Now that was ugly. And I don't mean Kirsten-Dunst-without-makeup-ugly. I mean the-Bucs-are-gonna-get-pantsed-in-the-playoffs-ugly. And it has nothing to do with backups coming into the game. It was awful pretty much from the beginning.
Alex Smith, Michael Clayton and Joey Galloway all had passes laid into them perfectly and dropped. That high one that Smith tipped up and got intercepted I don't feel so bad about because the pass wasn't that good, but the easy ones are just so frustrating.
The left side of the offensive line, including the center, was no match for San Francisco's defensive line. Donald Penn was outmanned all day and Arron Sears got absolutely no push. The right side did somewhat better, but really no one was opening holes for the running game and Jeff Garcia got hit way too much.
Forget the starters, you know who was coming up big for the Bucs in the game? Michael Pittman and Jerramy Stevens. Pittman knows the offense and knows how to get open to get something out of an aborted play. And Stevens is proving to be a reliable receiver.
Maurice Stovall broke his arm and is out for the rest of the season. Because of this, you may see Stevens a lot more in the playoffs. He's big and physical like Stovall and may be able to take his place on certain plays.
You could just feel Clayton's disappointment in himself when he came down out of bounds on the two-point conversion. Good. I hope he feels like shit and learns something from it. I know it's not very Christmasy, but damn it, you see receivers make much more acrobatic catches under much more difficult circumstances. That was a rookie mistake.
Jovan Haye and Ryan Sims both looked impressive. If Larry Coyer can get Sims to play to the potential he had coming out of the draft, he'll be a huge steal.
How does a guy as fast and strong as Quincy Black let Frank Gore get away fro him?
Something was wrong with the secondary yesterday. I don't know if it was the coaching or the execution, but Vernon Davis's and Darrell Jackson's touchdowns were a breakdown in something. Jackson's was actually caught between Brian Kelly and Will Allen.
Ok, so now the Bucs defense has allowed Quinn Gray, Sage Rosenfels and Shaun Hill to beat them. Seven touchdowns to one interception. Are all these backup quarterbacks just that good? Are the Bucs not preparing adequately because they think they don't have to? Or is this a defense that is overranked because of a very, very weak NFC South?
Special teams can eat my balls. How many punts can he put on the ground before someone finally shoves a football up Phillip Buchanon's ass? Even Micheal Spurlock almost lost a fumble before a review confirmed he was down by contact... barely. Just put Pittman back there and let him do whatever he can. At least you know he has good hands.
Again, the Bucs had two trips into the San Francisco red zone to start the game and had to settle for two field goals. It's just not good enough. Let's just say the Bucs beat whoever comes to Tampa. Does anyone think the Cowboys are going to have any trouble with the Bucs in Dallas? Rest the starters for the Panthers game, but for the love of God, no rest at practice. Not even for Galloway. From what I saw, everyone needs to work on the basics.
