Sticks of Fire: a Tampa blog

No team rules the local sports scene like our Buccaneers, come NFL season they dominate the water cooler talk (although lately they have failed to dominate on the field). With that in mind the Sticks presents its 2007 Buccaneer preview, featuring myself and Scott from BucStats with John from Boltsmag moderating the discussion. (John’s in bold, Scott’s in italics and I’m plain old text.)

John: The Buccaneers are carrying four Quarterbacks to start the season… Assign purposes for each and try to rationalize Jon Gruden’s love for Bruce Gradkowski. Is it because he looks like a drug dealer who would be more appropriate on the Raiders roster?

Scott: Jeff Garcia’s official purpose was to bring experience and a winning mentality to a Buccaneers team that hasn’t had it for a few years. Garcia is also Jon Gruden’s official Gannon-comparison quarterback, because everybody knows that the only way Gruden can win is with a clone of Rich Gannon. Is anyone else sick to fucking death of hearing how Gannon and Gruden were made for each other and how neither of them have been a good since they split up? Maybe they should just film a remake of The Notebook with them and get it over with.

Luke McCown will serve as the primary backup to Garcia. McCown is the most athletically gifted of the quarterbacks, as evidenced by his ability to chase down and tackle Jamaal Fudge after a Buccaneer fumble recovery. That’s a very important skill for a Bucs quarterback to have. McCown also brings in that critical pre-tween demographic since he himself looks like a member of a failed 90s boy band.

Don’t underestimate how important this demographic is. Someone needs to buy all those Buccaneer Crocs.

Bruce Gradkowski is the third-string or “emergency” quarterback. It’s easy to envision an emergency scenario where Garcia breaks a hip and McCown can’t make his way from the bench because of his autograph demands, so Gradkowski’s role is important. He also fulfills the self-destructive need for Tampa Bay to have a seriously flawed “quarterback of the future”. This prestigious role has previously been filled by Vinnie Testaverde, Trent Dilfer and Shaun King. Gradkowski’s flaw is his long ball which, much like an ICBM, is accurate to within 100 feet.

Your comment about Gradkowski looking like a drug dealer is no doubt a dig at his Italian heritage, which I find offensive and is beneath you to say. Besides, he is also half-Polish, which likely means he would have the getaway car in reverse or something.

Chris Simms’s sole purpose on the Tampa Bay roster is to keep him off of the Atlanta roster. He is also now the poster boy for courage under fire and re-telling a story to death. Every time a player comes off the field with an injury, Simms is there to condescendingly console them for a minute and then add, “Back in my day, I gave my SPLEEN to this team! And I STILL finished the game!” Players return to the field more quickly because, god damn that gets old fast.

Scott, I’m half Italian, a quarter Polish and a quarter Irish… Aren’t
I allowed to self mock by race in this case? Also, I was repeating
something that Ski had implied on Sticks of Fire ages ago.

So it wasn’t intended as a dig at Bruce for anything more than
appearance and… Oh, hell, it’s Ski’s fault.

Ski: Sure blame it on the Pollock.

Seeing as how both encourage vast amounts of drinking, I will compare each quarterback to a character from Cheers, which is quite possibly the greatest show ever.

Jeff Garcia: Sam Malone
Steady hand who is past his prime but still has something to contribute. And despite Scott’s rant to the opposite, the only quarterback Gruden has proven he can excel with is a Rich Gannon clone. Gruden hasn’t had a top ten offense since he left Oakland, despite surrounding just about every quarterback in Tampa with talent.

Luke McCown: Woody Boyd
Seriously underrated and ready to backup Garcia/Sam Malone. Although if either McCown or Woody are manning the helm then you might as well kiss your ass goodbye.

Bruce Gradkowski: Cliff Clavin
Both the quarterback and the character serve one purpose: comedic relief. And in defense of Gradkowski and fellow Pollocks everyone, we not only invented the screen door submarine but also the horse drawn tank.

Chris Simms: Rebecca Howe
Loads of potential and high expectations but in the end you wish for someone else.

I guess the appropriate response to this (the Simms remark) is a quote from Norm: “Women. Can’t live with’em… Pass the beer nuts.”

Ever? I’m sorry, Ski. I never knew your family has been without a television since 1987. My condolences.

And that’s solely on the quarterback’s shoulders? I think the ridiculous performance of the offensive lines had a lot to do with it as well. And “talent” is subjective. I am a huge Michael Pittman fan, but he is not an elite running back. Michael Clayton, Tim Brown, Bill Schroeder, Charles Lee, Edell Shepard, Karl Williams… stop me when I get to the talent. All servicable, but none of them will help raise the performance of the quarterback. Who, besides Joey Galloway, have any of the Bucs quarterbacks since 2003 had to really bail them out?

The Bucs have had some good receivers since Gruden came to town: Keyshawn, McCardell, Jurevicious, Clayton his rookie year. The problem is none of the qbs have been a good fit for Gruden’s offense. You have to agree Garcia is the best quarterback Gruden has had since he came to Tampa, no?

Wait, didn’t you call Garcia a “washed up has been” on your blog? On paper, Garcia looks like a good fit for Gruden’s system, I agree. We’ll have to wait a few games to see if he can make those same plays against defenses that are trying a little harder. I still remember Cleveland and Detroit. I *hope* he is the best quarterback that Gruden has had in Tampa because it means more wins. I’m just skeptical right now.

Coaching’s coming up a bit in this discussion so let me play out that string - Monte Kiffin made changes to his coaching staff after last season where the Buccaneer defense and the vaulted Tampa Two fell down and went boom. Jon Gruden made no such changes and blamed injuries all around for lack of performance and flaws. I know the question is personnel as much as coaching changes but will we see improvement on the Defense with thanks to some of monte’s coaching shifts, and is Gruden being too faithful to his coaching staff for an offense that has not progressed much?

Yes on both. Greg Burns and Jethro Franklin were disasters as coaches for Tampa Bay. They may be good coaches, I really don’t know, but the Bucs did not respond to their style of coaching and the defense regressed terribly. You can’t underestimate the value of having Raheem Morris back as the secondary coach. The secondary was arguably the weakest link in the defense last year; that won’t happen again in 2007 with Morris back.

I think Bill Muir has been given more than ample opportunity to turn the offensive line around. If the line doesn’t improve this year with two first-rounders and two second-rounders as starters, he needs to dropped in a swamp and replaced. I am also suspicious of Paul Hackett’s ability to mold a young quarterback into a franchise star. Art Valero and Richard Mann seem to be doing the best with what they have to work with, although Michael Clayton’s decline could be partially blamed on Mann for not keeping him focused.

I will answer the second question first. You’re right, the offense has failed to improve under Gruden. In fact, statistically the offense has declined since the Dungy era . But I will take the convenient answer and blame the lack of progress on the quarterback position, which has been a revolving door ever since Dilfer was chased out of town.

For the first time ever we are going to see extensive use of the 3-4 formation this season, which has me as giddy as a Senator in an airport bathroom. The defense should rebound since the Bucs have finally added talent to what had been a depleted defense. More importantly, I believe we are on the verge of the next great style of defense, a 3-4/Tampa Two hybrid. Both Tampa and Pittsburgh are experimenting with hybrids of the two defenses which have won the last six Super Bowls.