green Bay, Buffalo or Detroit into L’s…. The Bucs could have drafted a Hall of Famer but instead got a bust (of course Culverhouse could have refused to pay and/or the guy could have did a Bo Jackson but for argument’s sake lets just assume they signed aa HOF’er; that could have brought the franchise back to respectability years before Dungy arrived)….. Hopefully the Jags, Skins, Raiders and Jets also get winner’s envy in a few years when the Bucs hopefully have a future HOF’er on the roster… So I take back a bit of my anger over the close losses vs the Vikes, Bengals, ‘aints, Rams, Panthers and Borwns all winnable games; a W could have turned our future QB into a future bust. That is how I am justifying this horrid 2-13 season and hope that is Lovie’s plan because if he was actually trying to win games like Ray Perkins’ did in the late ’80s’ well then our Bucs are even worse off than the Culverhouse squads……. Still it is not fair to the season ticket holders; I felt ripped off and only went to the Lamb and Vike games; both epic inept losses that will be impossible to replicate and the Lamb game was far too early in the season to be a tank job but I think once the Bucs got past the DC win they decided that more wins = worse future; at least I hope so…….
December 22nd, 2014 at 9:34 pm
Mark Sanchez has plenty of playoff experience and I don’t want him anywhere near our roster. I would however be calling on Philadelphia and figuring out what they would give up for Marcus Mariota. You know they want him running that offense. I would start with this year’s number 1 and 2 and next year’s number 1 and have them throw in Nick Foles. Then try and draft Hundley and let him sit behind Foles and learn the offense that hopefully a new OC will install.
December 22nd, 2014 at 9:51 pm
this is what you get when you hire off of dungeys tree…I warned you.
let me remind everybody AGAIN. Dungey did not win a championship until he was told he had zero control of the offense…the reason why he never could win here is the same reason why his village idiot clone won’t….they are conservatives and pious at that…their hubris and ego will never allow a progressive mind in a progressive offensive league have control….the glazers gave him as they did dungey carte blanche…
this team is screwed with this “leader”…
December 22nd, 2014 at 11:17 pm
They’ll continue to be a minor league outfit until St. Lovie is on the unemployment line.
December 23rd, 2014 at 3:03 am
Stop barking for coaching change… Give it a rest! A good OC that fits the first round QB you’re gonna (must) take. A few offense lineman and another? Legit person that can bring pressure and ship will be righted! Dare to dream! Go Bucs
December 23rd, 2014 at 11:45 am
Mark these words. Guaranteed Lovey will not bring in another QB early in the draft. He won’t spend the early pick on one. Guaranteed he will not bring in another offensive coordinator. He is Loyal to a fault and probably feels like we are going in the right direction offensively. Aroyo will be promoted. Expect more of the same offense next year with a small improvement but this is who he is and that will not change. People do not change. He has a history we can look at. Sorry to bust everyone’s bubble. Lol.