Stop The Bogus Analogies, Rah
November 6th, 2009
Former Bucs DE Steve White
Former Bucs defensive end Steve White, who nails it every week in his popular Bull Rush column on JoeBucsFan.com, also has plenty to rant about on his own sports blog.
This week he came after Raheem The Dream again demanding he stop comparing his team and players to previous Bucs eras. Earlier this year, White took Raheem The Dream to task for a Dungy comparison.
Now it’s a Warren Sapp-Aqib Talib analogy, based on quotes in the St. Pete Times, that has White fired up.
Morris said Talib still has a lot of growing up to do.
“You’ve got to weigh character with a man’s God-given ability to play this game,” Morris said. “Has he made mistakes? Yes, He has. Has he made some as a Buccaneer? Yes, he has.
“He has to get better and we’ve got to contunue to get better…We had a bunch of players like him in the past. To mention one, Warren Sapp. He grew up and became a man.”
Look every coach has to have his own way of disciplining players, but I for one definitely feel like Morris has let this Talib situation get away from him. With a guy who came into the league with so much baggage prior to even playing a down and then for him to be in trouble several times since he was drafted this is the kind of thing that should call for immediate punishment in my honest opinion. But hey, just because the guy beat up a cabbie and then turned around and missed a curfew who am I to tell Morris how to run his team?
But what you DON’T need to do is keep trying to compare your situation to former Bucs players and coaches to try to justify where you are at. I played with Sapp for 6 years and yeah he was far from perfect. But he for damn sure wasn’t getting arrested for beating up cabbies. He for damn sure wasn’t hitting his teammates in the head with helmets. He for DAMN SURE wasn’t missing curfew either.
It was bad enough when Morris took a shot at Coach Dungy who I believe took the Bucs to the NFC championship and won a Superbowl with Indy the last time I checked. But this is really getting out of hand now.
Do everyone a favor Coach Morris, just focus on the people who are there now. …
Joe wonders what Sapp would say about Raheem The Dream mentioning him in the same breath with Talib?
November 6th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
Ask Sapp on Twitter, he’ll probably have a choice response.
November 6th, 2009 at 7:05 pm
Steve love your work dude. Just wanted to ask you this. Do you think it was a good idea to have such a young coach who was never a head coach, coach such a young team?
November 6th, 2009 at 8:26 pm
@Matthew
Yes I think it was a good idea to hire Coach Morris.
Let me tell you something that most people aren’t reporting on and most fans don’t really realize. Some years ago the NFL made what probably seemed like an innocuous change in the definition of coaches. Back in the day you used to have three categories of coaches. Head coach, coordinator, and position coach. But they changed it to just two categories of head coach and assistant coach.
Why does this matter?
Because it had always been general practice that teams would release a coach if they were offered an upward position with another team. Meaning a position coach would be released if another team wanted them as a coordinator. A coordinator would be released if another team wanted them as head coach. But now with just two categories position coaches could be and have been blocked from leaving their current team to go and be a coordinator for another team. The Bucs totally screwed Rod Marinelli from going to be the defensive coordinator for Lovie Smith under the guise of that new policy. Wouldn’t even let him interview for it.
Now what that will mean going forward is that you are going to see young position coaches getting hired as head coaches and never getting an opportunity to be a coordinator because of that policy. Coach Morris probably would have fallen into that category pretty soon and with the Bucs firing Gruden kind of late in the game then promoting Mark Dominic from within to be GM I am sure they felt like they needed to make the move now and keep some semblance of stability. Remember, even though Coach Morris had been promoted to coordinator had the Bucs went out and hired a big name coach like Bill Cowher for instance there is no guarantee that he wouldn’t have wanted to bring his own staff in.
My biggest problem is that Coach Morris decided to go with a new defensive scheme even though there are a ton of 4-3 coordinators who have similar packages to Monte Kiffin’s and even though that defense had carried this team for over a decade. The offense was already going to be different just by virtue of the fact that Gruden was gone but to change the defense as well to me just wasnt a good move, especially considering the fact that we weren’t going to go on a spending spree to bring in guys to fit the new system.
But we are still just at the halfway mark of the season. If Coach Morris ends up winning a few games and Josh Freeman isn’t just totally horrible there is still a chance that he will get the fans back on their side. But I think there are some things that he will learn along the way that will help him as a head coach going forward beyond this year.
November 6th, 2009 at 9:39 pm
I’m not a big… Let’s Fire Morris Guy! I just want to see progress which as of right now we as fans are not seeing. I understand that this was a rebuilding year and that this roster will look very different in the near future. The reason I ask about bring in a young head coach is because, in the first process of a rebuilding team is putting in a system and staying the line with that system. The fact that almost every choice that coach Morris has made has been the wrong one, firing your OC picking a DC that’s system is not made for the players you have on your team. Saying you want to run the ball but half way into the season we are 30th in att at rushing. I just think that with every loss its going to be harder and hander for a young coach like Morris to keep his team together and with him. If you are 0 and 8 or 0 and 9 and have Marty Schottenheimer telling you keep working we’ll get one, it might come across better to the players who are in the locker room every day than having a 32 year old telling you the same thing . I know that Morris is a rookie head coach and has made some rookie mistakes. We’ve all made rookie mistakes…. I just hope he doesn’t lose his team and can put a staff around him that helps him succeed as the head coach of the Tampa Bay Buc’s.
Also just wanted to say one more time… Thanks for your hard work and insight into the NFL. Hope you have a great weekend and let’s GO BUC’s, let’s get that upset of the Pack!!!