“These comeback victories are great but all it means is you screwed up in the first half.” –Peyton Manning after Monday Night’s win against San Diego.

Joe really enjoyed the candid quote above from Peyton Manning. It simplified Joe’s attitude toward Josh Freeman’s 2012 performances, and represented where many fans stand with Freeman.

Sure, quarterbacks have to be judged on 60 minutes and by wins and losses. Yes, Freeman is still getting on the same page with his receivers and learning a new offense, but there are no excuses for the dead periods in games fans have seen from Freeman this season.

If the goal is for him to be a franchise QB for a Super Bowl contender, then Freeman has to find a way to be more consistent. “He’s improved but still not on,” is how former Bucs tight end Dave Moore and current Bucs radio analyst described Freeman’s play this week on WDAE-AM 620.

Moore noted that Freeman, as he’s done much of his career, looks most comfortable when the Bucs spread out the offense and open up the field.

That, however, is not how the Bucs’ offense is designed to operate most of the time. It’ll be interesting to watch the ongoing development of Mike Sullivan’s plan. Will it quickly evolve to Freeman’s strengths, or will they stick to the plan and wait for him to be consistent?

OK, this is one of the last posts about Sunday’s win over the Chiefs. Joe’s at One Buc Palace today so there will be fresh Saints-related content today.

This is a little nugget again, about Mike Williams.

When the Bucs wide receiver hauled in his 62-yard touchdown pass in the first half, an aerobatic, ballet-like move, Joe was immediately reminded of Lynn Swann in Super Bowl X. In that game, Swann may have made the most spectacular catch ever seen, and no, it was not the juggling, diving catch at midfield (also against Mark Washington).

With Swann being covered like a wet rag by Washington up the right sideline, Swann seemed to sprout wings on his shoes, jumping out of bounds, yet somehow sailing in front of Washington, grabbing the ball in front of Washington and top-tapping his feet inbounds.

For the life of Joe he cannot find the video of that catch anywhere online.

Joe mentioned this to Williams, that Lynn Swann wanted his play back and Williams, smiling broadly where his Grady Wilson beard once was, didn’t argue with Joe.

“It was a routine touchdown,” Williams insisted. “To me it was routine. But you are right. I think it is mine now. I will talk to Lynn Swann.”

Granted, all the offensive pyrotechnics in the second half came at the hands of the Chiefs. The Chiefs. But if somehow the Bucs can continue to get crazy catches like that from Williams, and strong play from Vincent Jackson, there aren’t too many receiving duos in the NFL better than Williams and Jackson.

The fantasy geeks are all giddy about Mike Williams and his 100-yard games and touchdowns. Apparently, he’s a hot man on the fantasy waiver wire. (The only fantasy wire Joe is aware of involves Rachel Watson and trapeze maneuvers).

NFL Network brought Williams on one of its fantasy segments this week to talk all things Bucs.  The video can be found here and has some great NFL films looks of Williams’ play.  Williams also gives Vincent Jackson “all the credit” for his success the past couple of weeks for “taking all the coverage.”

“I think I can handle one man,” Williams said.

As for his elite body control and acrobatic catches this season, Williams told Joe this week that they’re really nothing special to him.

“I think it was just a routine catch. Throw the ball up and I went and got it.  That’s just what I’ve been doing my whole career, really since high school. So it’s like a routine catch to me. It’s really not that exciting to me. I love that it makes the fans happy, but it’s really not exciting to me.”

Jimmy Graham’s health is a question mark for Sunday, but there’s little doubt Mark Barron was drafted, in part, with Graham in mind.

For months, Joe’s been looking forward to Sunday’s Saints-Bucs game to see Mark Barron cover Jimmy Graham.

In part, Barron was drafted so high because he can match up (we hope) physically with the freak-of-nature basketball tight ends like Graham, a new hot trend in the NFL. FOX Sports analyst and former NFL personnel man Chris Landry did a fantastic job explaining this in June with Steve Duemig.

Last night, Ronde Barber talked about the almost hopeless challenge the 6-7 Graham poses, during an interview on the Buccaneers Radio Network.

“Jimmy Graham is, I mean he’s almost impossible, you know, to manage in a 1-on-1 situation,” Barber said. “He’s just bigger than you. He’s a basketball player. He’s a power forward posting up on a point guard almost every time anybody is trying to cover him.”

Barber went on to describe the Saints as “a little down and out in a lot of ways” but still at team scoring a lot of points led by a “top-3 quarterback.”

While Joe hopes Graham takes Sunday off with his bum ankle, which the Saints have been very quiet about, there’s part of Joe that really wants to see Barron take on the challenge of Graham. A win with Graham on the field would be extra sweet.

Veteran Saints cornerback Jabari Greer thinks he knows all about the Bucs. Hear what he has to say in this Times-Picayune video. Joe sincerely hopes the 5-10 Greer finds himself in man coverage against Mike Williams or Vincent Jackson.

Joe’s friends at Ed Morse Cadillac Tampa have the best service deals around. So why go get your car fixed at some chain tire shop dump when you can have top-shelf trained Cadillac service and relax in absolute luxury? It makes no sense.

The great folks at Ed Morse Cadillac Tampa have a new digital alignment tester all set up and ready to give you a FREE alignment check and diagnostic printout. Joe highly recommends it. In less than 10 minutes you’ll know where you stand. And if you need tires, their prices will NOT be beaten. Click on through below.

Note: Joe briefly posted an incorrect version of this story. Joe didn’t realize he had posted it live and was actually researching and writing it when it was viewed with errors. Joe often builds a story a couple of ways at night and goes with a version in the a.m. after further review. This was a case where Joe hit the go button too soon.

Ronde Barber does care about individual records, and he’s unhappy about missing out on one Sunday.

Remember the near interception Barber had deep in Chiefs territory late in the game Sunday, a clear pick-six if he could have wrapped his mitts around the ball? Barber said a score there would have tied him for the all-time defensive scoring mark, so he said on WDAE-AM 620 last night. 

“I was closing in with that touchdown earlier [in the Chiefs game] on the all-time scoring record on defense. And if would have got that second one, because I could have moonwalked into the endzone there was nobody there, I would have tied Rod Woodson and Darren Sharper for the most all-time. So, yeah, I was kicking myself a little bit. Thankfully the game was out of hand. It wasn’t, you know, a crucial play, a crucial missed opportunity. But for personal goals, yeah, I’m banging my head on my desk still.”

Joe surely wouldn’t bet against Barber tying and breaking the mark this season. But in some ways Joe hopes Barber doesn’t get there. Perhaps that would keep him extra hungry for a return in 2013.

As Joe wrote Monday, in the first half when Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman was struggling, throwing a ghastly pick in field goal range early and later one-hopping a pass to an open Tiquan Underwood, fans at the stadium on Dale Mabry Highway booed as if Derrick Ward had returned to suit up for the Pewter Pirates.

Later that night, after the Bucs had manhandled the Chiefs, Bucs receiver Vincent Jackson took to the SiriusXM NFL Radio airwaves to discuss the game with Steve Torre and Bill Lekas. And while Jackson wasn’t asked about the fans’ impatience with Freeman, it was as if Jackson was speaking to the fans about that very subject, all but telling Bucs fans to get a grip.

“Man, it is great,” Jackson answered in response to a question about how he likes working with Freeman. “I love to see this kid’s resiliency. He is learning, he is betting better each and every week. Obviously, it is a new offense for all of us but we have been working on it since March. We have gotten to a point where we trust it, we believe in it and we know we can make plays no matter how the game is going.

“His maturity level is very impressive the way he is able to come out there and take control of the game as he has been doing, putting together two-minute drives and when we are ahead to control the game and move the ball down the field when we need first downs. It’s fun to play with him. He’s a hungry guy, he is competitive. I love playing with him.”

If one is to read between the lines, it’s as if Jackson is saying the Bucs offense is continuing to grow week by week because the players are becoming more and more comfortable with it.

If that is the case, and the Chiefs game is an example, the Bucs may be able to hang with the Saints if Sunday becomes a shootout. Drew Brees certainly will have his chances against the struggling Bucs pass defense.

The leader of the New Schiano Orders says conditions are ripe for “frustrated” Dallas Clark’s emergence

Mike Williams and Vincent Jackson are ripping the top off NFL defenses.

Their yards-per-catch numbers are stunning. Among receivers with 10 or more receptions, Williams ranks second (22.1 ypc) in the NFL and Jackson ranks fifth (18.5).

This kind of deep threat is going to quickly draw significant attention, says Greg Schiano. And the head coach expects life to change for “frustrated” (Schiano’s word) Dallas Clark.

“I want to get Dallas [Clark] more involved, myself. But you know what, when things are there you take them,” Schiano said on WDAE-AM Monday. “And I think what’s going to happen here soon, there’s going to be a lot more over-the-top coverage, which is what’s natural to happen when guys are making plays down the field. That opens up the middle of the defense. And hopefully Dallas and Luke and all the guys can have a bigger impact in the pass game.”

Schiano went on to say he knows Clark is down on his lack of action.

“I know he’s frustrated,’ Schiano said of Clark. “Heck, he’s been such a productive player for so long. But you wouldn’t be able to tell it by the way he’s acting on the sideline, and in the practice and in the meeting rooms. Certainly, I’m hoping we can get him the ball and he can feel personal satisfaction as well as team satisfaction. But he knows how much he means to this team and how he’s playing a big, big part. It’ll happen. It always does. It goes in cycles.”

Joe also would expect teams to try and take away the deep ball and make Josh Freeman beat them in the short game and over the middle. But that doesn’t necessarily mean a ton of work for Clark.

More over-the-top coverage also plays to strengths of Jackson and Williams. Neither is a one-trick pony, and both are good on slants and short routes.

Not that long ago former Bucs quarterback Shaun King, one of only three quarterbacks to lead the Bucs to an NFC title game, suggested Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman needed a shrink.

In retrospect, there is a pattern developing with Freeman that lends credence to King’s words.

In short, Freeman needs to be hypnotized.

In the first half of games this season, Freeman is Trent Dilfer-like, only to channel his inner Joe Montana in the second half of games, so documents Dan Parr of ProFootballWeekly.com.

What the heck? QB Josh Freeman’s Jekyll-and-Hyde routine in the past couple games cannot be amusing for the Bucs. He has completed only 51 percent of his passes in the first half in the past two games before turning it on in the second half, where he has completed 70 percent of his passes in the same span. Freeman has thrown a TD and two picks in the first half in his last two outings. He has thrown three TDs and no interceptions in the second half over that span. Freeman has to end the emerging pattern of putting forth less than complete games. It works against the Chiefs, but it will not work against good teams.

Pretty striking, huh? But this likely has more to do with gameplans than anything else, and to the point, that Bucs coaches can adjust on the fly that helps Freeman and the Bucs offense.

So, yeah, if Freeman truly needs a shrink, as King advised, then Freeman (and maybe some offensive coaches) need to be hypnotized that the first half is actually the second half, and the second half is still the second half.

The very part-time young running back with a career average of 4.7 yards per carry isn’t pouting. He’s not moaning and getting all diva because of limited work. And his head coach respects that.

The leader of the New Schiano Order offered great praise for LeGarrette Blount yesterday evening during The Greg Schiano Show on WDAE-AM 620.

“Well, I’ll tell you. I think LeGarrette’s shown great maturity in the way he’s handled the whole situation,” Schiano said of Blount of accepting his reduced role. “Certainly, there’s one or two ways you can take it: you can be frustrated and act out, or you can just keep workin’ and be part of the solution. And that’s exactly what he’s been. He’s done some really good things and I look forward to it the rest of the year.”

Joe still shakes his head when thinking of Blount not getting more action. Yeah, it picked up Sunday, but a lot of that was with the Bucs up by three scores in the fourth quarter, “garbage time” as Marv Albert would call it.

But kudos to Blount. He’s running hard, working hard and clearly healthy.

Joe’s not calling a conspiracy here by any stretch off the imagination. But Joe is puzzled why the Bucs and the NFL are not going all out to promote the free game replay of the Bucs-Chiefs game available for the past 36 hours on NFL.com — in glorious HD to those with IP addresses in the Tampa and Orlando markets where the game was not televised.

Joe understands and supports the blackout rule, but if Joe were adopted into Team Glazer, Joe surely would pound the URL of this game video to the Buccaneers’ 600,000 or so followers on Facebook and Twitter, and provide a big ol’ link on the team website. Hell, Joe would even ask the players to fire it out on Twitter.

Last season, NFL.com ran banner ads after blacked out Bucs games promoting a direct link to watch those games free. This season? The banner ads are gone and the link to the blacked out Bucs game is buried deep — real deep. (It’s also only available free for another big handful of hours.)

Joe would encourage everyone to share the link above, including Joe’s media brethren. Exposing a blowout win like this is a public service and can only translate into good things.

Joe hears so many of his media colleagues shouting from rooftops and typing with vigor while calling for the immediate jettisoning of Aqib Talib.

They’re calling Greg Schiano a hypocrite. They demand to know how the New Schiano Order mantra of “Trust, Belief and Accountability” could possibly include suspended Talib’s return in a few weeks. 

Tampa Bay Times columnist/WDAE-AM 620 host Tom Jones even said this morning that Talib’s situation is very simple, “like a dog peeing on the rug,” and that dog needs to be leashed and taken outside otherwise he’ll continue to soil the house.

Joe gets the passion, and Joe wouldn’t cry if Talib is cut tomorrow. Not at all. But Joe hardly believes that Schiano isn’t capable of making Talib “accountable” without cutting him.

Does anyone really believe that’s not possible? If so, Joe’s got magic beans to sell you.

Also, there’s that concept of a clean slate for players that Schiano talked about many times in the offseason. Players’ commitment levels were evaluated to a high standard for more than six months, and then decisions were made on who stayed.

Talib earned a spot in the new family of “Buccaneer Men” and got high marks for his commitment. His slate was clean for this regime. That’s got to mean something and not just be talk.

Yes, Talib has dirtied his slate. But for all Joe knows, Talib’s teammates want him back, his captains want him back, and his coach already has explained how Talib will be made accountable before his return, perhaps a new conditioning test and more, and perhaps Talib will be made to earn his job back if he gets back on the roster.

Again, the concept that Talib can’t be held accountable without getting cut his ludicrous. Holding a teammate, family member or co-worker accountable is rarely about kicking them out of your world.

And then there’s that accountability to fans. Yeah, lots of fans want Talib gone, but that won’t help the Bucs if they need him late in the season, or if Talib is on another team shutting down Mike Williams in a key game. There also are lots of fans that don’t care about the drama and just want to see the best players on the field. Increasing Myron Lewis’ role is not Joe’s idea of “accountability.”

Joe still cares most about winning. Talib is an idiot, yes, but not a sleaze like Jerramy Stevens. For Joe, there’s a big difference there.

Perhaps trying to come back to soon or maybe he’s an incredibly fast healer, defensive end Da’Quan Bowers is scheduled to resume practicing tomorrow, so Bucs coach Greg Schiano explained yesterday, by way of Stephen Holder of the Tampa Bay Times.

The Bucs defensive end ruptured his Achilles tendon during conditioning in May, but on Wednesday he’ll re-join his teammates in practice now that he’s permitted under guidelines governing players on the physically unable to perform list.

Players on PUP cannot practice during the first six weeks of the season. But after that, teams have 21 days in which to decide whether the player is ready to resume practicing. In this case, Bowers already has convinced the Bucs he’s there, coach Greg Schiano said.

“He’ll do some stuff the rest of this week and we’ll just observe and kind of go from there and see how he responds,” Schiano said.

Now generally, an Achilles injury takes a year to fully recover, if not more. Bowers was injured at One Buc Palace during a routine training workout — five months ago.

Granted, just because Bowers is practicing, limited practicing that is, doesn’t mean he will be reinstated to the 53-man roster. The Bucs have until the first week of November to make that decision.

As Joe has written before, the more the Bucs win, Joe believes the chances that Bowers will be reactivated increase; if the Bucs fall out of the playoff race, Bowers’ chances of playing this year decrease.

All things equal, Joe would much rather Bowers sit out this year. An Achilles injury is nothing to monkey around with. Rushing to play a handful of games when thinking of the big picture, well, it’s not worth it.

Announcers and coaches fear saying his last name. Hopefully quarterbacks will fear him, too. He’s Daniel Te’o-Nesheim, Adrian Clayborn’s replacement, who has been solid at right defensive end.

He was in the Chiefs backfield against the run Sunday, and he laid a huge hit on Brady Quinn that would have been a fumble in the old days.

“I thought Daniel played really good football for us. Did his job,” Greg Schiano said today.

Joe caught up with Te’o-Nesheim to see how he feels about his game.

JoeBucsFan.com: You’ve got the starter’s job now. How have you settled into that role and where’s your game at now.

Te’o-Nesheim: I think today was an improvement, but there’s a lot of stuff I need to do, especially on third down getting to the quarterback, being more productive as a pass rusher.

Joe: So you were a 2010 third-round pick in Philadelphia and the Bucs got you off their practice squad last season. Do you feel you just hadn’t caught a break until now?

Te’o-Nesheim: I’m never going to blame me not succeeding on anything but me. I’m just glad to have gotten this opportunity and hope to be productive enough to stay in the spot.

Joe: The Chiefs were the NFL’s No. 2 running team coming in Sunday. Can you talk about how the line played together and executed a great run defense.

Te’o-Nesheim: Just seeing all different guys on the line make tackles for a loss and nice plays, like Gerald [McCoy] and Mike [Bennett] and Roy [Miller] and Gary [Gibson]. It’s such a team effort. People don’t realize how when you play good run defense the wealth is spread to all positions, all depths. Just everyone excecuting their assignments, someone’s got to make the tackle.

Speaking to the Tampa Bay pen and mic club this afternoon from One Buc Palace, Bucs coach Greg Schiano sure kept the door open for the possibility that troubled Bucs cornerback Aqib Talib has played his last game as a member of the Bucs organization.

Talib was slapped with a four-game by the NFL for failing a drug test for banned substances and Talib confessed he had popped Adderall without a prescription (which is an illegal act; buying prescription pills without a prescription).

Pressed by eye-RAH! Kaufman of the Tampa Tribune if Talib “with certainty” will return to the lineup once his four-game suspension is lifted, Schiano adamantly said he would be back but passed on the opportunity to say the future transaction was locked in stone.

“He’s going to be back with us. There are no absolutes in anything in this world, right? I may not be back here when he comes back. How do you know? That’s the plan, yes, and we are going to move forward at that point. As I have said in everything, as I say all the time to our team, things change day-to-day, week-to-week, month-to-month guys. I can’t tell you exactly how things are going to be a month from now. I hope that we have won a bunch of games in a row, that’s one thing I hope. So, yeah, the plan is, yeah, to have him back here with us.

“Look, every decision we make as an organization has one thing in mind and that is what is best for the organization. I guarantee you no one is always right. But I guarantee you every decision we are going to make is strictly for one reason and that it is best for the organization. It’s not just winning. Yeah, that’s what we do, that’s what you do in this league. There are 32 teams and we are all chasing one prize. But when you are part of a community — yeah, there are a lot of things that go into the decision. I can just tell our fans and all the people who care about this is, we are going to do what is best for the organization which is going to be best for everybody. So you will have to just trust us on this one.”

That sure is a qualified answer to Joe. “The plan” is to have Talib back, yet there are no absolutes. Plans, as we all know, can change.

If one is to ascribe motives, this decision on Talib’s immediate future may not be strictly Schiano’s alone to make. It almost smells like the decision will be influenced, or made directly, in an upstairs office at One Buc Palace.

How frightening was the Bucs offense in the first half yesterday? Bradenton Herald columnist Alan Dell suggests it was too unnerving for innocent children to witness; they would have been better off being frightened out of their pants by the local ghouls and goblins who will soon knock on their front doors, and by living-room ambushes of TV commericals warning of the coming annual plague of the non-basketball association.

Dell, however, also marveled at how Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman turned from homely to Cinderella in the second half.

As he has often done this season, Freeman lost his GPS, couldn’t find his receivers and then just forgot about them. Outside of Williams’ TD catch, he completed 4 of 12 passes for 60 yards in the first half.

But Freeman is a smart guy and knows if he wants to remain the Bucs quarterback in the future he needs to take advantage of the talented receiving corps he has at his disposal — weapons such as Williams and Vincent Jackson are precious commodities and Tiquan Underwood, the man Bucs’ head coach Greg Schiano cut not too long ago, is a nice security blanket.

They did a lot to earn a free dinner from their quarterback with big yardage after catches and circus catches.

It sounds simple, almost in a mocking way, to say Freeman should just throw the ball up and let his receivers make plays. The NFL is not backyard football. There’s a little more complexity than just that.

If anything, working with a new coaching staff, a new playbook and a new offense, Freeman needs confidence most of all.

Joe is hopeful the second half yesterday, and the numbers Freeman put up, will buoy his psyche.

Formerly lettuce-bearded Mike Williams — yes, he shaved — spoke loving words yesterday about his suspended teammate, one-time-only-Adderall-user Aqib Talib.

Talib is a true team player 99 percent of the time. And Williams, who is lighting up the NFL as a deep threat this season, credits Talib with three years of regular mentoring.

“Having Talib at practice everyday and working against him and talking about what corners are trying to do, it’s helping me everyday,” Williams told Joe. “He and Ronde, they let me know how to get off of jams, what release I should use, what corners are looking at. If had to grade Talib’s impact on my career, I’d give him a good amount of credit on my career because Talib has been there since Day 1 with me.”

“As a team we gotta fight and get back. We’re here cheering for him. We know he’s got to do his time and whatever. I hope he gets out of his situation cool and gets back.”

Joe realizes loads of fans want Talib cut yesterday, but it’s not going to happen so fast, if at all.

Joe’s confident Talib won’t return in 2013 — he’s a free agent after the season — but Joe wouldn’t ditch Talib just yet. The Bucs might need him down the stretch, and there are other ways to hold Talib accountable for his actions.

Yes, it’s Monday, and that means the very first thing Joe read today — and every Monday of the calendar year — was the must-read piece for football fans of all ages, the words of cricket-loving, Marriott-sleeping, popcorn-munching Peter King of SI.com.

Though the Bucs won Sunday with a strong second half, after an ugly, offensive first half, King pointed out how Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman nearly set up Kansas City with a springboard for an upset with a ghastly interception.

2. I think this is what I didn’t like about Week 6:

a. Bad decision by Josh Freeman, throwing right to Justin Houston with the Bucs headed for a score in the first quarter.

It was a terrible interception and Joe’s groan at the play said it all. It wasn’t just a bad decision by Freeman, who for reasons unknown may not have seen Houston running towards targeted receiver Dallas Clark. Freeman simply floated the pass. Never mind that pass shouldn’t have been thrown to begin with, you can’t float a pass to the sidelines, especially in field goal range.

The Bucs were fortunate it wasn’t a pick-six.

Freeman was shaky in the first half, one-hopping a pass to an open Tiquan Underwood and, with enough time to make an appointment with a dentist, threw to a totally wide open Doug Martin roughly six-inches off the ground.

Freeman rallied in the second half, fortunately. For some reason, it seems Freeman has trouble with short passes. Long passes are in his wheelhouse. Joe can’t say if this is just a quirk in his control or bad footwork or what.

That written, Joe has confidence Mike Sullivan will right Freeman’s ship.

Joe remembers that faction of Bucs fans that wanted to see left tackle Donald Penn kicked to the curb and have the Bucs draft Matt Kalil back in April.

Those fat-haters said Penn had eaten himself out of his bloated contract and was part of the problem.

Joe found that thinking thoroughly ridiculous. And now the slightly slimmer but hardly svelte Penn is back in Pro Bowl form. Just watch the tape from yesterday; Penn played a near perfect game, often up against Chiefs beast Tamba Hali. The Bucs also spent much of yesterday running left behind the twin mountains; Penn and Carl Nicks.

Joe’s a big Penn fan and is glad to see so many haters have been silenced.

Joe’s raising a donut in Penn’s honor.