How Committed Were/Are The Glazers To Coach Morris?

With the news breaking yesterday that the Glazers had sat down with Bill Cowher already to "gauge his interest" in coaching the Bucs, it made me want to revisit some thoughts I had almost from the moment that Raheem Morris was hired as head coach. You can take it or leave it but it was my impression from the get go that the Glazers weren't especially committed to Coach Morris and that they weren't looking at him as a long term answer. Of course if he came in and set the world on fire then that's one thing, but if he were just average I think they would have been looking to replace him in a few years. That this season has been a disaster my well have moved up that timeline but its still in the back of my head that maybe this was all preordained anyway. Now I know some folks might scoff at that so I will walk you through my thinking on this.

Lets start with the process of firing Jon Gruden and hiring Coach Morris. I said to more than a few of my friends and ex teammates over the last few years that Coach Gruden and GM Bruce Allen were a package deal. Allen owed Gruden his job as Gruden was the one who basically hired Allen to be his boss after Rich McKay left to go to Atlanta. Now don't get me wrong, winning a Superbowl generally grants a head coach some leeway too. But it was my opinion that Bruce Allen wasn't going to fire Jon Gruden no matter what. And therefore in order for Gruden to be fired the Glazers would also have to fire Allen as well. I for one didn't see that ever happening because the Glazers aren't really "football people". When they bought the Bucs they had the luxury of having one of the most respected GMs in McKay already in place to conduct their search for a head coach. But with no GM in place the Glazers would have had to find both and that just isn't their strong suit.

So lets think back to last January shall we. How did the Glazers get around this problem?

They hired a new GM from within in Mark Dominik who in turn hired a head coach from within in Coach Morris. Pretty neat trick if you ask me. Don't get me wrong, I like Dominik a lot and he has definitely put in the time over there at One Buc working his way all the way up the ladder to get where he is today. But ask yourself a question, when was the last time a first time GM hired a first time head coach for an NFL franchise? And the next question is how many times has that happened within a week of the former head coach and GM being fired?

I'm going to go with never. And lets also keep in mind that the firing of Coach Gruden happened well after most of the other head coaches had been let go. That meant that even with hiring both Dominick and Morris, essentially without looking anywhere else, almost immediately they were still behind on all of the offseason work.

Then there is the matter of the contract that Coach Morris signed. I remembered reading this about his contract and being very concerned.

Morris signed a four-year contract, a pretty big commitment to someone who has never been a head coach at any level. In fact, his only experience as a defensive coordinator came during one season at Kansas State in 2006. The Bucs named him defensive coordinator on Christmas Day, but that was before they fired coach Jon Gruden Friday.

However, there could be some language in the contract that gives the Bucs the ability to terminate or extend the deal after three seasons.

Why exactly in the hell would the Glazers put language into Coach Morris' contract whereby they could terminate it a year early? I could also say why in the hell would Coach Morris sign a contract with such language but I know the answer. He wanted to be a head coach like most coaches want to and he was probably willing to accept something like that in order to be able to show what he can do.

I hate to speculate but you have to wonder if the Bucs inserted that language into the contract because three years out would be one year removed from Gruden's contract coming off the books if he continues to do broadcasting rather than coaching. The Bucs would then would be free to fire Coach Morris if they so chose without worrying about having to pay him. At that point Dominik would have had 3 years worth of seasoning and they would have a clear picture about whether they should keep him on board or find an established head coach who would bring their own GM with them. That is my opinion but you have to admit the pieces fit.

So we have established that hiring Coach Morris and Mark Dominik were probably acts of convenience as much as anything else but what about some of the other moves in the offseason which either blew up or appeared to show a lack of commitment to Coach Morris?

The Coordinators

I realize that lately there has been a lot of speculation about who picked Jeff Jagodzinski and Jim Bates to be the Bucs' offensive and defensive coordinators respectively, and I really don't have any kind of insider information on that. But there are a few things I think should be revisited about the hiring of these two men.

First I think its important that we revisit the offensive coordinator search. Check out this excerpt from a TBO article about one of the early candidates for offensive coordinator, Scott Linehan, and other likely candidates.

MOBILE, Ala. - Former Rams coach Scott Linehan didn't turn down a job with the 49ers just to join the Bucs' staff.

"I just wasn't ready to make a decision at that point," said Linehan, one of the top candidates for the Bucs' offensive coordinator job.

Linehan said personal considerations played a part in his decision. It's unsure whether those considerations will prevent him from taking a job with the Bucs.

"There's a lot that's still up in the air," Linehan said. "I'm just sitting back right now and weighing all my options."

The Bucs are doing the same. They plan to interview several offensive coordinator candidates, including quarterbacks coach Greg Olson.

Other possibilities are Chiefs offensive coordinator Chan Gailey, Browns offensive coordinator Rob Chudzinski and Eagles quarterbacks coach Pat Shurmur.

Notice that you didn't see Jagodzinski's name mentioned anywhere in there? It's worth remembering that he wasn't Coach Morris' first choice and it appears that at least initially he wasn't even in the top 5. Now how he came to be hired in the end I have no idea about. For that matter I don't know that Linehan or any of the other candidates would have come in and had our offense firing on all cylinders. But I don't think any of the initial candidates would have ended up fired just before the season started.

With Jim Bates you could say many of the same things about him not being on the short list initially, but at least he had plenty of NFL experience to point to as a reason to hire him. I know some people keep pointing to some times that Coach Morris has with Bates' family but I am not really buying heavily into that. But I once again want to remind you of how it was explained that Bates came to be the defensive coordinator and what his scheme would look like from the mouth of GM Mark Dominick.

Dominik said the Bucs will maintain a 4-3 base with Bates, but likely will work more blitzes into the one-gap and Tampa 2 packages Morris has been schooled in.

To recap we didn't blitz more, we blitzed less while Bates was still coordinating the defense, and instead of sticking with the one gap scheme that had been so successful here over the years he decided to start two gapping with the interior defensive linemen. Basically Bates did the exact opposite of what Dominik said he would do. I don't pretend to know if Bates misled the Bucs about his intention or if Dominick was just confused about what the plan for the scheme was, but its very obvious that some how some way there was some miscommunication there that led to a catastrophic start to the season for our defense.

At this point both of those guys are out of a job and the defense is playing better and in the last two weeks at least so is our offense. It would appear that firing both guys was the right move at least in the short term, but you have to continue to ask why they were hired to begin with and more to the point why coaches who were higher on the list of candidates decided against coming to Tampa. Did they know something that we didn't back then? I mean Scott Linehan ended up in Detroit for goodness sake.

Player Turnover

Lets look at a list of starters or major contributers from last year who were released or weren't resigned in the offseason.

Derrick Brooks

Cato June

Phillip Buchannan

Jovan Haye

Kevin Carter

Jeff Garcia

Warrick Dunn

Alex Smith

Ike Hilliard

Joey Galloway

Matt Bryant

Luke McCown

That's a total of 12 guys who either started or were big time contributors to the team last year. And how many guys did we bring in via free agency or a trade? A grand total of 3, Byron Leftwich, Derrick Ward, and Kellen Winslow Jr. Does that math add up to anyone else?

They lost 5 starters, including Buchannan who was at least the starter in nickel, on defense. Who did they bring in? NOBODY!

They jettisoned to of their most consistent wide receivers, who did they bring in? NOBODY!

They cut one of the most consistent kickers in team history for a guy who made more money and sucked.

And they even cut Luke McCown who may not be a world beater but at least was athletic enough to make plays with his feet and familiar enough with Gruden's playbook that he could have run it once offensive coordinator Greg Olsen took over for Jagodzinski. Instead we went with Byron Leftwich who while he might be a great teammate, and he does have a strong arm, couldn't avoid a pass rush to save his life.

Are those the kinds of moves that you would say owners would make when they are committed to their head coach?

Having said all that I fully admit that there are moves that Coach Morris made this year that I didn't agree with and didn't think were right. I am not absolving him of any and all responsibility. Being 3-12 is a record that he has to wear because he has earned it. But I grow tired of the talk of him being in over his head. I don't hear that kind of talk when you mention Steve Spagnulo who had the defensive coordinator experience that folks keep pointing out Coach Morris doesn't have and is still getting his ass handed to him on a daily basis as head coach of the Rams. Likewise I don't hear that kind of talk about former long time Titans defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz even as his Detroit Lions get the hell beaten out of them every week. So why does Coach Morris get painted with that brush?

I am sure some of you will say that the Bucs aren't the Rams or the Lions as far as talent level, but have you checked our roster lately? The Bucs have exactly one guy who has made the Pro Bowl on defense, Ronde Barber. We have exactly two guys on offense who have made the Pro Bowl in Davin Joseph and Kellen Winslow. On paper at least are we really that much better than the Rams or the Lions? I don't think so. Yet Coach Morris is "over his head" because he doesn't have the experience that those other two coaches have whose teams have worse records than the Bucs?

The truth is, I shouldn't have to be the one pointing that out. Mark Dominik or the Glazers should have been out there make a statement early this morning affirming their support of Coach Morris in light of the big win and in light of the rumors about Bill Cowher, and making the same point that I did. But instead you get nothing but quiet and an off the record denial. This isn't meant to be a justification of Coach Morris keeping his job, after all it IS the Glazer's team and they can do with it what the please. But this is meant to connect some dots that some people may have missed or forgotten.

Its up to you now to decide whether you think the Glazers were ever committed to Coach Morris or if they were using him as a hold over from the start. I already know my thoughts on the matter and I think I have made them very apparent.

What say you?

What Chris Hovan Said

"The old defense is out-dated and didn't work,'' Hovan said. "This defense is what it is, it's true. It's physical. It's violent, it's fast. It's Tampa 2. It's what this city has been raised on.

"You could just tell the swagger is coming back to this defense, the way we approach the game, the way we study, the way we take the field. There's a different swagger and it comes into play...We're not running the old defense against these guys, we're running the Tampa 2. We're about to find out how good we are. When we played them in the past and played this defense against them, we've been successful. Not to say that we're going to be successful, but we have a lot of confidence when we run this defense.''

Those are the words of Bucs starting defensive tackle Chris Hovan. And judging by the paraphrasing in the title "Hovan: The old (Jim Bates) defense is "outdated and didn't work.'" I am pretty sure that it will be played up as a shot at defrocked defensive coordinator Jim Bates. And who knows, maybe it was. But I am here to tell you that there is plenty of truth in what he said.

At the beginning of this season I started off with several complaints about this defense in general and in the defensive line set up in particular. Everyone on our defensive line started the year with their outside hand down. This was, in my opinion, crazy. Slowly but surely this changed as the season wore on. Another complaint that I had was that we never lined up our weak tackle over the center which made it easier to run in the A gaps. This never changed until Coach Morris took over calling the defense. I also complained that we never ran any under defense which would take advantage of Quincy Black's skills more. Again, this never changed until Coach Morris took over pay calling duties. And last but not least we were running so much bump man coverage in early downs that we were routinely getting bombed on almost every single game. And yet again, this did not change until Coach Morris took over.

Nothing Hovan said was factually wrong, and if you recall I was one of the few who was excited right off the bat when they announced before the Atlanta game that we were going back to our "Tampa 2" scheme (which incidentally is a lot more than just playing Tampa 2 every play). What I hope is that nobody takes what he says and tries to twist it and use it against him. I have seen and heard a bunch of clowns taking shots at Hovan over, of all the silly shit in the world, him painting his face with eyeblack recently. Something he has been doing practically his whole career. I mean here is a guy who has performed well since he has been here, has been a model citizen, never said or done anything remotely controversial since his arrival, and people are taking shots at him now over bullshit. And that is why it concerns me that this will get blown out of proportion in one way or another. All Hovan did was speak the truth and something that most Bucs fans themselves probably said a time or two this season. Maybe he shouldn't have come out and said it right now considering their record and how the season has gone, but I personally don't find anything wrong with it. Aren't fans always saying they want people to tell them the truth anyway?

It is what it is.

New Post Up At JoeBucsFan

My new post is up over at joebucsfan.com. Please go over and let me know what you think.

The Difference

I have to keep saying this, this blog was meant to be pretty much a hobby of mine. I had no reason to believe anybody would care about what I had to say about sports in general and the Bucs in particular. So the interest that I have drawn truly humbles me.

Having said that, there are some fans who think that I have some kind of ulterior motives. I have a feeling that they aren't feeling what I say on this blog because for the most part I give substantive critiques instead of broad (and usually wrong) generalizations. See when you speak in specifics a lot of the times the media narratives they normally hear don't fit. So all of a sudden I am covering for the defensive line or I am just trying to get some notoriety when the truth is like I said before this was all a hobby for me.

But here is the thing, I haven't actually been factually wrong about anything all year. I know this because I actually watch and rewatch all the Bucs games before I decide to offer my assessment. I highly doubt any of the chattering classes around here do that listening and reading some of what they have to say. If they do then either they don't really know football or they are intentionally misleading their fans in order to further some other agenda.

However this blog is about what God loves, the truth. Doesn't matter really to me if people believe me or not, like I told a commenter yesterday all I can do is argue with facts. After I do that I can't make anyone accept those facts but at least I will have exposed them to them.

Now here is the narrative you will hear all week about the Bucs. That they are in disarray after essentially firing Jim Bates. That they never gave Bates the players he needed for his defensive scheme. That we really don't have any play makers on defense. And that this change won't really make much of a difference.

So here is what I think about those memes. First of all, yes firing both the offensive and defensive coordinators in the same season is a bad sign. I can't defend it and I don't know that anyone should. But I will say this, something had to give. And honestly, although I would never call for Bates to be fired I would almost bet that the only reason he lasted this long was because the Bucs didn't want to fire him after firing their OC Jeff Jadgozinski right before the season started. Whether this means the team is in disarray will be seen in the final games.

As for not providing Bates the players he needed, yeah I have said for the past few weeks that what we brought in here in the draft this year versus what Bates said he needed for his defense did not line up. Neither did trying to switch Jermaine Phillips from safety to outside linebacker. But here is my thing on that, as a coordinator you have to be able to adjust your scheme to the players you have, especially in the pros. Every year people lose big time players on offense and defense. So lets imagine for a second that the Bucs brought in two big tackles and two big linebackers to fit Bates scheme. What happens if those guys get hurt during the middle of the season? The NFL is set up where you are only going to have so many big time guys because of the salary cap. If your coordinator on offense or defense can't adjust their scheme to their talent level then you will always be one or two injuries away from disaster.

As for talent level I will say again that we have enough talent to win. Not all of the guys on our defense are guys I personally think would be starters in the NFL but that doesn't mean we can't win with them. Lets take a trip down memory lane. In the year the Bucs won the Superbowl one of their starters and best players on defense, Booger McFarland, got hurt. We had to go down the stretch run through the playoffs and into the Superbowl with a guy most people never heard of, Chartric "Chuck" Darby, as our starting nose tackle. Here was a guy who wasn't drafted and had played in the World League before signing with the Bucs. And yet he still played well and we did go on that run and we did win the Superbowl.

It ain't always about the big name guys. Its about how they fit in your scheme.

As for whether this will make a change on defense, absolutely it will. The one thing that I am worried about the calls Coach Morris will make at crucial times. I haven't seen him in that situation so I am not sure how that will go. But I am telling you right here and now that our defense will show a marked improvement on Sunday against the Falcons if they truly go back to our old scheme with the weak tackle lined up over the center and at times running an under defense with Quincy Black on the line over the tight end. If you see those things happening on Sunday you will see our stats improve. Basically the thing about it is there were small adjustments Bates had every opportunity to make all year but never made them.

I know most sports pundits around here won't take the time out to actually attempt to explain what the specific problems on our defense were, but I don't work that way. I am not just going to say this group or that group is the problem or this player or that player is the problem...unless they ARE the problem. I will give you one prime example in closing.

Today on the radio I heard some very popular sports guys say, loudly, that the Bucs didn't have any hurries against the Saints. Now I like both of the guys who said this but that doesn't mean they know what they are talking about. The Bucs actually had 6 hurries. First let me make sure you know what a hurry is. A hurry is when someone hits or gets close to hitting a quarterback which either makes him throw the ball away or affects the throw and ends up in an incomplete pass. The truth is we could have had a couple of other hurries but for the fact that Brees still found a way to complete the pass even with someone bearing down on them.

As for the hurries we did have, Greg (Stylez) White had 3, one of them on a great spin move when he hit Brees right in the kisser. Jimmy Wilkerson had 2, one of them on a 3rd and 5 in the first half when he was rushing the guard and made a really nice rip move. And Roy Miller had 1 where he beat a double team on an early down and got right in Brees' face.

Now would I have liked to have had more hurries? Hell yes. I would have also liked to have some sacks too. But still you have to admit that 6 is a lot more than 0. And for someone who wants to argue with me that we didn't have any hurries they are going to have facts.

*Kanye Shrug*

Anyway, I advise all Bucs fan to at least stay on board or get back on board for this weekend and check the defense out against Atlanta. I am not saying we will win, and I am not saying we will be perfect. But what I AM saying is that you should see a noticeable improvement.

It is what it is.

The Axe Has Fallen

Tampa Bay Buccanneers Defensive Coordinator Jim Bates has been relieved of his coaching duties.

From Tampabay.com

TAMPA -- Saddled with the worst run defense in the NFL and a 1-9 record, coach Raheem Morris decided Monday night to relieve Jim Bates as defensive coordinator and take over the defensive play-calling duties.

Bates, 63, will remain with the team at least through the end of the season in a consulting role, breaking down film and helping Morris on game day from the coaching box.

Morris is expected to immediately return the Bucs' to their Tampa Two scheme, which will allow their undersized defensive linemen to take advantage of their quickness rather than penalize them for a lack of size.

Morris and general manager Mark Dominik met until late Monday to discuss the organizational shift, one day after the Bucs were routed by the unbeaten New Orleans Saints 38-7, one of the worst home defeats in club history.

Under Bates, Tampa Bay's defense is ranked 26th overall in the NFL and last against the run, allowing 168.9 yards per game. Only the Detroit Lions have given up more points than the 29.4 per game allowed by the Bucs this season.

Believe it or not I am torn about this. You see while I disagreed with a lot Bates had done during this season, I also realize just how big of a deal it is for a coach to get fired. Coaching in the NFL or on the college level is a very nomadic lifestyle. People get hired and fired so much these days after awhile some coaches don't even have their family's fully unpack until a few years into their contract. Bates won't be leaving immediately but obviously he won't be here after the season is over with and that means unless he retires which is doubtful that he and his family will have to move yet again. Its another reason why coaching is so hard on marriages and parenting.

On the other side of the coin our defense just wasn't getting it done and as I have said many times on this blog, it was the scheme that was killing us. Now I wouldn't expect us to come out and play like the 1994 Dallas Cowboys but I would almost guarantee that the defense will perform markedly better this Sunday when they go back to playing the kind of run defense we have played around here for more than a decade prior to this year. I am not sure if Raheem is going to have a declared undertackle but just without thinking it through I personally would love to see him have Hovan go to the strong side every play so he is always in a position to pass rush and have Sims with his big body always on the center and then have Miller spell both of them at times.

Now Stroud in his article takes a few shots at the defense by saying they don't have many play makers. I respectfully disagree. I would look for Hovan, White, Talib, Black, Jackson, and Ruud to look a lot better this Sunday and make the kind of plays fans have been hoping for all year.

Oh and for all of the haters who thought I was talking out of my ass or that I was "trying to get paid" as one message boarder commented, what do you have to say now?

One Game Evaluation Of Ndamukong Suh

While reading several Tampa Bay Buccaneers message boards and blogs this year I have seen time and again different fans saying that we should select Nebraska defensive lineman Ndamukong Suh with our first round pick. Now I will tell you up front that I am not one of those guys who breaks down the upcoming drafts round by round and tries to be a mini Mel Kiper. What I can do however is look at different players and assess their talent level and how it might transfer to the NFL, especially defensive linemen. So I decided to take a look and the young Mr. Suh and see what all the fuss was about.

Now I actually took a look at Suh earlier in the year when Nebraska played Baylor. In all honesty I didn't come away all that impressed but I figured maybe it had to do with the level of competition. Considering the fact that Kansas State is a pretty good team that was still in contention for a bowl game last night I expected to have a truer picture of him as a player. So I DVRed the game and went back last night and did a play by play evaluation of Suh. Now this is still just one game and for all I know he could play better or worse in any other given game, but I just want to put that caveat out there.

The first thing I want to point out is that the announcers for last night's game were having an absolute love fest over Suh. I am not sure I have ever seen a situation where what the announcers were saying were so out of touch with what was actually going on on the field. Its not that Suh had a bad game, he actually had a pretty good game. But what he didn't have was some kind of super human game like they were trying to make it out. It got so irritating to me that after awhile I had to turn the sound off. I will say this though, whomever Suh has doing his PR should be on every college player's speed dial.

Here are the stats as I recorded them from last night's game. He played 72 snaps including penalty plays. He had 6 solo tackles 2 assisted tackles and 1 sack. He also had to passes knocked down. On the down side I was generous by only giving him 3 loafs* and he had one missed tackle.

Here are my general thoughts about Suh.

This is a guy who is obviously strong and fast in a straight line but not all that physically imposing. His 6 foot 4 frame looks taller but he by his own admission is not 300 pounds. To me he looks like a guy who could stay where he is at weight wise and be a decent to better than average 3-4 end, or maybe take off about 10 pounds and be a 4-3 left end. He has long arms and he plays with pretty good leverage. When he wants to he shows flashes of having pass rush moves but at least for last night at least, they were few and far in between. He is obviously fast for a guy that size as he ran down several plays from behind. But he also is prone to taking plays off if the action isn't close to him. In a lot of ways I think playing beside Jared Crick may open him up to some criticisms about his effort as teams begin to break him down on film. I don't think Crick is near the athlete but he seems to go harder play in and play out.

There are a few things that I saw last night that would have me leaning away from drafting Suh in the top 10 picks in the first round as a 4-3 defensive tackle. For one I didn't see that explosive get off that you would like to have from your defensive lineman. Some of that is a function of the kind of defense Nebraska plays where their tackles aren't in very wide alignments most of the time. But even when he did get the opportunity to get in the gap and get off I just didn't see that explosive first step. I also did not see any consistent pass rush moves. That's not to say he can't be a great college pass rusher because he surely has been. But when you get to the NFL level just being bigger and faster than most of the guys blocking you won't be enough. Time after time I have seen big athletic guys get drafted and end up being busts because they didn't have any moves. Make no mistake about it, in the NFL defensive linemen, aside from the occasional 3-4 nose tackle, are judged by their ability to sack the quarterback. And I am just not sure Suh will come in and be able to do that, at least from the defensive tackle position. And with a top 10 pick you really want a guy, aside from a quarterback, who can come in and be productive from day one.

Last night I counted at least 6 times where Kansas State single blocked Suh on a pass and he got locked up. I counted at least 7 other times when he didn't even bother to make a pass rush move. He has a tendency to kind of drift all over the field and then if he sees the quarterback scramble try to take off and tackle him then. Now that is perfectly fine for college football but its something you can't do on a regular basis in the NFL.

Let me heavily caveat this assessment. Suh is without a doubt very athletic. For all I know he will go to the Senior Bowl and tear it up there and show the pass rush moves he isn't showing in games. And he might go to the combine, run a 4.7 and bench press 225 lbs 40 times. In that case most teams, probably including the Bucs, will feel compelled to take him in the top 10 or maybe even the top 5 regardless of what they have seen on film. And honestly the guy, where ever he gets drafted, may come into the league and get with a really good defensive line coach who teaches him moves and motivates him to play hard every play and he ends up tearing the league up. But as for me I have always been the type to judge a guy most heavily by how he plays on film. How tall, big, fast, strong, or well spoken are all secondary to me when it comes to evaluating talent. And from what I saw last night and in part of the Baylor game Suh is not a guy who is going to come in and tear it up as a defensive tackle in a 4-3.

Just to give you a comparison, in the one season I worked as a graduate assistant at USF coaching the defensive ends, we happened to earn our first bowl bid in school history. That of course was the good news. The bad news however was that we would be playing North Carolina State. At the time NC State almost literally had an NFL defensive line, with Manny Lawson and Mario Williams playing defensive end. I hadn't really seen them play that year so I decided to sit in with the offensive coaches one day just to check out their defensive line. Mario Williams sold me in that one day of watching film that he should be taken with the first pick in the draft. The guy was huge with long arms but he wasn't fat at all. As a matter of fact as I said at the time he really just looked like a regular sized linebacker just blown up to about 6 ft 6. But what was most impressive about him at the time was his range of pass rush moves. I mean this guy was knocking hands down, doing rip moves, doing arm overs. Hell he even broke out a spin move a couple of times. He was literally unblockable and NC State moved him all around the defensive line. There wasn't a position he couldn't pass rush from and I mean in a dominant way.

I simply don't see that when I watch Ndamankuh Suh. I see a guy who is athletic and strong and can make plays when he wants to. But I don't see dominance jumping off the screen where you just can't take your eyes off that guy.

Now another major reason why I am not sold on the Bucs selecting Suh is that the design of their defense is such right now that he doesn't really fit what they are looking for inside. If you look at Jim Bates' years at Miami which is what people bring up when they defend his scheme, what he had there was two really really big tackles who were essentially no name guys but could attract double teams. If you know who Larry Chester and Tim Bowens are more power to you, but I doubt most people do. And neither of those guys were top 10 picks I might add.

Here is what Bates had on that defense. He had two tremendously gifted pass rushers at defensive end in Adewale Ogunleye and Jason Taylor. He had two tremendously gifted physical cover corners in Sam Madison and Patrick Surtain. He had a ball hawking safety in Brock Marion. And he had very physical and fast linebackers in Zack Thomas, Marlion Greenwood and Derrick Rodgers.

Interestingly enough, none of his linebackers were much bigger than the guys we have now. However I will say that they came down hill a lot more than we do now against the run.

But I digress.

The point is, if we are going to draft a defensive tackle high I would rather see us go after Mount Cody out of Alabama as he is a big guy who will demand a double team and keep offensive lineman off our linebackers. But you don't draft a guy like Cody that high. You wait till later rounds and find him or a guy like him and plug him in. If we are going to be picking in the top 10 I still think we would be much better off picking a defensive back or a linebacker or maybe even a pass rushing defensive end. Those are the guys who are expected to make big plays in Bates' defense and so those are the guys we should put a premium on finding.

Ndamakong Suh may make sense for a lot of teams to take that high, but I just don't see how he fits in here.

* A loaf is a term most coaches use to grade a player down on their effort. When a player either is not busting their but to the ball or there is a noticeable change in speed during their pursuit to the ball then they are given a loaf because the coaches expected better. Suh doesn't come out of the game and plays a lot of plays, I will give him that. However there were quite a few times where it appeared he wasn't busting his tail to get to the ball. Because looks can be decieving I tried not to give him a loaf unless it was just blatant, but if I was actually his coach I probably would have given him several more.