After a strong start last season, Bobby Rainey had just two carries in Tampa Bay’s final six games.

Doug Martin got healthy. Charles Sims was force fed, and Rainey was buried. (more…)

Newsflash: The Bucs’ pass rush was to football what Rosie O’Donnell is to beauty.

Watching opposing quarterbacks clip their fingernails before throwing a pass made Joe want to toss his lunch just as much as when that thing O’Donnell accidentally happens upon Joe’s TV screen (until Joe rapidly grabs the remote). (more…)

Start your day with the Morning Cup of Joe from HootersCalendar.com. And don’t forget to visit HootersCalendar.com for the 2015 calendar, amazing videos, pictures and cool gifts. It’s Joe’s second favorite website.

Bucs news forthcoming.

NFL says Greg Hardy can sign a contract. [NFL]

Naturally, Darnell Dockett runs smack after signing with 49ers. [BSPN]

Fugitive taunts sheriff on Facebook gets locked up (includes mugshot goodness). [KEYETV]

Does size matter enough to get a divorce? [Daily News]

Yunel Escobar was PO’ed the Rays traded him. [RaysIndex]

There are unwritten rules when you’re the face of the franchise, which Jameis Winston is telling everyone he wants to be.

These rules, well, they go beyond the playbook. (more…)

In many ways, Tampa Bay’s 2014 season was more bizarre than the MRSA-infected, quarterback-gone-mental, Fire-Schiano-billboards campaign of 2013.

There were plenty of real Bucs mysteries last year, and Joe’s revisiting the most interesting of the bunch. (more…)

Often heard this time of year is the draft-the-best-player-available cliché. (more…)

Man, Joe sure will have a great lunch today at Pete & Shorty’s in Clearwater. Check out the menu.

Oh, boy.

Joe sure hopes Lovie Smith doesn’t repeat the stunt he pulled with veteran cornerback Mike Jenkins last year. (more…)

Chucky weighs in

Joe wonders if you can remember the Bucs once had a defense that was boastful, proud, brash and, oh yeah, could — in the immortal words of Mike Ditka — knock the snot out of you.

Yet the team floundered in the playoffs. Could rarely score. That’s when a young, offensive hotshot by the name of Chucky came in. (more…)

One of Jason Licht’s great finds is now on the free market. And he’s headed to Tampa to visit, says BSPN.

Joe wrote earlier about yet another potential angle the Bucs could pursue to cut the snaps of ghostly and ghastly defensive end Michael Johnson.

But what about Trent Cole, who fell victim to the Philly wackiness since Chip Kelly got control of the Eagles’ personnel? (more…)

After a shadowy 2014 season, it is dangerous to bank any hopes on ghostly DE Michael Johnson.

It really is so, so sad that an NFL team cannot find a consistent defensive end since potential Hall of Fame candidate Simeon Rice left its squad. That’s nine years, folks.

And when it looked like they finally found a strong defensive end, they let him walk away for no good reason (Michael Bennett). (more…)

Start your day with the Morning Cup of Joe from HootersCalendar.com. And don’t forget to visit HootersCalendar.com for the 2015 calendar, amazing videos, pictures and cool gifts. It’s Joe’s second favorite website.

Bucs news forthcoming.

Troy Polamalu’s days with the Steelers are done. [NFL]

Greg Hardy still in NFL limbo. [BSPN]

Unusual move by Bucs. (Thanks Cork!) [Business Insider]

TV news reporter thrown off by being called a “hamburglar.” [TheBigLead]

Merlot Joe became too much of a circus with the Rays. [RaysIndex]

A new interview with Lovie Smith appears to show the Bucs head coach has a preference when it comes to a potential No. 1 pick who plays quarterback. (more…)

Marcus Mariota’s biggest learning curve?

It’s going to be hard to avoid a train wreck of a season from a Tampa Bay Buccaneers rookie quarterback in 2015. (more…)

The Bucs have sunk so low it is a crime to buy tickets for your neighbors in Hernando County. Well, sort of.

A Good Samaritan trying to be be a nice guy apparently has turned his neighbors against him. Surprisingly, the Bucs are in the middle of this friends-turned-criminals spat.

A Spring Hill man decided to buy his neighbors Bucs tickets. Maybe for a late Christmas present or a birthday present or just being neighborly. A kind gesture, right? (more…)

Fresh action on the NFL trade and free agency front is hurting the trade value and options for former Bucs “quarterback of the future” Mike Glennon. (more…)

Photo courtesy of Buccaneers.com.

So it is clear the Bucs have a frontrunner for their No. 1 overall selection in the NFL draft come April 30. It’s easy to conclude it’s Jameis Winston.

Yesterday, the Bucs hosting Winston at One Buc Palace got so much run, and the Bucs pimped the visit so much, it nearly pushed aside Israeli prime minster Bibi Netanyahu’s landmark speech before a joint session of Congress. (more…)