I Support This Kind Of Animal Cruelty

Jeff Garcia was 15 of 20 for 173 yards for the whole game. In the second half he only threw five times. I realize this is because the Bucs had the lead, but it wasn’t like it was 1-2-3 out after halftime. The Bucs gained 47 yards rushing in the first half and 100 in the second. Clearly, the strategy of continuing to run the ball and wearing out the defense has some merit to it.

B.J. Askew was out for the game and Byron Storer got hurt on a special team play which meant that Earnest Graham had to play fullback for most of the game and Warrick Dunn was the primary tailback. This worked out pretty well and Graham really did a nice job at fullback for not having practiced the position much. He laid linebackers out more than once to spring Dunn for some nice gains. It will be interesting to see if they stick with this package or if they try to make a roster move for a replacement fullback. With how well it turned out, I’d guess they stick with what they have.

Whatever happened to the offensive line in Denver seems to have been a temporary thing because the line was back up to full speed against Carolina. Garcia didn’t get sacked and was barely touched during the game. This was a game made for the line, what with all the downhill, off-guard running. The middle three especially had an excellent day run-blocking.

Arron Sears for hurt in the first half and was replaced by Jeremy Zuttah. Zuttah was so much better as a left guard than he was as a right guard. Zuttah showed power and good footwork all game long.

No penalties for Jeremy Trueblood! I’d love to know what Jon Gruden and Bill Muir said to him to get him to staighten out his act.

Julius Peppers apparently did not talk to Ebenezer Ekuban about how he got past Donald Penn last week because Penn held off Peppers for the whole game. Sometimes Peppers got shoved back on Penn’s first punch. It was glorious to see.

Alex Smith has been on fire these past few weeks. It’s not even that he’s running such special routes or is so fast. Other teams, for some reason, are just forgetting about him from time to time and he really makes them pay for it. I’ve watched him hold his blocks just long enough to convince a safety that he’s going to stay in to block, then he releases into the middle. It’s a nice move, but that’s not when he gets thrown to. I’m pretty sure he has some kind of hypnotic ability to make other players think he’s invisible or something. It’s the only way I can explain it.

Does this team even need wide receivers? Michael Clayton had a nice catch in there and the announcers made a big deal of Antonio Bryant’s only catch. I’m pretty sure Ike Hilliard caught one for a first down like he always does, too. But Smith and Dunn were the leading receivers on the day.

It was a trick question. Yes, they need wide receivers. Eventually other teams are going to stop respecting the wide outs and will concentrate more on the running backs and tight ends. That’s when a couple of these guys will be tested with seven or eight passes thrown their way. Soon, one of them is going to have to come up big to take the pressure off the tight ends.

This is the best game I think a defensive line could have without recording a sack. Jake Delhomme never seemed to get comfortable and they just pushed the Carolina offensive line around the field. The defensive line’s plan may have been to make the pass rush a secondary concern because they sure seemed focused on stopping the run yesterday and guys like Jovan Haye and Kevin Carter each had four tackles. The Panthers had 40 total rushing yards.

Gaines Adams has to still be kicking himself after dropping that easy interception. He didn’t make it on the stat sheet otherwise and got fooled bad by one of Delhomme’s play-action fakes.

In fact, the Bucs dropped four easy interceptions but made two hard ones. Derrick Brooks, Barrett Ruud, Ronde Barber and Adams all could have had relatively easy interceptions.

I understand that, thanks to Chad Johnson and Terrell Owens and all their imitators, celebrations on the field have gotten somewhat out of control and have to be reined in. But if backflips are allowed, I don’t see why Haye can’t do a cartwheel. Just because he went to the ground doesn’t seem like a good enough reason. Hell, he should have been awarded 15 yards just for being able to get his fat ass upside down.

The Bucs linebacking team has got to be one of the best in the league. Brooks and Cato June were anticipating where runs were going to go before the Panthers broke their huddle.

However, Brooks’s illegal contact penalty directly cost the Bucs two points. Jordon Gross had just committed holding in the endzone, which is an automatic safety. Brooks’s penalty offset that.

Tanard Jackson looked like a beast yesterday. The only place I could see where he messed up was when he was caught looking into the backfield and allowed Steve Smith to take an angle on him and leave him behind for a big gain.

In fact, the entire secondary had a great game. Solid tackling, tight coverage… did you see Elbert Mack’s coverage of Smith toward the end of the game? He ran with him step for step but never touched him. It would be easy for a rookie like that to either play too aggressively and get a pass interference call or to play too conservatively to try and avoid the call. Mack seems to have found that balance early.

Son of a bitch, special teams is frustrating. For everything good that happened, there was something that happened later that negated it. Geno Hayes blocks a punt and returns it for a touchdown. Awesome! Dexter Jackson makes an ass of himself again and completely misjudges a punt. Boo! Sabby Piscitelli downs a punt inside the two yard line. Awesome! Maurice Stovall and Storer both get hurt on special teams plays. Boo!

Ok, it’s hard to be mad when you have a blocked punt returned for a touchdown.

This game reminded me a lot of the Panthers game in Carolina last year. Efficient play from Garcia, consistently moving the ball down the field and tight defense. A couple things should be obvious from this game. One is that Jeff Garcia is a better quarterback than Brian Griese. Most of us always knew that. Whereas the team won games despite Griese, Garcia made several positive contributions to this game. The second is that the combination of a run-heavy offense, a good offensive line and Garcia’s ability to make plays is a winner. I don’t give a shit if the team is down in the third quarter… keep running the ball. It works. The per rush average of 3.8 yards isn’t as good as it has been, but it’s it enough to keep the chains moving and will pay off big in the fourth quarters of tight games.