Tuesday Afternoon Linebacker

The Bucs won in thrilling fashion on Sunday. For all intents and purposes locking up the NFC South title in the process. Now comes the hard work. Jockeying for position with Seattle and Green Bay.

Mr. Who Cares
If Jeff Garcia is Mr. Today, and (according to Gruden) Bruce Gradkowski is Mr. Tomorrow; then was does that make Luke McCown? Which is probably why he played so well. He had nothing to lose. If the Bucs lost and he didn’t play well we’d be back to square one again. Wondering when Garcia would be back. Wondering about the playoffs. There as no pressure on McCown. Which then begs the question; was that him “blowing his load” or is that what you get with him?

I fear that McCown’s performance Sunday was an aberration. There’s a reason a guy doesn’t start for nearly 3 years. There’s a reason he bounces around the league. Flashes of brilliance notwithstanding. Early word is that Garcia will be ready to go against Houston Sunday. Let’s hope so. I’d rather not find out the hard way that I was right. Though given the choice between Gradkowski, who has proved his inability to run this offense, and McCown who at least has one good game I’d go with McCown. I have a lot more to say about the Bucs’ quarterback situation, and will expound ad naseum during the Post Season Post Mortem (hopefully to be posted sometime in mid-February).

They Got No Push
I’m still worried about the defense. They are playing well to be sure. But they don’t seem to be as good as they were even two seasons ago when last we took the NFC South. The pass rush seems to come and go. This defense used to regularly undress even the stoutest offensive lines, but now any competent O-Line seems to erect an almost impenetrable barrier against the Bucs’ onslaught. Even though the lads didn’t get to Brees as often as I’d like, they got there enough. And more importantly, when it counted.

Houston, though, should provide the D-Line with some nice snacks. The Moo-Cows are without two offensive linemen, and will start the immortal Sage Rosenfels at quarterback Sunday.

Team MVP?
Would you be live Josh Bidwell? This is what he does of course, but his booming punts all year have bailed out the offense when it has been, ahem, less than spectacular. And helped the defense amass some nice stats too. It was no different on Sunday as Bidwell boomed punt after punt deep into Saints territory.

In all seriousness though, if I had a vote for Bucs team MVP my finalists (in no particular order just yet) would be Garcia, Bidwell, and Graham.

E.G. In Da Hizzie
On the subject of the little tailback who could, he turned in another excellent performance. Again, I’ll go into this more during the PSPM, but I’m feeling real good about this part of the offense for next year.

I was particularly impressed that Gruden stuck with the run. There were a few times when Graham an into the line and was stuffed. But as any long time TALB reader can tell you, sometimes all you have to do is run into the line for no gain and everything will be okay.

Bonehead
Speaking of “running into the line for no gain”, thanks Sean Payton. When simple and fundamental works, he goes for flashy and doomed to failure.

Verrry Interesting
With Trent Dilfer taking snaps for the 49ers and Vinny Testaverde lining up under center for Carolina the Bucs could close out the season by putting beatdowns upon their one-time saviors.

The Last Mile
Four games remain; @HOU, ATL, @SF, and CAR. This is the kind of final schedule that could ruin a team like this. Four games that they should win quite easily could turn very ugly in a hurry. Hopefully the lads learned a thing or two from the Detroit and Jacksonville games.

Next Week
The only thing I fear for next week at Houston is the let-down factor. All week the players will read (if they pay attention) about how they’ve wrapped up the South and have smooth sailing into the playoffs. The Texans are probably the last team on the schedule that can make a game of it against the PiPP, so the lads need to stay on task and finish.