“A Failed Experiment”
January 7th, 2015
NFL Network beats on the Bucs
How bad was the quarterbacking for Tampa Bay this season? Despite two 1,000-yard receivers, one of which perhaps had the best rookie year of any WR in NFL history, the Bucs finished ranked No. 30 in offense.
That is almost impossible to believe. Yet, if you watched turnover-prone quarterback Josh McCown bumble his way through the season, it really shouldn’t come as much of a shock.
Shoot, McCown was so, so terrible at times, reasoned folks had to wonder if leaky, sleepy Josh Freeman could have done better, and he is out of football, perhaps for good.
The godawful quarterback situation came up with fetching Colleen Wolfe and Akbar Gbajabiamila in this NFL Now video. Gbajabiamila believes fixing the quarterback problem should be Priority No. 1.
“Get the quarterback situation correct,” Gbajabiamila said. “We have seen them go through three quarterbacks that have been a failed experiment. They still haven’t fully developed that offense.
“They need to make sure the quarterback is on the same page as that coordinator. The Bucs need to get it right.”
A lot will depend, of course, on the new offensive coordinator. Surely, the Bucs should have a new offensive coordinator by the start of Senior Bowl practices, which begin a week from Monday. One would hope so.
With Greg Roman currently interviewing with other teams, it seems he either passed on working with Lovie Smith, or Lovie may have passed on him.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:11 pm
Winston accusers is back that’s not over yet
January 7th, 2015 at 2:14 pm
Man. Don’t get Trestman. He’ll start McCown.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:16 pm
I have absolutely no doubt that Freeman, for all his issues, is better than this scrub. Even considering our lack of a line and running game woes.
McCown did lead the league in dumb looks on his face this year. That’s something.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:18 pm
I’ve heard the phrase that the most popular player on the team is the backup quarterback. Our most popular player, pretty much since before the season started, is still in college. That pretty much sums up being a Bucs fan these days.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:24 pm
I don’t think it is the QBs that are the failed experiment. I think it is the new HC every other year that is the failed experiment. The Glazers are the failed experiment. Need a New Owner.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:27 pm
There is no way McCown should be on this team next year. PERIOD. The bucs could use the $5 million somewhere else. Does anyone really want him “mentoring” a rookie QB? Not me. What is he going to show them? how to throw horrible pick 6’s and fumble the ball away at the worst time? No thanks. I would rather get another veteran QB in here that has a little more clout than McCown. Any new QB brought in would be coming into a new system, just like McCown. It’s not like he would have an upper hand because he knows the offense. If McCown starts this year, we all might as well kiss the 2015 season goodbye as well.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:30 pm
Everyone but Lovie knew the McCown experiment wasn’t going to end well…
January 7th, 2015 at 2:31 pm
there’s no excuse for mcclown still being on the team.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:32 pm
I think Lovie and Licht interviewed Greg Roman in order to get his inout on the two QBs in the draft…most likely of Mariota, since he is sort of like Colin.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:33 pm
And LOVIE SMITH ROCKS!!!!!!
Seriously. The time will come when all of you, except the true haters, will agree.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:34 pm
Why would Roman come here to be an OC when he could possibly be a HC?
January 7th, 2015 at 2:37 pm
I don’t believe they were ever serious about bringing him in as OC. And what team is dumb enough to actually offer him an HS job? Interviewing is one thing. Offers are another.
The man has a losing record.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:40 pm
I love me some Mike Evans, but he didn’t even have the best rookie year from this year’s rookies, much less ever.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:41 pm
We may never know the real reason Lovie stuck with McCown when it was clear he sucked. MGM may not have been much better but he couldn’t have been any worse and we should have taken a look.
But perhaps there are grander plans behind the scenes. Get the #1 pick maybe?
Preserve trade value?
Something was strange about the decision to play McCown to the bitter end. It didn’t make football sense as in this player gives us the best chance to win.
To be perfectly honest I’m not sure that Kafka didn’t give us just as good a chance to win as McCown.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:47 pm
The Cannon was benched because Lovie thought McCown gave us the best chance to win.
I was of the opinion it was to preserve Glennon’s trade value but was sadly mistaken. It was about saving face all along.
Stubbornness won out.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:51 pm
Yep, hard to watch the Buc’s offense this year, and the uniforms sucked too, adding to the mess on the field.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:52 pm
nate_tweetz,
We are pretty much going to kiss next year goodbye anyway. We will be starting from scratch on offense. (not a bad thing). New staff, new playbook, a rebuilt OL will need weeks to gel and a rookie QB too..
On the verge? Doubtful. Just watch, Vegas will have the over/under at 5 games.
January 7th, 2015 at 2:59 pm
30th offense in the league, that’s an improvement over Glennon’s 32nd offense from the year before. things are looking up people!
January 7th, 2015 at 2:59 pm
Now Now Now, football starts in November folks. We still have 10 1/2 months to go.
January 7th, 2015 at 3:02 pm
While I’m quite certain we will pick a QB at number one…I am becoming less certain which one it will be.
My instincts tell me it will be Mariota…my fears tell me it will be Winston.
I will say this….today the Winston rape accuser filed a federal lawsuit against FSU for failing to properly investigate the incident.
The more of that that goes on, the more difficult it will be for the Glazers to permit Winston to be drafted.
No matter what happens we will be a better team….and many in the fanbase will be unhappy with the choice and it will take a while to settle things down.
January 7th, 2015 at 3:06 pm
SPBF, i’m with you. there absolutely was a dimension beyond on-the-field success in 2014 that went into that QB decision. if you think about it, if glennon truly is a possible QB of the future (which i still think was a fallback if the bucs failed to tank sufficiently for a top 2 pick or picked a rookie who needed some sideline time), you probably don’t want him getting severely hurt a la chris simms while standing behind that porous line in meaningless games. you’re paying mccown $5 mil, might as well let him take the hits, scramble a little, and keep you in play for #1 overall
January 7th, 2015 at 3:11 pm
TBBF, sadly the kid could not do another wrong thing in his life and still not have a ton of people out there change their mind about him. and with the shakedown from the accuser (my judgement based on all i have read about the story) seemingly not going away, i feel for the kid. i am no lawyer, but you are filing suit against a university for a matter that is 100% in the hands of police and courts. that tells me your first target (winston) has been deemed unlikely to capitulate and you are going to the institution that would rather pay you to make it go away than defend its position in a protracted and public legal battle.
January 7th, 2015 at 3:16 pm
at this point it seems to me that the accuser is fighting to preserve her reputation and recoup losses after her family probably invested alot in the shakedown, only to be undermined by the accuser and her friends deleting texts that would have comprised key evidence against the accused if they supported the accused’s accounts.
ok i’m done offering unqualified legal opinions now. it’s sad how ruinous and permanent an allegation can be, even after no body of justice feels is credible enough to pursue
January 7th, 2015 at 3:18 pm
@ Bannor
Not so fast, I believe a JBF’er dug through some stats that showed if one removed the 3 games Freeman started for the Bucs in 2013 that the Bucs O was 28 or 29 (something like that). Hell remove the games Glennon played this year and I’d imagine the Bucs O was 31 or 32. The Pineapple McCown/second coming of Rich Gannon experiment certainly was a failure…the only two people who actually didn’t realize this in the offseason were Lovie and a poster here who went by Owlykat (poor dude probably had to change his handle here after making bold predictions of McCown and Pro Bowl in the same sentence) 🙂
January 7th, 2015 at 3:23 pm
@ pick6
I am only reporting what’ happening…..my opinion doen’t have much to do with the facts (I don’t know them) prehaps they will never be known. Some people just attract these sorts of things……perhaps it’s immaturity or perhaps its the crowd they hang with…And it is unfortunate that the accusation alone can cause such damage.
I am fairly convinced that especially in light of what the NFL has gone through this year, that the Glazers will be very reluctant to sign him as the face of the francise.
I think they would rather take the gamble that he is the best QB….but Mariota is good enough to make him worth the pick without the off-field gambles.
January 7th, 2015 at 3:31 pm
even after no body of justice feels is credible enough to pursue
______
Pick6,
You mean after a police department that is basically an FSU Booster Club failed to investigate. It’s hard to pursue a case that the police refuse to investigate. Here is from the New York Times:
“In his announcement, the prosecutor, William N. Meggs, acknowledged a number of shortcomings in the police investigation. In fact, an examination by The New York Times has found that there was virtually no investigation at all, either by the police or the university.
The police did not follow the obvious leads that would have quickly identified the suspect as well as witnesses, one of whom videotaped part of the sexual encounter. After the accuser identified Mr. Winston as her assailant, the police did not even attempt to interview him for nearly two weeks and never obtained his DNA.
The detective handling the case waited two months to write his first report and then prematurely suspended his inquiry without informing the accuser. By the time the prosecutor got the case, important evidence had disappeared, including the video of the sexual act.”
January 7th, 2015 at 3:34 pm
TBBF, the bucs are the king of bad timing. leave it to them to be in a position to wrestle with this question after one of the most tumultuous offseasons in NFL history off the field moves the “red flag zone” from pacman jones\aqib talib style lurid or violent crimes to evaporating accusations and underclassman stupidity.
if i believed, even slightly, that winston had non-consensual sex with a woman, i would be letting my tickets go if we drafted him. but like you said, that’s neither here nor there. for the glazers, that bit of baggage and others, along with the josh freeman downward spiral have put them in a position where it makes real sense to take the lesser prospect from a pure football standpoint.
January 7th, 2015 at 3:38 pm
@pick6
The issue is more simple for fans, players and even coaches……take the more pro-ready player…..write off the off-field incidents as pure immaturity….believe that they will not return once NFL guidence is in place…..but for the owners….
Take the guy who can be developed and has virtually no chance of becoming a nightmare!!!
That’s where I think this is going….and I’m OK with it…
January 7th, 2015 at 3:58 pm
Lovie stuck with McCown, because he gave them the best path to the number 1 pick!!! They realize the season was over after the first game in Atlanta…
January 7th, 2015 at 4:02 pm
@lightningbuc…so does a shoddy investigation automatically validate the accusation? Jameis deserves to carry this for the rest of his life because the matter was handled in a way that makes the accusation impossible to disprove? that’s an inversion of our legal principles, among other things.
if Jameis IS innocent, then the shoddy investigation actually makes him MORE of a victim. based on what NYT wrote, it would seem that exonerating evidence would have been lost through the same failures of procedure just as surely as incriminating evidence. Moreover, it keeps his accuser (and thus him, in association with sexual assault) in the news because of the failures of a 3rd party.
i’m not going to continue this thread of discussion, although it’s been done very respectfully at all, i think we are firmly in that place where we are discussing a non-football matter and people’s minds are unlikely to be changed by debates in the JBF comment section.
January 7th, 2015 at 4:03 pm
*typo, “it’s been done very respectfully BY all”
January 7th, 2015 at 4:11 pm
pick6,
That’s fine, but how can you accuse the girl of a “shakedown”? At the time, Jameis had never played a down for FSU – she had no idea when making the accusation he’d be a 1st round pick 2 years later.
January 7th, 2015 at 4:15 pm
Trestman is interviewing with Jacksonville this week. The train is going to leave the Bucs with their slow process for any OC.
January 7th, 2015 at 4:17 pm
I hope everyone here who keeps accusing him of rape gets a taste of their own medicine one day. The players you cheer for every Sunday aren’t quior boys . This girls story is so shady I can’t believe one of u think he did anything other than screw her.
January 7th, 2015 at 4:26 pm
damn lightning. thats pretty damning.
I agree where there’s smoke there’s fire, but we’ll see.
having womanized for ages and getting more play than dirk diggler, I can say that I always no when no meant no.
funny how so many stars get accused and it goes away. let’s stop trashing the accuser. hell, if thats the case, then cosby is innocent!
January 7th, 2015 at 4:28 pm
“The players you cheer for every Sunday aren’t quior boys”
WTF???
they should not be rapist either. women don’t make this $hit up IMO. The ones that do are already so bat $hit crazy it would never get to a lawsuit.
January 7th, 2015 at 4:34 pm
@picksix
” i feel for the kid”
You are correct that nobody knows for sure what happened that night between Jameis and the girl…other than those two and his two friends who taped it and then conveniently destroyed the tape before it could be used as evidence.
It’s a classic He said/she said and yes that’s always a tough situation. But why feel sorry for Jameis. He has brought most of this upon himself. He clearly has no remorse and no smarts about the implications of having sex on the first date…having buds video the event..then get accused of rape.
Let’s give you the benefit of the doubt pick 6 and say Jameis is guilty of no sex crime and only of poor judgement. I could have gotten past that.
But the screaming of the vile internet meme that supposedly was connected to that case is just beyond the pale for me. Ignorance that deep is truly hard to measure.
And so by his own mouth Jameis has poured fuel on the fire. Feel sorry for him. He’s set to earn millions and millions of dollars for playing a freaking kids game. He’s already won the ovarian lottery. He’s big, strong, famous, gets all the chicks he wants and can get away with a lot in his future privileged life as an athlete. Nothing to really feel sorry for there. Jameis is responsible for a large part of his reputation…the girl he did only got the ball rolling.
Now if you feel sorry for him because he was so blessed physically and so lacking intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually, then I’m with you. I’m sorry that for all his physical gifts he never got the gift of character.
January 7th, 2015 at 4:58 pm
Just for the fun of it all……
“I’m gonna, in the end, I’m going to make all the decisions, like I’m responsible for everything in our program,” Lovie said. “I’d like to get the coordinator in position, and from there, we’ll go forward.”
Others may feel that the Tampa OC is a good job, but you cant tell me that the worst team in football, who’s supreme overlord is the worst offensive mind in football is a great gig.
We have nothing in place. Nothing. Outside of Evans, very single player on the offensive side of the ball is expendable.
It’s going to be a loooong process just to hire the bridesmaid who didn’t get the job elsewhere.
A seasoned NFL OC
January 7th, 2015 at 5:50 pm
Jameis is junk. Mariota is mediocre.
January 7th, 2015 at 5:53 pm
Biff
I agree. My only hope is that the Glazers have gotten Lovie behind closed doors and put their feet down. They could force Lovie to accept Licht as the TRUE GM and the next OC as the guy totally in charge of the offense.
That may be our only hope. Lovie is set to play Dungyball. Run-run-pass-punt and wait for your defense to score points. IF that is the case he might as well trade down for a boatload of picks and make that defense as stout as possible. Of course if he does that it’ll simply make me even happier that I’m a freaking Lightning fan! At least one franchise from top to bottom in Tampa Bay gets it!
January 7th, 2015 at 6:00 pm
and Melman is the “AntiWin”
January 7th, 2015 at 6:04 pm
It would be nice to see some exciting offensive football here, instead of bite your nails protecting a tiny lead on the last possession and hope the D holds, only to lose in the end. I guess we will wait until Lovie is gone and then hope for a change in philosophy.
January 7th, 2015 at 6:15 pm
I got a 2nd interview for the bucs OC position. We’re on the verge boys.
January 7th, 2015 at 9:04 pm
StPeteBucsFan said:
“Lovie is set to play Dungyball. Run-run-pass-punt and wait for your defense to score points. IF that is the case he might as well trade down for a boatload of picks and make that defense as stout as possible. Of course if he does that it’ll simply make me even happier that I’m a freaking Lightning fan! At least one franchise from top to bottom in Tampa Bay gets it!”
You are correct sir and that scares the Buc fan in me as I can see Lovie doing that if the Glazer lads do not force him to do otherwise.. This guy would actually be okay with a middling offense and hang his hopes on a defense that can hold other offenses to under 13 points……. Dungyball makes for some competitive football if you have a top 3 D but otherwise it is a recipe for a team that always loses the time of possession battle which leads to the D eventually tiring and giving up lead after lead late in games as the below average offense simply goes 3 and out on most drives or turns the ball over at the most inopportune times. Sound familiar? If the Glazers’ do not force L&L to implement an offense that can actually rank in the top half of the NFL in all relevent categories we fans are doomed to watching a string of 10+ loss seasons unseen since the Creamsicle years under the watch of the penny pinching Hugh Culverhouse. I sincerely hope the Glazers have enough pride and common sense to try and avert this and make a stand: force Lovie to hire someone who will be aggressive on offense. Lets face it: as Joe stated on Duemig’s show it is very likely Lovie would prefer an OC that would not be threat to him as a potential replacement; thus the interest in guys like the ATL OC and the fan’s realistic fear this guy will just hire
January 7th, 2015 at 9:07 pm
“But the screaming of the vile internet meme that supposedly was connected to that case is just beyond the pale for me. Ignorance that deep is truly hard to measure.”
i don’t think that is accurate. AFAIK it’s a mindless internet meme that has little to nothing to do with actual sexual intercourse and more to do with stuffing 2 shocking words into a one second span in totally inappropriate contexts such as news reports and, well, lunchrooms. stupid and entitled, yes. malicious and unremorseful? i wouldn’t agree on the basis of that incident and can’t say i buy that attribution.
as far as the accusation & circumstances, as i said, i’m not going back to discussing the events of that evening. amid the sparse evidence, there are pieces for advocates of either party to latch onto as indications of innocence or guilt (victim & friends also deleted critical texts from what i understand, seems like every party had evidence they wanted to see gone), but as many have said we will never know. the only certainty would come from JW being definitively guilty, since the a large portion of the country will never again accept him as definitively innocent.