“Woeful Effort” On Special Teams
August 18th, 2015
Rough start for Kevin O’Dea’s special teams
Tampa Bay’s lone Hall of Fame voter, eye-RAH! Kaufman, aka The Custodian of Canton, dropped the hammer on the Bucs’ special teams yesterday.
It seems Kaufman had little use for Saturday’s night’s poor punt coverage, sloppy tackling, missed field goal and rookie returner Kaelin Clay, who Joe almost started calling “Wrong Way.”
“Coach Lovie Smith called out Tampa Bay’s special teams Monday, two days after a woeful effort in the preseason opening loss at Minnesota,” Kaufman wrote for TBO.com
“I thought we hit a couple of decent punts the other day,’’ [Lovie] Smith said, “but that phase of the game hasn’t been exactly what we wanted it to be.’’
What about the return game?
“That’s something we’ll continue to work on,’’ said Smith. “We need to get more than we’ve gotten. The last game was average at best.’’
Yes, it was a rough opener for special teams.
Joe found it interesting that Lovie said yesterday that Bobby Rainey “can always return punts for us.” Well, then why didn’t he get a real shot to win the job last year?
Joe talked to starting linebacker and special teamer Danny Lansanah on the preseason opener and he didn’t show much concern. He called the unit very devoted and explained to Joe that special teams coach Kevin O’Dea challenged the unit last year to spend 10 minutes daily working together before or after practice without coaches. It was a “challenge,” not an order.
The group met the goal last year, Lansanah said, and it extended into training camp 2015.
“We’ll clean it up,” Lansanah said.
August 18th, 2015 at 10:12 am
Fire Rick Scott!!!!!!!!!!
August 18th, 2015 at 10:22 am
The unit is weak. We need an overhaul. Bobby Rainey in at punt return is a good use of existing personnel. I have more faith in him then rookie Clay. Seems like daily punt returns are in order–BR against the whole team–LOL!, the 10 minute self modules aren’t cutting it.
August 18th, 2015 at 10:22 am
There is another thing for Winston to get use to. Bad field position. How often does this team get the ball past the 11 or 12 yard line? At least with Dotson out maybe we will save on the flags backwards.
August 18th, 2015 at 10:23 am
The Buc Bald Look!!!…..Lovie, Bajakian, O’Dea
August 18th, 2015 at 10:28 am
Let’s not call them special teams at this time. There is nothing special about it. The Bucs special teams always has the look of practice squad on game day. The return man is generally not even capable of making the starting offense. So why would you expect them to be able to produce any threat on the return game. Every time any decent field position is made on the return there’s a flag thrown 99/9% time. As a Bucs fan its almost like your just waiting for it.
This will be a huge factor for Winston on every starting offensive possession. Preseason was just the tip of the iceberg.
August 18th, 2015 at 10:38 am
Bald Brotherhood!
August 18th, 2015 at 10:45 am
Another abject failure by Incompetent Lovie Smith. This guy ran the worst special teams unit in football and his good buddy Lovie says “hey, great job Kevin. I want you back here next year to help our special teams unit lead the race to the bottom of the barrel”!
August 18th, 2015 at 10:59 am
were a two and whatever team..hopefully Lovies last year
August 18th, 2015 at 11:08 am
I hope they can correct it.
The punt coverage unit was about as bad as it gets
August 18th, 2015 at 12:03 pm
I here you Dallas,but man his special teams unit with the other gig were top notch. I’ll give him a little more time to get this unit up to par.
August 18th, 2015 at 12:04 pm
But truth be told they were atrocious on Saturday..
August 18th, 2015 at 1:09 pm
Maybe they mean Special as in Olympics