Top 30 Buccaneers Mysteries Of 2014 — No. 18
February 16th, 2015
In many ways, Tampa Bay’s 2014 season was more bizarre than the MRSA-infected, quarterback-gone-mental, Fire-Schiano-billboards campaign of 2013.
There were plenty of real Bucs mysteries last year, and Joe’s revisiting the most interesting of the bunch.
No. 18 — Investing in seven starts
When the free agency dinner bell rang last March, the Bucs handsomely paid veteran Anthony Collins big bucks to start at left tackle, the premier position on the offensive line.
But there was one giant red flag. Collins’ resumé revealed he had never made more than seven starts in a season.
Joe gets the desire for change, but why would the Bucs invest heavily in such an unknown?
The $6 million per year Collins was granted by Tampa Bay was a giant leap of faith, one Joe questioned strongly at the time, especially since Collins needlessly replaced talented ironman left tackle Donald Penn.
The Collins investment is among several 2014 mysteries along the Bucs’ O-line. It grew in stature when, in December, the Bucs decided veteran starting right tackle, Demar Dotson, was their best left tackle option despite no regular-season experience at the position.
No. 19 — Returner decisions
No. 20 — VJax’s wrist
No. 21 — Anti-Jell
No. 22 — Seferian-Jenkins boasting about penalized pose
No. 23 — Never moving Michael Johnson
No. 24 — “I didn’t want to put more points on the board”
No. 25 — Glennon success without an offensive coordinator
No. 26 — Putrid punting
No. 27 — Defending three-step drops
No. 28 — Eight consecutive red zone runs versus Rams
No. 29 — Leaky Sean Glennon
No. 30 – Jorvorskie Lane
February 16th, 2015 at 11:08 am
Another example of Lovie’s basement learning, I guess that is why we ended up in the basement, he likes it, it is warm and cozy and you don’t have to worry about dropping any lower unless a sinkhole opens up and then you are still in the basement only the sub basement.
February 16th, 2015 at 11:12 am
It worked with Clinton Mcdonald… You dont hit on all these signings. Thats why you set it up so they can be cut and you can try again
February 16th, 2015 at 11:17 am
“Collins needlessly replaced talented ironman left tackle Donald Penn.”
Needlessly
February 16th, 2015 at 11:18 am
Lovie screwed the pooch on the three most important positions…
QB fail.
LT fail.
RDE fail.
February 16th, 2015 at 12:02 pm
Lots of FA busts by the Bucs under L&L with no real decent signings. The fact that the OL talent was so blatantly below average is probably the only reason that OL coach Warhop was not fired when Marcus Arroyo was pink slipped. Even a good OL coach probably would not get good results considering the talent level. Still Warhop remaining on the staff should qualify for this top 30 list as well as the collective inept FA signings by L&L last offseason as every penny spent in the offseason was simply flushed down the crapper in 2014………
February 16th, 2015 at 12:12 pm
How could anyone bring Collins in here and hand him the starting LT job and pay him the salary of a pseudo star. He’s a backup. Maybe a situational blocker at best. I wouldn’t be opposed to a restructure and keep him for depth otherwise trade him for a sack of footballs.
February 16th, 2015 at 12:54 pm
Great point Joe… Seven starts and to make that type of investment and cut penn is inexcusable. I’m glad the Matt Flynn game or the 1st four starts of Kirk cousins didn’t happen at the end of last season, or they’d be are starting QBs in 2015.
February 16th, 2015 at 12:55 pm
Top 30 Uninteresting Complaints. Top 30 Reasons to Keep Beating a Dead Horse.
February 16th, 2015 at 1:03 pm
I get the reasoning as to why Penn and Davin were ousted but Jeremy Zuttah had no business being traded for a sixth rounder. He by far would have been our best olineman last year. EDS was a DOWNGRADE in every way. Collins was a DOWNGRADE to the over paid out spoken Donald Penn who struggled last year. Omaemah (?) was terrible and was a DOWNGRADE over Davin Joseph who was benched in St. Louis! I would’ve rather had Pamphile and Edwards learn under Penn and Joseph as opposed to head case Collins and underwhelming Logan Mankins. What does he teach… mope around and bitch when things dont go your way?
February 16th, 2015 at 1:16 pm
Might be more of a mystery if every NFL analyst including Uber personnel guru Bill Polian didn’t agree with them.
Joe, quit trying to make Donald Penn into the second coming of Paul Gruber. In 2013 Penn was worthless and was blamed for I believe 14 sacks.
He got a quick slap of reality called the unemployment line which shaped him up.
Now he is playing for less money because of it.
February 16th, 2015 at 1:28 pm
@ddneast — Penn was the second coming of Paul Gruber. Stop believing the false gospel of Pro Football Focus. Worthless Penn in 2013? Who is this, Lovie?
February 16th, 2015 at 2:25 pm
This and all of the other stuff.. yet people bashing the opinion that: in all the years Lovie never had a great “plan” of “building a lasting contender” – or a realy good team…
Still: we shouldn´t have fired him in the very last offseason, because you dont fire HC afer one year?
Even if they act as stupid as it gets?!
Guess he has first to waste our golden oppertunity this year (high picks, enough cap space to to do some golden things..)
Not to say Lovie will fail for damn sure – just that history suggest it and so its the sad predictable outcome…
Again: just look at ALL THE HORRIBLE STUPID MOVES FROM LAST YEAR
where the F do all those Lovie supporters get their hope from?!
February 16th, 2015 at 2:26 pm
I totally understand why they wanted to replace an aging and increasingly ineffective Donald Penn last year. Especially since he was set to earn more than $8M last year if I remember correctly. Talk about overpaid. I liked Penn too Joe and understand why you might want to take up for him. But the tape don’t lie. Penn was NOT a good LT for the Bucs in 2013.
“Collins’ resumé revealed he had never made more than seven starts in a season….why would the Bucs invest heavily in such an unknown?”
Now this was a very fair question – even prior to the season starting.
Hopefully Licht learned a lesson. I’d have been OK with the Collins experiment IF his contract had been structured so that we could walk away with little or no penalty. But $3M in guaranteed $ this year to a guy you completely benched in Dec and really don’t want any part of moving forward is a tough pill to swallow. It almost forces you to just keep him another year and let him compete for a guard spot or something to try and salvage some value.
Almost I said. I imagine the Bucs are probably going to cut him though because otherwise they would have let him play some snaps at Guard or try moving him to the right side at the end of last year. He had a couple games early in the year where it seemed like maybe he would be OK – but as a whole, Collins season last year with the Bucs was pretty bad.
February 17th, 2015 at 9:49 pm
A mistake….lets move on.