The leader of the New Schiano Order seems to have heard the fan and media buzzing about Darrelle Revis allegedly being unhappy about playing too much zone defense.

Speaking on WDAE-AM 620 last night, Schiano told a fan caller, “Don’t buy the hype” when it comes to that chatter.

Revis, Schiano said, is in “1-on-1 man coverage” for “a high percentage of the time.”

Schiano explained that he would never ask a cornerback to cover 1-on-1 for an entire game, and that Revis will always have some snaps when he’s in zone coverage, and some where he’s in man and his teammates are zone, in addition to the defense playing a man scheme.

“Sometimes when enough people say it,” referring to Revis playing too much zone, “people believe it’s true,” Schiano said.

So there you have it. Revis, who played every defensive snap Sunday by Joe’s count, is being used the way a $1 million-a-game cornerback should be.

Wow, Bucs fans are teetering on the edge like Joe has never seen before.

Joe remembers there was a faction of fans fed up with Chucky’s spinning his wheels. Joe knows there was a tar-and-feather crowd who couldn’t wait to burn down Raheem Morris’ favorite South Tampa bar, if that’s what it took rid the franchise of him.

But Joe has never seen the current anger of Bucs fans and how quickly they have turned on Bucs commander Greg Schiano. Just a few short weeks ago, Bucs fans almost universally applauded his law-and-order approach, the New Schiano Order, and how he demanded players put out in practice or face a nasty tongue lashing.

Now? Wow.

Joe cannot count how many Twitterings he received in the past couple of days, since the Bucs offense laid an egg in New England, wanting Schiano gone now. In all caps no less.

How bad has it gotten? Well, likely the most revered man in the Tampa Bay area who sits behind a microphone, all around good guy, straight shooter and the voice of Tampa Bay, Tedd Webb of WFLA-AM 970, co-host of AM Tampa Bay, and no friend of Ron Reagan, Jr., took a rare venture to Twitter Sunday to unload on the crumbling Bucs, in particular, Bucs franchise quarterback Josh Freeman and commander Greg Schiano.

@TeddWebb1: If Schiano sticks with Josh, then Schiano is the problem!

Man, if Tedd Webb, on an all-news station whose listeners include impressionable casual football fans and plain hausfraus and yentas throughout the area — and more importantly, potential advertisers and folks with expendable income — has turned on you, things are bad and you are about toast.

Unless Freeman has a monumental turnaround, Joe simply cannot see him returning to the Bucs in 2014. With a fanbase that is so fed up with Freeman, rightly or wrongly, just how is the team expected to sell any tickets or more importantly, corporate sponsorships when Freeman is the face of the franchise?

And yes folks, a quarterback is always the face of the franchise.

Yes, Vincent Jackson has a lot of drops. So too does Doug Martin. Unlike other NFL QBs who are victimized by drops, somehow Josh Freeman cannot overcome them.

Joe just looked up quarterback stats and man, Freeman’s are just brutal. He leads (cough) the NFL in inaccuracy with a galling 45.7 percent.

Friends, that’s begging to be thrown out of town, especially in a contract year.

Yes, yes, yes. Joe knows Freeman victimized by drops. Please cite another NFL quarterback who has perfect receivers.

Joe has been trying to find accurate stats about dropped passes and cannot. The sites he finds are either wildly inaccurate (listing Vincent Jackson with two drops for example) or are simply not updated.

The thing Joe found that was interesting, most sites had Denver receivers, specifically Eric Decker, with a boatload of drops. Funny, Joe doesn’t hear people screaming from atop the Rocky Mountains about how those drops are killing Peyton Manning.

Joe knows Tom Brady has been a victim of a lot of drops. He somehow finds a way around them. That’s what good quarterbacks do.

Another funny stat: teams that appear to put the ball on the ground a lot are a combined 6-0.

Let’s be generous here. If we add the drops that Doug Martin and Kevin Ogletree have, along with Vincent Jackson and a few others, (why are people outing only Vincent Jackson for dropping passes and not Martin?), let’s give Freeman, say, 10 more completions, shall we? That gives him 53 completions on 94 attempts.

Freeman would still be in the bottom rung of completion percentage at 56.3 percent.

Sadly, this just reinforces something Joe has long thought about Freeman: He struggles to overcome adversity. He gets rattled.

Somehow, guys like Manning and Brady fight through adversity and, at times, make their teammates better. Has Freeman ever made his teammates look better? Not since 2010. It’s really the other way around. Bucs rock star general manager Mark Dominik has tried to stock the offense with stud players to make Freeman look better and play better.

To be fair, with tight end Tom Crabtree’s injury, Freeman has only three reliable targets, and two of them are having lousy years (see above) catching the ball. Hopefully, when Crabtree gets better, it will help Freeman out more as that should be a reliable fourth target.

NFL.com’s Gregg Rosenthal is of the mind a quarterback change for the Bucs is near.

Tampa’s offense struggled. Quarterback Josh Freeman was hurt by drops, but his shaky accuracy is the real issue. Rookie Mike Glennon was spotted warming up on the sideline in the second half. Coach Greg Schiano stuck with Freeman, but a signal-caller switch is coming. Bank on it.

Joe doesn’t see that happening. No, sorry Mike Glennon Mob, Freeman will likely be starting for the foreseeable future.

As for the distant future, 2014? Barring a major turnaround by Freeman, Joe’s not banking on it.

Perhaps it’s the curse of Myron Lewis, who was wearing No. 31 when the Bucs finally cut him this summer, but the No. 31 is haunting the Bucs this week.

Tampa Bay is ranked 31st in points scored (11.3 per game), 31st in yards per game (282), and 31st in passing yards (175 per game). And ProFootballTalk.com’s latest power rankings have the Bucs as the 31st best team in the NFL.

Statistically, the Bucs defense is faring much better. They’re middle of the pack in the main categories, tied for third in the NFL in sacks with 12.

The human armoire, Carl Nicks, shared his take on the recent report of Bucs players gathering in training camp to lodge unified complaints toGreg Schiano — about Greg Schiano.

Woody Cummings, of The Tampa Tribune, laid it out yesterday.

Nicks said the group that expressed concern over the nature of the Bucs’ camp workouts was made up entirely of newcomers that were not accustomed to Schiano’s disciplinary style.

“It was some of the guys that came from different teams or were rookies and they just weren’t used to it,” Nicks said. “The guys that were here last year, we’re used to it and to us it wasn’t that difficult.” 

Nicks also discussed the nature of a players-only meeting the Bucs held prior to the start of the season, saying it was largely an attempt to get all the players focused on performing as well as possible in the regular season.

As Joe’s written previously, so what if players think they’re being worked too hard and talk about it among themselves to get a message to their boss. Joe watched those 1990s training camp sessions at the University of Tampa. They make what goes on now look like a high school gym class.

Joe’s far more concerned about game-day coaching and lower-tier quarterback play than August adjustment issues.

For Joe, watching the Bucs offense is akin to swimming up stream. It’s a struggle.

This was on display Sunday when the Bucs tanked against the Patriots.

The Bucs moved the ball OK, until they started to smell the end zone, and ka-POW! Implosion.

The stat geeks at ProFootballFocus.com noticed the same thing and typed this nugget up.

Offensive Inconsistency

The three points on the scoreboard might lead you to believe it was a disastrous performance for Freeman (+0.6), but it wasn’t the worst we’ve seen from him, and there were in fact some positives. He threw a beautiful deep route to Mike Williams on his first pass of the game, but of course followed it up with an overthrow just three plays later. After Tampa Bay’s first drive ended in a missed field goal, their second drive was going well until Freeman forced a throw into the end zone that was nearly picked off by free safety Devin McCourty. He bounced back on the very next pass, however, to drop a corner route where only tight end Timothy Wright could catch it, but Wright was unable to haul it in and the Bucs settled for yet another field goal attempt, this time with the 3 points tacked on. Those sequences represent the day in a nutshell for the Bucs, as Freeman and his teammates worked to undo their good with just enough bad to keep them out of the end zone.

Ah, yes. The drops. As if no other NFL quarterback has to deal with receivers dropping passes. If you are bored, look at how many receivers Peyton Manning and Tom Brady have that are putting the ball on the ground. Don’t hear too many folks crying for them, do you?

Only with Josh Freeman does it seem that his 10 offensive teammates have to play perfect ball for the quarterback to have a solid day.

To be honest, Joe will take the Freeman of Week One and Week Two, who didn’t have a good game at all against the Jets or Saints, but when his team needed him the most, he put the Bucs in position to win the game with solid drives in the final minutes.

Give Joe clutch over numbers any day.

The somber Bucs locker room was open today and WDAE-AM 620 was there to cobble together notes and quotes from various Bucs players, roughly 24 hours after a shameful loss at New England where the Bucs offense managed just a measly field goal.

Some of the Bucs who were willing to talk were defensive tackle Gerald McCoy, guard Carl Nicks and safety Mark Barron.

Of course, Bucs commander Greg Schiano had his daily press conference.

As always, audio courtesy of Joe’s good friends at WDAE-AM 620.

Joe was a big $10,000 Pyramid fan when he was a kid. And for those familiar with the game show, the above quote would fall under the category of Things An NFL Head Coach Shouldn’t Say.

Unfortunately, Greg Schiano uttered just those words tonight to TJ Rives, host of Total Access on WDAE-AM 620.

Joe nearly had a seizure.

No matter the context, the words “you can’t load the entire roster in a two-year period” just can’t be spoken, especially when your 0-3 team is stocked with eight Pro Bowl players 30 years old and younger, plus emerging stars and/or first-round talents like Lavonte David, Mark Barron, Mike Williams and Josh Freeman, and your team is sitting on a pile of salary cap room.

It sounds like making excuses.

Does Schiano really believe the Bucs don’t have enough talent? A few days ago he said the Bucs had all the “components” to win now. Surely he knows his predecessor won 10 games in his second season with the same quarterback, and a lot less talent and a record number of rookies.

The Bucs had the ninth-ranked offense last season and added two legitimate superstars to the defense in the offseason. The roster is loaded in many areas. And in other areas rockstar general manager Mark Dominik and Schiano decided they’d rather sit on salary cap room than, using Schiano’s words, “load the entire roster.”

Joe hopes this was a just a slip of the tongue by Schiano, but sadly Joe suspects Schiano really believes what he said.

In the win-now NFL, coaches like Schiano don’t get a third year to “load the entire roster” while their team is getting worse. Owners typically prefer to let a new commander handle those duties.

With the Bucs offense teetering between pathetic and criminal, the team got a major scare when No. 1 receiver Vincent Jackson was lost during the ugly loss to the Patriots with a rib injury.

No need to run for the Sunshine Skyway Bridge, Bucs fans. It appears Jackson will be fine, per NFL insider Ian Rapoport, by way of Dan Hanzus of NFL.com.

NFL Media Insider Ian Rapoport reported Monday that Jackson did not suffer any broken ribs Sunday and should be OK, according to a person who spoke with the player.

Jackson was injured in the third quarter of Tampa Bay’s 23-3 loss to the New England Patriots. He underwent tests Monday morning to determine the extent of the damage. The Buccaneers will host the Arizona Cardinals next Sunday.

Jackson has been one of the only bright spots on Tampa Bay’s anemic offense this season, leading the team with 15 receptions for 265 yards. Jackson hasn’t missed one game since 2010. We’d be surprised if that streak ends in Week 4.

Is Jackson having his best year of his career? Of course not. It’s hard to argue the Bucs are better off with him not on the field, despite him having a severe case of the dropsies.

The Bucs need Jackson at full strength, along with a healthy Mike Williams, or Bucs franchise quarterback Josh Freeman is toast.

Joe knows this will make about 15 percent of his readers so giddy they won’t be able to sleep for days. Yet this news is met by Joe with a big yawn.

Track star and part-time football player Jeff Demps was added to the Bucs’ active roster of 53 today, taking a roster spot left open after stalwart tight end and injury-prone Luke Stocker was placed on the injured reserve.

First on Demps, Joe doesn’t get why so many fans drool over him so much. He’s a part-time player who treats football as a hobby. Not sure how Demps is going to turn the Bucs around from putrid to average (good teams contend for the playoffs. This just in: the Bucs are not good).

Now on Stocker, Joe has been pretty adamant about this the past day or so. Having Stocker as your No. 2 tight end behind a guy that has never been a full-time starter in the NFL was inviting disaster. And look what happened.

Joe understands in Mike Sullivan’s offense a tight end is not a primary target, therefore it is a waste of cash to throw big money at the position. Joe gets that. But the front office all but set up the tight end position to fail. There had to be someone out there to sign in the offseason that was as talented as Stocker but wasn’t as injury prone.

Now the Bucs are grasping at straws hoping converted wide receivers (from the passing juggernaut of Rutgers) can haul the load.

Last year, Dallas Clark caught 47 passes from Bucs franchise quarterback Josh Freeman. Those are gone. Clark was a weapon.

Yes, Tom Crabtree has promise but when he got hurt, the team was left to hope that a perpetually hurt tight end could play. That blew up in the faces of the Bucs front office/coaching staff.

Look, Joe isn’t making excuses for Freeman but is trying to be fair. All quarterbacks have drops. Joe doesn’t see people screaming from mountaintops defending most other NFL quarterbacks because a ball or two was put on the ground, surely not when said offense couldn’t muster more than three points in a blowout loss.

But not having a reliable option for depth at both tight end and wide receiver sure as hell isn’t making Freeman’s job any easier. Freeman basically has but three targets: Vincent Jackson, Mike Williams and Doug Martin, and Jackson and Martin have been bitten by a bad case of the dropsies virus.

Greg Schiano explained what caused him to miss the Bucs’ team plane ride home from New England. His father became ill during the Pats-Bucs game and Schiano stayed with his dad while waiting for other family members to drive to the Boston area.

Schiano didn’t detail what happened, while speaking to media today, or when he learned of the problem. The head coach said his father was still there for testing.

Joe wishes the elder Mr. Schiano well.

(Joe has turned off comments on this post to avoid babysitting the infants that would poke fun at the situation.)

Greg Schiano endorsed and defended Josh Freeman today

Greg Schiano had plenty of short answers today for the Tampa Bay media.

“Details,” was the problem against the Patriots, Schiano said when asked what looked wrong when he studied the Patriots-Bucs game film.  

“The whole offensive unit. We need to be more precise,” Schiano said. “They’re schematic issues. … Just in general, offensive details.”

Schiano said make those fixes and we’ll “score a lot of points.”

Asked about making a change at quarterback, Schiano said “Josh is our starter.” Schiano repeated that phrase multiple times.

Schiano also talked about Freeman’s strength in extending plays and defended No. 5. “It’s hard to be the trigger man when some things aren’t going the way they’re supposed to.”

Joe just read a truly horrifying nugget that was passed on via ESPN.com’s Pat Yasinskas. It should sober any Bucs fan who is drowning his sorrows over yesterday’s gutless loss to the Patriots.

Bucs franchise quarterback Josh Freeman is on pace to obliterate the record for worst pass completion percentage set by the notorious JaMarcus Russell.

In Sunday’s loss to New England, Freeman completed 13 of 32 passes (40.6 percent) against four or fewer pass-rushers. Through three games, Freeman has completed a league-worst 40.7 percent of his passes in those situations.

Since the start of the 2006 season, which is as far back as current tracking data exists, the lowest completion percentage by a quarterback against four or fewer pass-rushers for a full season was 51 percent by JaMarcus Russell in 2009.

Yeah, it’s come to a point where Freeman’s getting mentioned with Russell. The sad part is Freeman’s on pace to beat Russell’s record.

There really are no words to express Joe’s disgust. “Unacceptable” doesn’t do Joe’s horror justice.

Yes, yes, yes, Freeman is the victim of untimely drops. Say every Bucs receiver has caught every one of Freeman’s passes with four or fewer linemen chasing him down. What does that make his completion percentage within these stats, 48 percent?

Oh, that makes everything so much better now! That changes the entire picture. Quick, Bucs rock star general manager Mark Dominik, sign Freeman to an extension, now! If you factor in those drops, why, Freeman is a veritable Jim Kelly, right?

No, Joe really doesn’t believe Freeman will get benched this season. And, no, at this point, Joe cannot foresee Freeman returning to the Bucs unless he immediately turns his fortunes completely around.

Anyone want to take odds that will happen?

Joe is still troubled by the news from NFL Network’s Albert Breer last week, claiming that prior to the season, enough Bucs players cried like spoiled children because their training camp practices were too hard.

It was bad enough that good guy Dashon Goldson called a team meeting to try to stem the bickering.

Of course, the Bucs are going to say all is good right now. But unless a player loses his cool in the locker room, it is difficult to believe one player will express disgust.

But for how long? Jarrett Bell of USA Today notes that for the Bucs and the other winless teams, it is full-on crisis mode.

Will outside criticism tear the team apart?

“Well, it is definitely a choice,” Buccaneers coach Greg Schiano said after falling 23-3 at New England. “It is their choice. I have great confidence this team will stick together.”

Stopping the grumbling is simple; Win games. That takes catching passes. That means completing passes. That means blocking. That means converting third (and fourth) downs. That means kicking makeable field goals.

Winning cures all ills. Winning is the best deodorant. May as well weed out any malcontents now and get them off the field.

For an offense to put points on the board, it has to move the chains. That is, unless you are going bombs away and completing 40-yard tosses to win games– not many do.

To move the chains you generally have to convert a third down or two at some point during a drive, much less the game.

Yesterday, the Bucs’ franchise-quarterback-led offense was miserable when the team found itself mired in third down situations, documents the “Custodian of Canton,”eye-RAH! Kaufman of The Tampa Tribune.

@IKaufmanTBO: Bucs were 5-for-14 on 3rd down and 0-for-4 on fourth down against the Patriots

While Joe applauds Bucs commander Greg Schiano for being agressive, his troops sure did a lousy job getting first downs.

You simply aren’t going to win many football games with those kind of numbers.

Joe gets that Doug Martin likely is a better No. 3 receiver than Kevin Ogletree, but that doesn’t say much.

Martin hasn’t shown good pass-catching skills all season yet the Bucs now seem to have added deep routes for Martin into the offense.

Joe doesn’t like it, which is why Joe posted the picture above from yesterday’s heinous loss to the Patriots. Martin doesn’t have the size, speed or leaping ability to be running post routes that are anything more than a decoy hoping for a breakdown in coverage.

The window to throw Martin the football is awfully tight, not Josh Freeman’s strength.

The Bucs would be better served finding a way to toss Martin successful swing passes, screen passes and checkdowns. It’s a mystery why that doesn’t happen.

It’s a great question: What are the Bucs doing on offense?

Joe hasn’t seen an offense with so little rhythm in a long time. The playcalling flummoxes Joe. At least on Sunday it was unpredictable for a change.

Former Bucs guard Ian Beckles (1990-1996) doesn’t get it, either. Speaking as co-host of the Ron and Ian show this morning on WDAE-AM 620, Beckles said Mike Sullivan is worse than Josh Freeman.

“Nobody can explain what they’re trying to do,” Beckles said. “Josh is not good, but Josh is just one of the problems we have offensively. … The scheme, offensively, is God-awful.”

As Joe’s written previously, it’s as if NFL defenses caught up to the Bucs offense last November and it hasn’t adjusted or recovered.

Joe, however, can’t hurl a truckload of blame on Sullivan yet. Joe would have to know whose decision it was to play not to lose in the closing seconds of the Saints and Jets losses. And the poor depth at receiver and tight end surely isn’t Sullivan’s fault.

Joe hates to quash the dreams of the Mike Glennon Mob, but here’s a bunch of reasons why the New Schiano Order won’t turn to the rookie anytime soon.

1) Playoffs: Joe and many fans might think the Bucs’ playoff hopes are gone. However, the coaching staff absolutely can’t think that way, definitely not at 0-3. That’s a great way to get fired. Right now, the Bucs can still get back into the mix with two consecutive home wins against teams with losing records. Josh Freeman plays great against teams with a losing record. 

2) Readiness: Glennon may not be ready. The guy didn’t exactly look great in the preseason. That’s no slight on Glennon. He’s got a very traditional skillset. And in a quarterback driven league, Glennon wouldn’t have lasted until the third round if he was considered NFL-ready.

3) Josh Freeman’s trade value: Freeman can be traded before Week 8. Before you laugh, you don’t know what injury might befall a starter in the league. Also, there still may be teams that consider up-and-down, 25-year-old Josh worthy of a shot, especially if he has another couple of “up” games in him. All it takes is one team. If Freeman were on the market in 2006, don’t you think Chucky would have made a move for him when Chris Simms went down? Once Freeman is out of the lineup, his trade value plummets.

4) Job Security: A permanent change at QB means Team Glazer gets involved in the decision-making process. Team Glazer might not react kindly to Greg Schiano telling them he just can’t win with Josh — in September. Team Glazer might harken back to when Freeman led the Bucs to a 14-8 stretch under Raheem Morris and wonder why Schiano can’t succeed with more talent.

5) Fan Outrage: Right now, Bucs fans are on the verge of insanity. A move to Glennon, and Glennon struggling, could have boos hurled at him by his first halftime. The fan base is that much on edge. Joe suspects the reaction to Glennon would be far more peaceful in, say, early November.

6) Mutiny: Only Bucs players collectively know how much they may or may not respect Freeman. And it’s unknown how much confidence Schiano has openly expressed in Freeman to his team. Yanking Freeman too soon, in the minds of the players, might not go over well. Players ultimately need to perceive the change is fair and in the best interest of the club. Nobody can argue a move to Glennon when the team is officially eliminated from the playoffs.

Yes, you can point at Josh Freeman’s ugly, ugly numbers. You can stomp your feet about Vincent Jackson dropping passes. You can kvetch about Doug Martin not getting enough blocking.

That’s fine. That’s accurate. That’s OK. But Joe is starting to believe the problems run much deeper that what we see on Sunday afternoons.

And no, it’s not Bucs commander Greg Schiano. It is deeper than that.

NFL Network’s Albert Breer was flown down to Tampa on Friday, before a travel day no less, to find out what the hell was going on with all of these rumors and stories floated about the Bucs in recent days. Because he works for Big Brother, Breer got access that few others get and unearthed the reason the Bucs had a players-only meeting before the season started.

The reason, according to Breer, was that Schiano, the Bucs felt, was working them too hard.

Players had been upset about the nature of Schiano’s second training camp with the Bucs, which some viewed as unrelenting, and that prompted Goldson to solicit feedback.

Even after that, some players didn’t feel like enough changed, with one saying that, “He came into the team meeting, said you guys gotta trust me, we’re in half-pads that day, then the next day, it’s back to the same thing.”

Right there is your reason for the Bucs’ problems. It springs to mind a phrase Matt Millen coined for a long-ago forgotten player. In Millen’s words, the player was “a devout coward.” Joe nearly hit the floor when he read Breer’s passage. Buccaneers were being worked too hard in training camp? Joe hasn’t heard that good of a one-liner on Howard Stern’s show in a few weeks.

Just who exactly said this? It couldn’t have been a veteran. Four years ago, NFL players were undergoing two-a-days, which are now banned. Current practices are picnics compared to those.

And it wasn’t long ago that Don Shula was forcing players through three-a-days.

This just really annoys Joe to no end. Here’s the thing: A team earns the right to easier practices by winning. The Bucs have not earned that right since 2010, and even then they may have taken way too many liberties as the team collapsed.

If Bucs fans want to know the problem with the Bucs, then right there it is. Of course, the Bucs have put a happy face on this, saying all is good within the team’s walls. Joe isn’t buying that. This team apparently has too many malcontents and clubhouse lawyers on the roster to whine about practices being too hard.

You want to know why Schiano had a team photo taken at 7 a.m. on Labor Day? To weed out malingerers.

Joe remembers a line from famous JoeBucsFan.com commenter Thomas 2.2 when players balked at the New Schiano Order during the regime’s first minicamp. “They haven’t worked the Rah out of them yet.”

That line still resonates today.

Props to guys like Dashon Goldson and Darrelle Revis for being team leaders and trying to keep order within what appears to be, nearly two years after Morris was ousted, still a dysfunctional unit.

Benching Freeman: Joe thought it was very telling when good-guy Earnest Graham, a former teammate of Bucs franchise quarterback Josh Freeman when the Bucs were last winners, wondered aloud on Twitter yesterday how much longer Greg Schiano would insert Freeman into the starting lineup?

Joe thinks it will be until the rest of the season.

At this point, barring a major turnaround that Joe simply does not envision, Freeman will not be part of the Bucs next season. Try to come up with a quarterback who, in his first five years as a starter, was playoff-less? The list is unimpressive and small. Vinny Testeverde, and the immortal Bill Kenney of the Chiefs in the early 1980s (who also once threw for 4,000 yards in a season), come to mind.

If Freeman returns to the Bucs next season, it will be his fifth season as the team’s opening-day starter. Joe would be shocked if he was brought back, again, barring a major and unforeseen turnaround.

Magic pill: Greg Schiano says there is no magic pill to revive the Bucs. Joe thinks there is, and it is not magic.

How about catching passes? How about making field goals? How about not making stupid penalties (which were cut down this week)? How about blocking?

Nothing magic about those, but they would go a long way to helping the offense, you know, score points?

Family emergency: For a possessed, driven guy like Greg Schiano to take any time off in the middle of a season, with the season if not his job in crisis, there has to be something major going on. Joe just hopes everything turns out OK. No matter what you think of Schiano as a coach, he’s a helluva good guy. Believe it or not, there are some things more important than football.

Sticking together: Schiano expects his team to remain tightknit. Of course he is going to say that. You would expect him to say his team is at each other’s throats? Just the actions of his players a few weeks ago suggest otherwise.

Winning cures all ills. Winning is the best deodorant. Start winning games and the bickering will subside.

Depth, or lack thereof: Joe makes no secret he likes Bucs rock star general manager Mark Dominik. Is Dominik perfect? No, but neither is Bill Belicheat. Somewhere last summer, either Dominik or Schiano or their underlings, or all of them, made some major, major gaffes on player evaluation and those mistakes reared their ugly head yesterday. Though the Bucs have high hopes for Tom Crabtree at tight end, guessing he can handle the rigors of being a full-time starter was just that. Guessing. Given that information, it was borderline inexcusable to rely on Luke Stocker as the backup tight end.

Now the Bucs are playing with a glorified wide receivers trying to play tight end (from Rutgers, no less), Tim Wright (who dropped a touchdown pass). That shouldn’t and didn’t need to be.

Then there are the wide receivers. The Bucs couldn’t have landed someone other than Kevin Ogletree as a potential No. 3 receiver?

These areas have been a major mistake in scouting and evaluation. While it could have been Schiano or Shelton Quarles or Dennis Hickey or all of the aforementioned, at the end of the day, those errors in judgment fall in the lap of Dominik.

Again, Joe likes the job Dominik has done overall. But there is no denying the Bucs could have used better talent and more depth at tight end and wide receiver. To suggest otherwise is simply being dishonest.

So much for Schiano hating Freeman: Yeah, since the combine, pretty much all fans have heard — through notorious unnamed sources — was that Greg Schiano so loathed Josh Freeman, that he was doing all he could possible to Pearl Harbor his career.

Funny thing happened yesterday. With every opportunity to pull the plug on Freeman, who was struggling, and with the game decided early in the fourth quarter, Schiano stuck with Freeman.

Schiano easily could have put Mike Glennon in the game to get some valuable snaps, but Schiano claims that move never crossed his mind.

Does that sound like a guy who wants to run Freeman out of town on the next bus?

Hey, CBSSports.com, about those “multiple” unnamed sources…

The maturing of Mark Barron: Yesterday was the first time Bucs safety Mark Barron played like the position he was drafted. The second-year man from Alabama was all over the field, putting Tom Brady on the ground, picking him off in the end zone, breaking up passes. Wow. It was easily the best game Barron has had in his short NFL career.

If there was something to build on yesterday, it was the play of Barron.

Cellar Dwellers: In case you don’t know by now, the Bucs are the sole owners of last place in the NFC South.

Too bad the NFL nixed the Bucs on wearing throwback creamsicles Sunday against the Desert Rats. It would have been so fitting.

Worse than Rah: This may be the worst season the Bucs have had in many, many years. Culverhouse awful. Even when the Bucs completely imploded in 2011, they started the season 4-2 and people were actually talking playoffs.

No one can tell Joe this year’s roster is not significantly better than in 2011 (remember the immortal Great Lumpkin?).

This also reinforces Joe’s notion that there is poison in the Bucs locker room (see first few paragraphs).

Hey, at least when Raheem Morris went 0-3 in 2009, he had an excuse. He had broken down Byron Leftwich as his quarterback.

Virus: Former Bucs tight end and current NBC and Buccaneers Radio Network analyst Anthony Becht said this losing streak is like a virus. And it can continue to spread.

Joe is going to guess in the coming weeks, Schiano will easily find out who is with him and who isn’t. If Schiano is back next year (Joe expects him to be as of today), then it will be very interesting to see what players do not return.

Josh Freeman’s ugly numbers: In case you forgot, Josh Freeman is now a depressing 6-17 when facing teams with a winning record for his career and an embarrassing 4-13 in his last 17 road games.

Help Joe out. When was the last time a team re-upped a quarterback in his contract year with those kind of numbers?

Around the NFL…

Kansas City: The Chiefs are for real. How about that clock-eating drive engineered by Alex Smith for a touchdown that effectively put the game out of reach last Thursday?

If only Smith had been available a year later.

(Oh, still mad that Vince Lombardi Chip Kelly didn’t come to the Bucs?)

Baltimore: The Crows blew out Houston yesterday in a matchup of two playoff teams from 2012. And people mock Joe Flacco, one of the most clutch quarterbacks there is.

Carolina: The Stinking Panthers blew out the Giants yesterday. If they can do this to the Giants, they can do this to the Bucs. A Mike Shula offense no less.

Wow, what has happened to the Giants? They are in the same pickle as the Bucs. Winless. That is one of the early surprises of the 2013 season.

Cincinnati: Joe has this game DVR’ed and will watch it tonight (Joe’s not wasting his time watching the pitiful Raiders play anyone). People like to mock Andy Dalton’s win-loss record against teams with a winning record (the percentage is a little better than Josh Freeman’s). But who would you take, a guy who has guided his team to the playoffs in each of his two seasons in the NFL, or a guy who has yet to accomplish such a feat in four years as a starter?

Dallass: This is why Joe doesn’t gamble. He would have dropped cash on the Lambs based on how awful Jerry Jones’ teams have been in recent years against the spread at home, and how good Jeff Fisher’s teams are against the spread.

The Cowgirls proceeded to hit the Lambs in the jaw with a horseshoe. The St. Louis crowd — included the normally sedate media — is already trying to run Brian Schottenheimer out of town, with a warm case of Budweiser as a parting gift.

Cleveland: So just after the Brownies decided to blow up their team in the quest for Teddy Bridewater, they go ahead and beat a playoff team on the road, with the immortal Brian Hoyer at quarterback. This is not the way to get your franchise quarterback locked up, Clevelandites.

New Orleans: Yeah, the Saints didn’t miss Sean Payton last year, huh. Right now they lead the NFC South, and Drew Brees isn’t having a Drew Brees kind of year, either. Scary.

Tennessee: The Titans aren’t likely going anywhere, but it will be interesting to see what happens in San Diego. How much longer before the Chargers decided they may want to blow up their team and make a run for, say, Johnny Football? Which may mean Philip Rivers could be on the trading block come February (or sooner).

Detroit: Joe isn’t sure how much the Lions should get props, beating the now hapless Redskins without Reggie Bush. Pretty solid day by Matt Stafford tossing for 386 yards.

Miami: The Dolphins are starting to look like a fun team to watch. They are 3-0 for the first time in 11 years, behind their young franchise quarterback Ryan Tannehill, who seems to be developing quite nicely.

New York Jets: It appears the Jets are a pretty damned good team. They are hanging in games, even with a rookie quarterback, and more often than not, finding a way to get the job done. Damn, that Lavonte David late hit still rankles Joe.

Seattle: Sure, the Seahawks are good. But Joe doesn’t put much stock into beating the Jags, who are basically a middling ACC team. Hope Teddy Bridgewater likes Northeast Florida/Southeast Georgia.

Indianapolis: Damn, the Colts lose their offensive coordinator from last year and their second-year quarterback is still playing damned good ball. Colts just may be a sleeper team to come out of the AFC the way they punked San Francisco in their own crib.

Chicago: Who says a first-year coach can’t win big? The Bears may be one of the best teams in the early weeks of the 2013 season. What a defense. And that offense has even calmed down bratty Jay Cutler.

Since the Steelers are an unheard of 0-3, you don’t think the penny-pinching Rooney family may want to trade… nah!

Non-NFL thoughts:

1. Joe can’t remember the last time there was such a dreadful slate of college football games for a weekend? Though some games turned out to be close (Georgia and Michigan for example), if Joe wasn’t such a college footballholic, he never would have watched.

2. LSU looks to be a runaway train. Alabama showed that they are vulnerable defensively (at least facing Johnny Football) and LSU is a different cat defensively that Texas A&M. If LSU freight-trains Georgia like Joe expects this weekend, Joe cannot wait for the Alabama-LSU game in November.

3. What the hell is going on with Michigan? First they damned near coughed up a game to Akron — Akron! Then, they had to fight for their lives to beat UConn, truly a miserable team.

Has the Big Ten sunk this low that mighty Michigan has to bust their balls to beat two glorified Division I-AA teams?

4. Clemson once again impressed. Yeah, beating North Carolina State on the road on a Thursday night game is tougher than one thinks (ask Florida State). The fact Clemson pulled away impressed Joe. The Tigers have but two more tests left before they can argue for a BCS title shot: hosting Florida State next month and then traveling to South Carolina in December.

5. Watch out for UCLA. Joe has a hunch that is going to be a dangerous team.

6. This Bo Pelini nonsense in Nebraska. First, the guy is doing an awful job for being a defensive guru. Second, Joe found it all too interesting so many people waved off the unearthed recording (after a win over Ohio State) where he completely freaks out about Cornhuskers fans and two local columnists, dropping F-bombs right and left. So many people dismissed it as saying he was just venting. Well, if instead of dropping F-bombs about fans and writers he was dropping racial or sexual orientation bombs, would these same sophists still be so dismissive of Pelini? Joe thinks not.

7. So Urbie Meyer was up 50 on FAMU and was still going for it on fourth downs? What a charming citizen for the youth of our nation to look up to.

8. So the Rays are clinging to their wild card lead by a nose hair and have to travel to the Yankees and Blue Jays this week to close the season? Yikes.

9. Damnit, you Cardinals. Of all the times to have your closer getting lit up on a nightly basis it’s the end of September ,when you are trying to stave off two contenders to win the division. Good thing that team is loaded with young arms.

10. Why is it that Junebugs are a scourge of Hernando County, and it’s September?