Jolly Bad Show, Old Chap

October 26, 2009 at 11:38am by Scott

Do I really have to analyze this one? Go through every position, every player, and put their performance under scrutiny to let you know if they were good or not? Hey, guess which player sucked. All of them! Seriously, that’s all you need. I’ll go over some players after this paragraph, but you should consider this an invitation to take the time you’d normally spend reading this entry and do something meaningful. Take a walk outside or buy everyone in your office donuts or give your mother a call (or Joe’s mother if you’re especially lonely). But if you lived through this game once, don’t put yourself through it again. It’s like continuing to buy stock in an company that’s already gone out of business.

After Josh Johnson’s first couple of starts, you could see some progress in his decision making and understanding of coverages. But after these last two weeks, it looks like he’s taken a couple steps back. I’m not sure if that has to do with the defenses he’s facing or if he hit some kind of wall that he needs to work through, but he will apparently not be getting the chance to figure it out since the Josh Freeman era has begun. Raheem Morris hasn’t announced it yet, but if he felt comfortable putting Freeman in against the Patriots, he likely won’t have any hesitation doing it against the Packers.

Johnson made some ridiculous reads yesterday, again passing over some wide open receivers in order to throw into coverage. Some of his throws were way off in terms of accuracy and it’s clear that the New England defense really confused him. And two of his interceptions were just awful decisions. But there were signs of hope. His on-the-run pass to Cadillac Williams for 19 yards was a great improvisational play. On the scoring drive (isn’t it sad that I don’t have to specify which one?) he had two great throws to Antonio Bryant, showing both touch and arm strength. He ended the day completing 35% of his passes with three picks and one touchdown. And then came Freeman.

Freeman took a total of nine snaps with one play blown dead on penalty. Here’s the condensed version of them: handoff, handoff, sack (-7 yards), 13-yard pass, incompletion, 3-yard pass, 5-yard scramble, incompletion, delay of game penalty, sack-fumble (-11 yards). The sack-fumble was on fourth down, the only time you really can’t afford to take a sack. Freeman’s best play was a 13-yard pass to Brian Clark. It wasn’t especially fancy or tough, but it was a completion. Based on all that, who honestly thinks this guy is ready for a full NFL game? Green Bay comes to town with another 3-4 defense — a defense that is currently ranked #3 in the league. For some reason, Morris felt four weeks ago that Freeman wasn’t ready, so he started Johnson who was ready. Or at least more so than Freeman. That hasn’t changed. As bad as Johnson has been, Freeman will likely be considerably worse. I believe Johnson can at least use these experiences to get better. I don’t think Freeman will. I’ve never had a lot of faith in Freeman, but I want to see him succeed and definitely don’t want to see him ruined like so many other underclassman quarterbacks who should have stayed in school.

At it certainly won’t help him when the offensive line is treating defenders like a screen door treats wind. Johnson rarely looked comfortable in the pocket and there wasn’t a lot of room to run, although to be fair, sometimes the line created a hole that the running backs didn’t see or chose not to run through. Vince Wilfork was unstoppable at times, even when he was drawing a holding penalty. There were a couple nice blocks here and there, but this was an inconsistent performance at best.

Speaking of the running backs, do not commit chop blocks on a Raheem Morris-coached team. Derrick Ward was called for a chop block and ten seconds later, Cadillac Williams was back in the game. We didn’t see Ward again until two series later. As the Bucs got further and further behind, the runs started drying up, but both Williams and Ward had a long run or two, but were mostly held in check (3.3 YPC for the running backs). Interestingly enough, there were a couple series when it looked like Ward and Williams were alternating snaps. I don’t know if this was because one was taking a rest or something, but the standard rotation was occasionally put on hold.

Is it time to start Sammie Stroughter yet? This kid runs great routes and gives up his body on every play. He was the leading receiver yesterday with 63 yards. Michael Clayton, on the other hand, can’t get separation and was held without a catch again. Antonio Bryant dropped a pass he should have had, but at least made up for it with a touchdown. Kellen Winslow also had a drop, but at least he made up for it by bailing Freeman out with a reception. Clayton never makes up for it, though. I’m not exactly being fair here. Most of Johnson’s attempts to Clayton were poorly thrown. But everyone else just looks like they’re trying harder.

The center of New England’s offensive line barely moved all game. Neither Ryan Sims nor Chris Hovan were getting any kind of penetration or able to collapse the pocket. Hovan was absent on the stat sheet again, and it’s starting to make me sad. It may be time for Roy Miller to start. Miller really turned up the heat at the end of the game (Hovan may argue that he was well-rested, but then where was Hovan at the beginning of the game?) All of the pressure on Tom Brady came from the edges, and there wasn’t much of it. Jimmy Wilkerson, Greg White, and Tim Crowder had decent games with new guy Michael Bennett getting in Brady’s face a couple times. The New England running game was held relatively in check, with the non-quarterbacks rushing for only 85 yards.

How good is Wes Welker? Linebackers can’t catch him or they miss the tackle on him, cornerbacks mistime their tackles or get PICKED BY THE UMPIRE, or he just flat outruns everyone. He makes defenders look bad. He is what everyone thought Tim Dwight was going to be all those years ago.

Barrett Ruud looked slow yesterday. He missed a couple tackles, one on Sam Aiken and one on Brian Hoyer. He’s usually up there in tackles, but he only had six yesterday.

The secondary is a completely different unit with Tanard Jackson in there. The guy is flat out a playmaker and he makes everyone else out there look better. Say what you want about his interception being an underthrown ball. He plucked that fucker out of the air before Randy Moss had a shot at it. And speaking of Moss and shots, Moss was never the same after Jackson destroyed him on the sideline. Did you see Moss shake his head like a cartoon character getting hit by an anvil? God that was awesome.

If you’re looking for a bright spot, the young talent on defense may be it. Aqib Talib, Tanard Jackson, Roy Miller, Geno Hayes, Quincy Black, Tim Crowder… all have shown they have potential to be excellent players. Now, whether they are in the right scheme or being coached properly is a different story, but it’s a start.

Sorry, I know this wasn’t one of the best summaries, but it was hard to get enthusiastic about it. I tried to find some good things to say about it, but the fact is that everyone expected a score like this one and some people probably felt fortunate that it wasn’t a complete embarrassment like Tennessee’s game was against the Patriots last week. The last time the Bucs got blown out like this was against the Giants in week 3. That was a 24 point loss and after that, Morris changed quarterbacks. Now after a 28 point loss, Morris is changing quarterbacks again. It seriously would not surprise me to see Byron Leftwich come back under center if the team gets the shit kicked out of them a couple times with Freeman. 0-7, folks. And the next game the Bucs play will be in the 1976 throwbacks. Is it possible? Could they really go winless AGAIN? If you have DirecTV, consider watching the condensed versions of the games later in the week. They’re less than a half hour long. You have better things to do with your time.