Bucs defensive coordinator Bill Sheridan explained what went wrong

Within 10 minutes of the final whistle Sunday, Joe had already deatailed the struggles and bang-your-head-against-a-wall use of the three-man rush against the Saints.

It didn’t work, and the Bucs were burned repeatedly. In a candid moment yesterday at One Buc Palace, Bucs defensive coordinator Bill Sheridan laid out what was going wrong.

“They blocked us up,” Sheridan said of the Saints offensive line.

“We weren’t able to pressure [Brees] well enough on three where he was going to throw on timing. In my mind, and it’s easy to say this after the fact watching the film, when he felt it was a three-man rush, he held on to the ball and waited for the down-the-field routes to get open. And even though we had eight guys back there and the windows were very, very small, he still fired it in there and hit, you know, 10-to-15 yard hits on those. And, so yeah, shoulda, woulda, coulda, throw the house at him and at least the ball’s going to come out sooner and the issue will be declared early in the down. You know what I mean? So, yeah, some of those definitely backfired on us.”

Joe appreciates Sheridan’s detailed breakdown. Jimminy Christmas! That three-man rush must have smelled like fresh-baked doughnuts to Brees, and it wasn’t just “10-to-15 yard hits” Brees was nailing down field.

To be fair, Brees is Brees, and there’s no great way to stop him if you can’t generate a pass rush. The Bucs didn’t do that with four men on Sunday.

Oh, how Joe longs for Jenny Dell to return to ESPN and break down all the statistical nonsense associated with Bucs games every week. She’s been gone for almost two years and Joe still hasn’t gotten over it.

Dell would have had a field day with the sad odds for the Bucs tomorrow night in Minnesota, per the Star-Tribune. Home teams on Thursday Night Football are winning at better than a three-out-of-four clip historically.

Thursday night home-field dominance is nothing new. Going back to last season, home teams are 13-4 on Thursday nights. That’s a .760 winning percentage compared to a .615 winning percentage (64-40) enjoyed by home teams overall this season. 

In a league of parity, a seemingly small thing such as a condensed schedule favors the home team.

It’s time to get a little loud and bond with your fellow Bucs fans while watching the New Schiano Order Bucs in Minnesota tomorrow night at Tilted Kilt in Clearwater.

This is going to be the place to be for this game. The Bucs on Thursday Night Football!!

Tilted Kilt has it all, indoor and outdoor seating, great food, the sizzling Kilt girls, a classy layout, and great viewing. The game audio will be heard everywhere, and Joe’s got lots of jerseys and hats to giveaway. There’s nothing better than the energy of a great sports bar scene rocking for the home team. Be there!

If anyone thought stud Vikings running back Adrian Peterson was washed up after an ugly knee injury last year, well, Peterson put all of that to rest by racking up 153 yards last week against Arizona.

Vikings coach Leslie Frazier had a hunch before the game that Peterson had overcome the hump of rehabilitation, writes Brian Murphy of the St. Paul Pioneer-Press.

Frazier looked him in the eyes and realized his superstar was not just physically ready to shoulder the offensive burden against a tough defense but confident he would get the job done.

The resulting 153 yards on 23 carries in Minnesota’s 21-14 victory Sunday, Oct. 21, validated the run-heavy strategy and signaled Peterson has graduated from recovery to the next phase of his career following Dec. 30 reconstructive knee surgery.

“I really believed that we were going to need him to have a big game for us and he said, ‘Coach, I’m ready. If that’s what you feel like we need to do, give me more carries, whatever, I’ll be ready,’ ” Frazier recounted Tuesday. “Then he had a great practice on Friday. The way he moved I knew what he said was not telling me something I wanted to here. And then he went out and played that way, and we needed to have that type of game.”

This is the daunting task the Bucs face tomorrow night at the big baggie in the northlands, the Minneapolis Metrodome (Joe knows it’s called something else these days; some non-descript,forgettable corporate name).

The Bucs are stingy against the run. Peterson makes defenses look like fools. Something has to give.

This just might be an old-fashioned cat-and-mouse game: Keep the ball out of Josh Freeman’s hands by pounding the ball with Peterson.

But if the Bucs can contain him, the ball will be in Freeman’s hands much more often.

This type of drama is why a higher authority invented beer.

Even Vikings quarterback Christian Ponder’s girlfriend, cutie ESPN sideline princess Samantha Steele, is stunned to learn Adam Schein would prefer her beau to quarterback his team over Bucs signal-caller Josh Freeman.

Joe has heard some wild tales in his life, but the following is right up there with the best.

As regular readerd here know, Joe loves — loves! — SiriusXM NFL Radio. Joe may listen to that station more than he watches the NFL Network, which is saying something.

Monday when discussing the previous day’s games, the subject of Vikings quarterback Christian Ponder came up (and no, it had nothing to do with the tryst he is currently involved in with ESPN hottie college football reporter Samantha Steele).

Ponder had a rare day Sunday in which he threw for a grand total of 58 yards, and won. This provoked popular sports radio personality Adam Schein, who co-hosts “The Blitz” with Rich Gannon, to invoke Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman’s name in the discussion.

(And no, Steele’s name still didn’t come up.)

“Rich, yesterday, Josh Freeman throws for 420 yards and three touchdowns,” Schein said. “If I had to pick right now who was quarterbacking my team, Christian Ponder or Josh Freeman, I’d have to pick Christian Ponder.”

Gannon, a big Freeman fan, seemed to be at a loss for words right away, but admitted it’s an interesting choice, though he is still a Freeman guy and he also thought Ponder will continue to grow as a starting NFL quarterback.

The key with Ponder, Schein pointed out, is he wins, despite pedestrian statistics.

Ponder and the Vikings are currently 5-2 and have their eyes set on a sprint for a postseason berth. The Bucs are 2-4 and staring at 2-5 with an always difficult Thursday road game in a stadium the Vikings have yet to lose in this season. If those trends continue, next spring’s draft will become a popular subject around the greater Tampa Bay area.

Joe brought Schein’s thoughts up for discussion with Ponder during a conference call Tuesday with the pen and mic club.

Adam Schein

“That’s one guy’s opinion,” Ponder said, sort of dismissing Schein’s thoughts. “I think Josh Freeman is a very good player. He was a first round pick a couple of years ago. I know him. He’s extremely talented and a good guy and works hard. To throw for over 400 yards and three touchdowns, yeah, it was a loss, but that’s playing at a high level. He’s going to be a quarterback in this league for a long time.”

Now Joe knows where Schein is coming from, sort of the Chris “Mad Dog” Russo of sports philosophy. Wins trump stats. Sort of like the banter of comparing Brad Johnson to Jeff George. Johnson won and has a ring to prove it; George had mind-boggling stats but few wins.

Still, despite Ponder’s eye for talent, Joe would take Freeman, who has much more of a body of work than Ponder.

If Joe’s readers would like to share their thoughts on Schein’s choice in quarterbacks, feel free to call “The Blitz” at 1-877-NFL-KICK between 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

With controversy swirling over the head of Bucs coach Greg Schiano in certain NFL cirlces, first over his kneel-down defense and now his field goal defense, Schiano is receiving public support from an unlikely source: Joe Theismann.

The Super Bowl-winning quarterback for the Redskins and popular NFL analyst had Schiano’s back when he appeared on the “Ron and Ian Show” today on WDAE-AM 620.

“I don’t have a problem,” Theismann said. “Our league continues to evolve from coaches and situations and to try to do something different. If you look at the victory formation, Herm Edwards’ play looms in everyone’s mind. You never know what is going to happen and it put everyone on alert: That when you play the Tampa Bay Buccaneers you will play to the last snap.

“Greg is going to find there are certain things that will be accepted and not be penalized for and some things you are going to want to do and realize, ‘I can’t do that.’ He’s not alien to professional football. “

Theismann then went on to say many of the plays and formations that are common in the NFL today were hatched plans as experiments by NFL coaches not that long ago, and what Schiano is doing is no different. As for his dust-up with Giants headmaster Tom Coughlin, Theismann said, “Coaches are always going after each other and that is not going to change.”

To hear the full interview, click on the little arrow below.

“No. he doesn’t [look a step slower], just as violent as he was before he got hurt, as far as the type of runner he is. He looks like he would prefer to run through guys, not necessarily over ’em, but run through tackles. He can make you miss, as you know, and run away from you as well. But, yeah, he looks as good as I’ve seen him.” — Bucs defensive coordinator Bill Sheridan on Vikings RB Adrian Peterson today.

The Bucs allow 3.1 yards per carry, best in the NFL.

Peterson is averaging 4.8 yards per carry and has 652 rushing yards and 22 receptions in seven games.

This should be a hell of a lot of fun to watch.

On a tight, shortened preparation schedule this week with a Thursday night game, it seems the Bucs defense will rely more than ever before on the watchful eyes of Butch Davis.

The former Cowboys defensive line coach, and former Cleveland Browns, Miami Hurricanes and University of North Carolina head coach, is a major force in the defensive planning each week and surely came to the table with all the ins and outs on how to stop the Vikings’ Christian Ponder.

Defensive coordinator Bill Sheridan explained today at One Buc Palace.

“He’s around all the time,” Sheridan said of Davis. “He watches a ton of film of our upcoming opponent. He’s almost from a film study standpoint, he’s almost like an advance scout. Even before we’re ready to move on to the next game, he’s already looked at three or four games of the upcoming opponent. He does a great job of really analyzing the upcoming quarterbacks we’re playing, and how they move in the pocket, how they scramble, where they like to throw the ball to, what kind of playactions. He does a great job of that. And these are all things he’s done in the past at other places and he shares them with us.

“He’s in a majority of our defensive meetings in the early part of the week when we’re digesting the film and putting together the plan. Yes, so he’s a tremendous resource and has been very helpful.” 

Joe’s not sure what this all means, especially considering the Bucs have been poor against the pass and have struggled to get to and stop quarterbacks. Davis. of course, might be doing a lot more than just what Sheridan identified and Davis doesn’t have a final say.

Regardless, Joe found it interesting to hear some details shed on Davis’ role.

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Check out the strong interview accessible below with Bucs icon John Lynch on 98.7 FM, where Lynch joined Gary and The Commish this afternoon.

Among many other subjects, Lynch said he was disappointed that his FOX producers cut the TV broadcast off so fast after the final play before he could explain the push-out rule, in regards to defensive backs going after receivers when a quarterback leaves the pocket. Lynch said Herm Edwards “used to preach that all the time” back in the early glory years of Bucs football.

On the alleged shenanigans regarding the disupted field goal defense, Lynch said it’s very much a NFL maneuver and shared that Brad Culpepper was a master at barking out distracting signals.

Lynch weighs in on plenty more. Enjoy.

It’s time to get a little loud and bond with your fellow Bucs fans while watching the New Schiano Order Bucs in Minnesota on Thursday night at Tilted Kilt in Clearwater.

This is going to be the place to be for this game. The Bucs on Thursday Night Football!!

Tilted Kilt has it all, indoor and outdoor seating, great food, the sizzling Kilt girls, a classy layout, and great viewing. The game audio will be heard everywhere, and Joe’s got lots of jerseys and hats to giveaway. There’s nothing better than the energy of a great sports bar scene rocking for the home team. Be there!

Joe had hoped to turn the page on the stinging loss to the Saints and concentrate on the Vikings game Thursday night. But Bucs rock star general manager Mark Dominik walked into the press room at One Buc Palace to give the pen and mic club an update this afternoon, and a clarification on the unsportsmanlike penalty called on Mason Foster. The flag game on a field goal defensive shift that gave New Orleans a first down, which led to a touchdown.

The Bucs, of course, lost by a touchdown.

“Just to update, I have been in touch with the league office on “that play,” [the unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on the field goal defensive unit]. Everything from a defensive line [standpoint] is legal, the shifting. Mason Foster, everything he did in terms of movement, is legal. Everything,” Dominik said.

“The only thing that is up for discussion on why the flag was thrown was the disconcerting sound of which the league office said they [the umpire] heard was ‘Huh… huh.’ That’s what the umpire said he heard.

“Now we have run the play with success before. In Washington. It is clear that we ran that play in Washington. There is no audio transcript of the New Orleans play. At that point it was a judgment, that’s what [the umpire] thought he heard. That’s why the flag was thrown.

“It is a legal play. Up to the point of what is it that the player actually say. We coach the players to say the same thing as they did in Washington. This is not a play that Greg took from Rutgers or college. It’s a play we have already seen at the NFL level and already had success with it. That’s why we did it again. I will let the coaching staff decide if we see it again or use it again. At the end of the day, legally, it is a legal play up to when the linebacker says what he said on the move call. At that point it is up to the umpire as to what he heard.

“As long as you are not simulating the sound of the count it is permitted. Not specifically the word.

“There are a lot of different elements to it (including messing up blocking assignments). Could you block it, could you get a false start? All of those are part of the reason to help us find a way to win.”

Dominik also spoke about the last play of the game, where the officials ruled that Mike Williams had been pushed out of bounds, which the officials ruled was legal because Josh Freeman had moved out of the pocket.

Dominik said the team had no issue about that call because the team believed the call was correct.

“It is standard; it was a good play by them,’ Dominik said. “When the quarterback gets out of the pocket you are allowed to push a player out of bounds. It’s a legal play.”

It was a galling loss to the Saints Sunday at the stadium on Dale Mabry. The Bucs defense allowed Saints receivers to run wild like antelope on the Alaskan tundra, making Saints receiver Lance Moore look like a Canton first-ballot inductee.

Bucs defensive lineman George Johnson said the slip in the Bucs defense was simple: People weren’t doing their jobs.

In the second half, the Bucs somewhat buckled down, sans the touchdown gifted by the Bucs after some illegal hollering by the field goal defense.

“The first half we got out of doing what we were supposed to do,” Johnson said. “The second half we did what we talked to do the whole week and that is to play them, just try to get our hand up and get in their face and disrupt them the whole time,” Johnson said.

E.J. cornerback E.J. Biggers agreed with Johnson but was much less specific. Biggers said over and over that the Bucs just needed to do their jobs. When Joe pressed what exactly that was, Biggers smiled sheepishly and said, “We just needed to do our jobs, that’s all I can tell you.”

“You just know in these division games it is always going to be a dogfight,” Johnson said. Drew Brees is “a great player, a Hall of Fame caliber quarterback. It’s hard to contain anyone in this league and he is one of the best.”

That will be different Thursday night. Samantha Steele-bedding Christian Ponder is not quite yet mentioned in the same breath as Brees, and is coming off a very pedestrian outing with a grand total of 58 yards passing.

Maybe Arrelious Benn got antsy after a touchback Sunday? Maybe his coaches encouraged him to try and make something happen out of the endzone? Maybe the lead blocker in front of him gave him the go signal?

But with the Bucs leading 21-14 Sunday, Benn fielded a kickoff eight yards deep in the end zone and returned it to the Bucs’ 8 yard line.

Huh? Not a good idea with a lead, plus there was no apparent opening anywhere, and Benn didn’t try anything out of the ordinary.

Damn that south end zone wasn’t kind to the Bucs against the Saints.

Last week Greg Schiano candidly said he was displeased with his kick return game but Benn’s role in it would not be affected.

The Bucs only got to return one kickoff Sunday. And it was that mess to the 8 yard line.

There’s little time this week to work on the details of kickoff return, but somehow the Bucs need to find a way to straighten it out.

It’s time to get a little loud and bond with your fellow Bucs fans while watching the New Schiano Order Bucs in Minnesota on Thursday night at Tilted Kilt in Clearwater.

This is going to be the place to be for this game. The Bucs on Thursday Night Football!!

Tilted Kilt has it all, indoor and outdoor seating, great food, the sizzling Kilt girls, a classy layout, and great viewing. The game audio will be heard everywhere, and Joe’s got lots of jerseys and hats to giveaway. There’s nothing better than the energy of a great sports bar scene rocking for the home team. Be there!

Of course, you’re already gearing up to come to Joe’s big Bucs-Vikings watch party at Tilted Kilt on Thursday.

But now you’ll also be able to watch the Bucs on TV on Wednesday, too.

NFL Network is replaying the fancy, condensed version of the Bucs-Saints game at 9 p.m. Wednesday. These replays are very cool, with loads of commercials and breaks chopped out and fancy NFL Films views sprinkled in.

Joe’s already watched the game a second time, and Joe can attest that it was fun but no less painful.

Dive deep into the Bucs’ defensive statistics and it’s downright amazing how highly the Bucs rank in various areas of run defense. The “swarm” Greg Schiano preaches is buzzing loudly.

Not counting kneel-downs, the Bucs defense leads the NFL in forcing negative yardage plays (8.7-per-game average), which is even more stunning considering the Bucs only have a flimsy eight sacks through six games.

Those “TFLs” (tackles for loss) Schiano often references? The Bucs lead the NFL in forcing negative runs (28), and Tampa Bay has played one less game than many clubs.

Bucs leaders in tackles for loss (TFLs)
LB Lavonte David                     9
LB Mason Foster                       8
DE Michael Bennett                  5
DT Gerald McCoy                      5

All those numbers represent an amazing overhaul of the Bucs run defense after Tampa Bay repeatedly got gutted and gashed since the December 2008 collapse began in Carolina through the entire Raheem Morris era.

Nobody runs on the Bucs anymore — unless it’s receivers frolicking through the secondary.

Tampa Bay allows 3.1 yards per carry, best in the NFL. Against New Orleans Sunday, the Saints literally could have ended the game in the fourth quarter when they ran Darren Sproles on 3rd-and-3 from their own 39 yard line. There were two minutes left and the Bucs were out of timeouts. A first down there gets the Saints to the kneel-downs. No dice. Sproles got one yard.

As for the Bucs secondary, well, Joe doesn’t want to look at those numbers. Hopefully, up-and-down Christian Ponder will be just what the doctor ordered on Thursday in Minnesota.

Not sure how many people were irresponsible yesterday and didn’t do their due diligence as football fans to browse through the must-read weekly Monday Morning Quarterback typed by smartphone-censoring, scone-loathing, cricket-watching, popcorn-munching, Marriott-sleeping Peter King of SI.com.

King broke down in great detail the tackle that will live long in Bucs fans memories when Vincent Jackson, who had a fantastic game for the Bucs, was caught from behind, prevented from scoring on a 95-yard touchdown reception by Saints’ Malcolm Jenkins.

The tackle on Jackson, and the subsequent four plays from hell, kept the Bucs from adding a score in what turned out to be a one-touchdown win by the Saints.

By King’s measurement, Jackson had a good 30-yard lead on Jenkins, who closed the gap in Secretariat-like speed.

I’ve looked up the dimensions of the NFL field, and ran the play over and over about 20 times on NFL Game Rewinds in the wee hours of this morning. This is what Jenkins faced as he turned from covering his man to look at Jackson catching the ball: He was at the far right hashmark on the other side of the field, precisely 27 yards across the field and three yards behind where Jackson was in full gallop. It looked impossible, but Jenkins said he didn’t think of that. “Just, ‘Go as fast you can.’ ”

Right away, you could see he might have a chance. Jackson, who’d been limited all week in practice because of a calf strain, was running at tight end speed. Jenkins, who runs about a 4.47-second 40-yard dash, took a very good angle, from watching the replay over and over. It looked like he aimed to go on a straight line from where he began, at about the Bucs’ 23, to the Saints’ 20. Running at a bad angle here would have ruined him. If he aimed to catch Jackson near the goal line, he wouldn’t be able to contact him in time.

“Vincent Jackson, he’s not slow,” Jenkins said. “I think what affected the play is we were in a regular Cover 2, and they quick-snapped the ball. Roman Harper went for the ball against Jackson, but they completed it, and then nobody’s around. So the first thing is to just run and see what happens.” When Jackson got to midfield, Jenkins was 10 yards to the side and six yards behind. “I saw him start to slow down a bit,” Jenkins said.

Joe was chatting with local scribes right before the game Sunday morning, and all agreed the Saints game was a crossroads game. The Bucs trying to win on the road Thursday is a monster obstacle, as it is for all NFL road teams on Thursdays, thus there is a very real possibility the Bucs could be staring at a 2-5 mark.

Chances of playing in January after losing five of your first seven games are not good at all.

And Bucs fans will look back to those five plays — the Jackson tackle, the three ill-fated LeGarrette Blount plunges up the gut, and Josh Freeman’s naked bootleg to nowhere — as the crossroads of a crossroads game.

Yes, Joe’s obsessing about Saints DB Malcolm Jenkins making up about 30 yards on Vincent Jackson to tackle the Bucs’ No. 1 receiver after his Bucs-record-breaking catch and run for 95 yards yesterday– one yard from the end zone.

Joe’s stunned disbelief that Jackson was out-willed on the play is no reflection on anything else Jackson does or has done. Like any dramatic play or action in sports, it’s only one play, and Joe’s simply judging the moment.

Yeah, Joe realizes many fans say, “how dare you” question Jackson’s will on the play, Joe? Joe’s response is that there’s no other way to describe what happened. If the tables were flipped and Jenkins was, say, Mark Barron, every Bucs fan today would be lauding Barron for “wanting it” more than his opponent.

Take this video clip from Bucs history in 2008 (2:47 of the video), when Jermaine Phillips simply wanted the ball more than the Falcons tight end wanted a touchdown. It was a huge play in that big game. Just an amazing show of will by Phillips. Yesterday, Jenkins gave the Saints that kind of extreme desire.

Chris Webber’s famous timeout that his Michigan basketball team didn’t have left for him to call, or Bucs running back’s coach Earnest Byner’s fumble that shocked the NFL and people of Cleveland, or Bill Buckner’s World Series gaffe, these were miscues that were magnified by the circumstances. 

Jackson’s failure was magnified by the Bucs’ inability to score on first-and-goal from the 1 yard line, and Jackson getting caught has flummoxed many an observer. And while it’s hardly of the magnitude of the famous ones mentioned above, it’s still a mind-blower being talked about today.

Joe ran into a couple of random Bucs fans at Publix — and talked to a Saints fan on the phone — and that’s the first thing they wanted to chat about this afternoon. 

One can speculate all day long that Jackson was somewhat hobbled by a calf strain, though that’s rather illogical considering his production and watching him run routes yesterday before and after that 95-yard play.

Perhaps the bigger mystery is why Jackson, after turning his head back three times during the run, to presumably see Jenkins, didn’t switch the ball into his left hand and try and fight off Jenkins, or make a dive for the pylon.

It’s one thing to run out of gas; it’s another thing to run out of gas and out of fight. Buccaneers Radio Network analyst and former tight end Dave Moore had no explanation during an appearance with the Ron and Ian Show this morning.

“I’m not really sure because we’ve seen him run,” Moore said of what happened to Jackson. “We’ve seen him run by defenders. Once that ball was tipped and then he caught it, he was never really in the fifth gear to slow down to third gear. He just never really, I guess he’s been bothered by a calf or something. I mean, you know, whether he was tired when he caught the ball to run, or either way, we can analyze it anyway we want. If he puts the ball in the left hand throws a stiff-arm, he can probably drag the guy for another two yards. But there are plenty of opportunities to second guess it.”

Jackon did nothing to end any speculation after the game and he discovered his stiff-arm move for prying reporters.

Joe’s still a big fan of Jackson, but he fell a small notch in Joe’s eyes for that play.

The NFL claims Bucs linebacker Mason Foster said something to try to get the Saints to jump offsides during a field goal attempt, which is an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. What Foster said is still a mystery.

The servers in the NFL Manhattan offices must have overheated this morning as a result of the mysterious unsportsmanlike penalty call on the Bucs, which negated a Saints field goal attempt and instead set up a Saints touchdown.

Oh, and the Saints won by a touchdown Sunday.

The NFL has “clarified,” in the words of Rick Stroud of the Tampa Bay Times, what happened on the play in question.

According to league spokesman Jon Zimmer, “Tampa Bay was penalized yesterday for Unsportsmanlike Conduct for using disconcerting signals, defined as ‘words designed to disconcert an offensive team at the snap,’ in Rule 12, Section 3, Article 1 of the NFL rule book.

And the NFL also specified the words came from Mason Foster, per Stroud.

So there you have it. The shift, which Bucs coach Greg Schiano maintained was legal, was legal, per the NFL.

Just whatever Foster said wasn’t.

Bucs fans can now rest. The issue is over.

“Add me to the list. Quite frankly it’s a legal play.” — Greg Schiano.

Schiano said at his news conference today that he’s among those who don’t understand what went wrong when the Bucs’ defensive shift on a field goal attempt — and the call to shift — drew a key 15-yard penalty Sunday.

Rather than a 51-yard field goal try, the Saints got a first down and drove for a touchdown. Schiano pointed out the Bucs did the “exact same thing” against the Redskins. Seen here.

The leader of the New Schiano Order did not offer specifics but said since game officials flagged the Bucs against the Saints it’s unlikely he will use that field-goal block tactic again.

A lot is being made of the Bucs field goal defense yesterday, when the zebras threw a flag, unsportsmanlike conduct, that turned a field goal attempt into a first down and an eventual Pierre Thomas touchdown for New Orleans

It appears the Saints did their homework and helped draw the flag.

The Bucs used a shift against the Redskins that was deemed legal by the zebras — missed. The Saints didn’t think so, and clearly noticed it by studying game film.

So yesterday when the Saints attempted a field goal, per Robert Klemko of USA Today, the Saints alerted the referees to be on the look out for illegal tactics by the Bucs.

“I haven’t seen it in the pros, because it’s against the rules,” said defensive tackle Sedrick Ellis. “You’re allowed to do your shifts but you’re not allowed to yell to try to get the offense to go offsides.”

Saints guard Jahri Evans said game officials were notified of the practice before the play.

“I think that’s just what they’re being taught,” he said. “And that’s what we told the refs — they can’t try to draw us offsides in that situation or in any part of the game. I haven’t seen that in a long time. I played Division II, and they didn’t even do that in DII. It was definitely done to draw us offsides and we all knew it.”

Joe will have a post on this later, but Joe will break down the shift. Ss Joe mentioned this morning, the Bucs players could have yelled “Goodell” and it still would have resulted in a flag.

Doug Martin had a bit of a breakout game yesterday. He looked sharp, quick and like a yungry first-round pick, including a 36-yard touchdown run that was well-blocked and only required Martin to break one tackle.

And it’s no coincidence that run went left.

This season, per the stat geeks at ESPN, Martin is averaging 4.9 yards per carry running left, and only 3.7 yards to the right. Up the middle, he’s at 3.1 yards per carry. Running wide left also shows a big, positive difference than running wide right.

On the left side, the Bucs present beasts Carl Nicks and Donald Penn, who have been nothing short of stellar pass blockers, as well. On the right side, it’s green Jamon Meredith and Demar Dotson, who have a combined 13 career starts. And those guys folded like a tent on the final play of the first half that represented a key shot for the Bucs to get in field goal range.

Joe points this out because it’s all so glaring. The loss of Davin Joseph can not be measured.