Roy Cummings Is Getting Hammered

Hey, guess who wrote another article predicting the demise of the Buccaneers under the guise of being unbiased?

There's little to indicate that the Bucs are on the verge of once again becoming a perennial playoff contender.

In fact, there are several teams that seem to be on a much faster track to long-term sustained success than the Bucs. I'd list Arizona as one of them, San Francisco as another and Tennessee as yet another.

Right now I see the Bucs in the same situation as the Green Bay Packers. They're looking pretty good right now and giving their fans plenty to cheer about. But what lies ahead doesn't seem so promising.

Take a look at the comments that follow his article. It's almost unanimously negative. People are tired of reading doom and gloom with an obvious personal slant. If things really are bad, he should say. But the team is 4-2 with a lot of optimism about the future. Dozens of comments telling Roy Cummings to go fuck himself. I feel all warm and tingly inside.

His main point, besides tacitly implying that Bruce Allen has built the team up for short-term gain and should be dragged out of town by horses, is that the Buccaneers' best players are older veterans who won't be with the team for the long haul. He mentions specifically Jeff Garcia, Joey Galloway and Ike Hilliard. Of course he mentions them... because everyone else is young! Four out of five starting offensive linemen are in their first or second year, Cadillac Williams will only be in his fourth year when he comes back, Michael Clayton is in his fourth now, and half the starting defense has six years or less experience. And the old guys he mentions aren't showing any signs of slowing down. They may be around for another one to three years more, plenty of time to work with their eventual replacements if they are drafted soon. And if not, guess what. Jon Gruden doesn't seem to have a problem convincing good veteran players to come join the team.

He makes it sound like a bad thing that the veterans are the team leaders. I kind of thought that was the way it was supposed to work. Anyway, read the comments after the article. For example:

Posted by wade less, clermont on 10/18 at 02:37 PM

Seriously...this article was about as insightful as directions to a Pez dispenser.