Koetter Takes Sword For Pitchout
October 28th, 2015
Blame Dirk Koetter, says Dirk Koetter.
The Bucs were on the cusp of putting away the Redskins last Sunday, even though Lovie Smith’s defense couldn’t slow down a cool breeze.
With the Bucs clinging to a three-point lead late in the game with the ball on the Redskins-1, the Bucs called a pitchout left to Charles Sims, where he was met by a gang of defenders for a two-yard loss.
The Bucs elected to go for a field goal and a six-point lead, which quickly evaporated when Kirk Freaking Cousins marched the Redskins down the field like Joe Montana in a Super Bowl for a game-winning touchdown.
It was a terrible call on third down. And Bucs offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter had a simple message: Blame no one but him.
“Let’s everybody get this straight: I screwed it up,” Koetter said in his weekly press conference today. “Nobody else. I screwed it up. Plain and simple. We had a check play on where we were checking on the goal line based on overload personnel. They had some injuries and switched some guys around. I gave Jameis bad information.
“One hundred – one thousand – whatever number you want to use – percent on me. Nobody else. Simple. Put that to bed. I screwed it up. I have to live with it. I feel horrible about it. I can’t take it back. I did it.
Yes, it is three days later, but Joe still cannot understand; why not have a big dude like Jameis run the ball up center Joe Hawley’s rear end for one yard and the game?
Dating back to the days of former Bucs commander Greg Schiano, the Bucs, for reasons unknown, seem paranoid of running a quarterback sneak.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:19 pm
At least he took accountability. I appreciate that.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:21 pm
Its a breath of fresh air to hear a Bucs coach man up and say he was to blame. A foreign concept to Lovie.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:22 pm
I still think we should have gone playaction on first or second down. The way we were running the ball, and the way the Washington Racial Slurs were selling out for the run, it would have been the easiest 6 we’d had all season
October 28th, 2015 at 3:22 pm
Responses like this makes me think this guy has what it’s take to be a head coach. If Lovie is fired, this man HAS to be promoted.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:22 pm
No Koetter, you did not screw up. You are the only bright spot about this season. The offense has by far exceeded expectations.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:25 pm
See Lovie it’s easy be accountable, it would make you feel better and all the fans as well.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:26 pm
A coach accepting blame and admitting to his mistake? What a breath of fresh air. Wake me up when Lovie is ready to accept a little ownership over his miserable defense.
Fire Lovie, promote Koetter to HC, let Frazier resume defensive play calling, and let Licht have full control over personnel. Simple as that.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:27 pm
“At least he took accountability. I appreciate that.”
Exactly. So much respect for this guy simply for that. And you can bet he doesn’t make that mistake again whereas I don’t see that kind of accountability with Lovie.
If we had a timeout in that situation I bet we would have called it due to confusion – but those were wasted in dumb situations earlier by Lovie.
If he was HC I doubt he kicks a FG there given the fact that the D had given up TD drives almost every possession in the 2nd half. I would expect him to go for it with Winston.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:31 pm
Anything — and i do mean ANYTHING — would have been better than a Sims toss sweep.
But the trouble started on first down. Martin had just run for 45. There are two reasons to go play action on 1st down:(1) Martin is tired and (2) Washington will be selling out for the run. Again, watch the good teams. New England fired a first down TD to Gronk in a similar situation, up one score late in the 4th (when fossilized conventional wisdom says run it and burn clock) vs the Jets. In any case, we were running it well so Martin on 1st and second makes some sense.
On third? Unconscionable. Sneak would have been delightful, as would a fake run left with a rollout run/pass option right. The lack of QB sneaks has always been a mystery and one that again highlights a lack of basic football IQ on the staff. I’ve seen Brady fail ONE TIME on a sneak out of at least 20 that I have seen.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:32 pm
Lovie love note. Koetter lightening the load off Lovie. Lovie says thanks Dirk.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:35 pm
Koetter will be the next head coach of the Bucs.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:36 pm
i have a tremendous amount of respect for koetter. i am just confused why he is able to improve the bucs offense so quickly without his own staff. remember it takes time…
October 28th, 2015 at 3:48 pm
The pitch out wasnt all that bad. The idiotic decision to go for 3 and thinking your crap defense, that hasent slown anyone down yet in 22 games, could somehow close the Deadskins out instead of going for a 2 score lead that would of won the game was the idiotic decision.
1 play call didnt lose this game. Our scared coach played soft again and we lost yet again. 4-19, here Lovie comes.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:51 pm
Koetter and Lovie are night n day in PCs. Koetter is genuine and Lovie only gives canned answers.
I also saw JWs PC and I’m just super impressed with this kid’s attitude, maturity and desire. Love everything about the kid.
I still think JW was told NOT to audible hence the 3&1 was “Koetters fault” wink wink.
October 28th, 2015 at 3:52 pm
We have had trouble for quite some time with 3rd & 1….4th & 1……not just this year……we don’t have a big back on the team & we don’t seem to want to hand it to Lane….what, has he had like one carry all year?
We need to find a fullback that can run….
SIMPLE AS THAT!!!
October 28th, 2015 at 3:53 pm
I suspect Lovie will start making the Offensive play calls to remove Koetter from the limelight becaue he’s doing a great job. On another note, is Lovie’s son a linebackers coach?
October 28th, 2015 at 3:54 pm
lovie smith may want dirk koetter to sit out a few press conferences. every week he is showing fans how a real coach takes responsibility while his boss insults our collective intelligence.
that being said, this is not a new thing with dirk koetter. I recall the falcons being famously ineffective in short yardage as well in the koetter era. i don’t know if it’s the blocking scheme, something about the pre-snap action, or just coincidence, but it was interesting to me that falcons almost seemed better off in 3rd and 7 than they were in 3rd and 1 in the latter years of the mike smith era
October 28th, 2015 at 3:56 pm
This guy has al the makings of our future head coach. Pay attention Glazers!
October 28th, 2015 at 3:57 pm
@drew, lovie’s son is coaching the DBs, indisputably the worst position group on the team
October 28th, 2015 at 4:26 pm
Dirk thank you for accepting responsibility for the 1 mistake you made last game. You’ll correct it and I’m not worried about you. If Lovie could man up and accept blame and one of his dozens of mistakes I’ll start to like him too.
October 28th, 2015 at 4:32 pm
The real problem was the 4th down call right after. Should have gone for it. That one is on Lovie.
October 28th, 2015 at 4:58 pm
Koetter is pretty funny lol
Whoever asked him about slant routes around 3:40-4+ minutes is awesome and always seems to be one of the more ballsier / in your face interviewers. Same guy basically said to Lovie after last weeks game “well it’s your forum you can only talk about the positives if you want to thats your right ” basically calling Lovie out for dodging everything as he always does
Joe who is this guy?
October 28th, 2015 at 5:23 pm
This is why I love Koetter as a coach! Tells it like it is.
That play was an ABSOLUTELY HORRIBLE CALL. So refreshing to hear him take full responsibility and accountability for it.
Maybe Lovie could learn a thing or two from him- oh wait..
October 28th, 2015 at 5:29 pm
and if we didnt lose yards on third, it would have made sense to go for it on fourth (but of course lovie would have been too scared to do it)
October 28th, 2015 at 6:01 pm
Forget all that… from the one yard line you line up and you punch it… they lined and the OL and RBs didn’t punch it in…simple as that if they would’ve gotten cute thrown and pass and took a sack or INT, we’d all be on here complaining like they did Pete Carol after the Superbowl … at the end of the day when games are on the line the players aren’t making enough plays to win games! Conte was gifted a game winning INT and he drops it… David could’ve prevented the easy slant pass for the winning TD if he’d only lined up properly
October 28th, 2015 at 6:03 pm
And this is the guy that some people want to promote to head coach. A guy who makes decisions like that on 3rd down. Maybe Koetter should be the one who gets fired.
October 28th, 2015 at 6:23 pm
DK is a good guy who appears to be doing a good job. But make no mistake, if he were 4-18 then we’d be sick of his honesty too. Winning would cure our ills. I’ve lost confidence in Lovie. Have the Glazers? If not then they really are clueless, and if so, then their decision to keep the status quo is ridiculous. The fans are revolting and the D players are unhappy. You can just sense it in the way LVD is acting, and the other players are talking. Swing the hammer. Do something to inject new life into this season.
October 28th, 2015 at 6:23 pm
I had a dream last night that Lovie was fired and Koetter was promoted…what a bummer to wake up from that one.
October 28th, 2015 at 11:15 pm
I refuse to blame Koetter.
The GL Sweep play works 99% of the time…. on Madden.
Clearly DC was stealing signs, deflating footballs and had drugged our Gatorade.
Why else would anyone run a GL sweep to the right when DC had more players on that side?
I also must assume that Jameis didn’t have permission to audible to a QB Sneak or a HB Dive.
October 29th, 2015 at 8:49 am
Schiano manned up and took a lot of criticism on himself too, he got ran out. Don’t get me wrong, I have a lot of respect for guys like Koetter (and Schiano) who own their mistakes with “I screwed up” instead of “we needed to do better” (Lovie), but the unfortunate truth is in the NFL it seems like guys who deflect blame tend to get a longer free pass for they’re poor performance than they should, while the stand up guys end up getting screwed. Personally I hope Koetter is interested in a HC interim job with the Bucs if LSmith is once again “tanking for…insert player….in 2016. It’s getting embarrassing (blowing a 24 point lead to the Redskins!?!?)