Of all the comments from Raheem Morris today, the most important was the confident talk about a return of LeGarrette Blount for the Bucs’ next game in New Orleans.

Sure, the Bucs beat New Orleans without him 12 days ago, but with Earnest Graham out of the season, there’s no question the Bucs might not win another game this season without Blount.

The good fellows at TBO.com listened to Raheem and took notes.

“We lost ‘Insurance’ Graham, but we’ll get Blount back after the bye,” Morris said. “We’ve also moved up (rookie running back) Mossis Madu. I’m feeling really confident about Blount. He looked good last week and he looked better today. He’ll have another week of rest and he’ll get a bunch of treatment and be ready to go downhill … here we go.”

Morris said he expects defensive tackle Gerald McCoy (ankle) back for the New Orleans game, along with center Jeff Faine (biceps). He said center Jeremy Zuttah (knee), rookie middle linebacker Mason Foster (ankle) and safety Tanard Jackson (hamstring) may all be available to play at the Superdome.

With Blount’s return, Bucs fans should be praying for at least the return of Zuttah or Faine. Joe’s going to need a case of Tums at the ready if the Bucs are forced to start Ted Larsen at center and Derek Hardman at left guard.

The stats gremlins at BSPN are at it again, cobbling together information they think is important to fans.

In this installment, relayed by NFC South blogger Pat Yasinskas, we learn the Bucs drop the most passes in the NFL.

The Bucs have moved into a three-way tie (with the Bears and Browns) for the league lead in team drops. Tampa Bay receivers have dropped 15 passes, according to ESPN Stats & Information. The Bucs are led by Mike Williams, who now has five drops. Arrelious Benn and tight end Kellen Winslow each have three drops.

One stat Yasinskas doesn’t mention is that Josh Freeman has thrown more passes this season than all but one quarterback. That would be Drew Brees.

And there lies the real problem;  the Bucs throw the ball way too much.

Joe has made his thoughts perfectly clear about BSPN. Outside of live games, Joe just doesn’t watch it.

But even before Joe went BSPN dark, Joe gave up on NFL pregame shows as a whole (and BSPN in particular). Outside of the NFL Network, which takes time to go in-depth in breaking down games, pregame shows are pretty much useless to Joe.

Ever since this little fad called the Internet came around, Joe can get all the information he needs during the week prior to a game, a lot more than any of the chuckleheads can give on Sunday morning.

(Joe has been known to nurse his Sunday morning hangovers vegging on his leather couch watching reruns of “The Sopranos.”)

So it was a total surprise to Joe to learn how Meshawn Johnson resurrected his old war with his former Bucs coach Chucky when Meshawn said how Chucky messed with his head (insert your own punchline for that).

“I didn’t want to be there,” Johnson said. “I didn’t want to be in the environment. No matter we had just won a championship, and I was playing fine the year that I got deactivated, I was doing great. In fact, we had a chance to go to the playoffs. But it was just something about the way I was being coached, talked to, dealt with. Just didn’t want to be there. So for me, I was happy when I got the phone call that said, ‘Hey, we’re going to deactivate you for the rest of the year.’ I was excited. I was like, ‘Oh, cool, no problem. I don’t have to be around this because my health is more important.’ Going into a building and not wanting to be there, it was just a blessing to me to be able to go to Dallas. Heck, even before I went to Dallas I was talking to the Arizona Cardinals. Now think about that. I just wanted to get out of Tampa.”

As Meshawn pointed out, the Bucs kicked Meshawn off the team. Just off the top of Joe’s head, the Bucs had little chance at the playoffs after a strong start. The miserable choke to Indianapolis before the whole world on Monday Night Football, the Bucs never recovered from it (especially when Joe Jurevicius and Mike Alstott got hurt on the very same play when they collided).

Again, off the top of Joe’s head, the Bucs later went to San Francisco and were alley-beaten (sound familiar), so Joe’s not so sure the Bucs had a shot at the playoffs.

But Chucky being Chucky, he responded this morning, and claimed he has thick skin.

It’s been what, eight years since these two shared a sideline and they are still going at it? Wow.

“I had a guy on SportsCenter say he couldn’t get along with me the other day on TV,” Gruden said. “So I know how it feels. You’ve got to have some thick skin, and you’ve got to know when things get tough there are going to be some negative things said.”

As Michael David Smith of ProFootballTalk.com pointed out, if Chucky really did have thick skin, he wouldn’t have brought Meshawn up.

The man Raheem Morris once dubbed “the driving force of our football team,” running back Kareem Huggins, must be feeling healthy after his 2010 knee injury, as Huggins worked out yesterday for the Washington Redskins, so reports Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com.

The Bucs also looked at backs Tuesday, Florio notes, with Jon Hoese and Eddie Williams getting eyeballed at One Buc Palace.

But those guys are fullback prospects, per Joe’s research, so it seems the Bucs are content with the running backs now on the payroll.

UPDATE: Bucs 2011 draft pick fullback Allen Bradford, who was cut by both the Bucs and Seahawks in recent weeks, stated on his Twitter feed yesterday the Bucs have been in contact with him but he did not provide further details.

While this is no surprise to serious Bucs fans, the reality of the situation smacked Joe in the face yesterday. The Bucs have six of their final nine games on the road.

That means the good guys will have it extra tough to get to the postseason promised land.

However, the Bucs can still get to 10 wins by winning their final three home games (Houston, Dallas and Carolina) and winning on the road in Jacksonville, Carolina and Tennessee.

In other words, the Bucs can win 10 games again this year without needing anything miraculous.

Imagine if the Bucs won 10 and missed the playoffs again, surely that would be some sort of bizarre new NFL record.

As can be read in the comments of the many posts Joe has written since the final gun sounded Sunday in London, Bucs fans are aghast as to what has happened to the Bucs’ passing game.

One of the main complaints is that the Josh Freeman rarely takes shots downfield, or in the words of former Bucs quarterback turned radio personality Shaun King, the Bucs passing attack has turned into an option-offense throwing the ball to the fullback.

Bucs beat writer Stephen Holder of the St. Petersburg Times suggests something a bit deeper if not darker. He believes Bucs offensive coordinator Greg Olson won’t let Freeman wing the ball downfield because he doesn’t trust Freeman to be able to make the plays.

For those fans who often ask why offensive coordinator Greg Olson doesn’t dial up more deep shots and take the reigns off Freeman, I think the answer is right in front of you. Olson doesn’t have complete trust in Freeman because he continues to make ill-advised throws. The good news? He’s just 23 and has been a starter for less than two years, so none of this has to define Freeman.

Wow. It’s just stunning to Joe how far Freeman has fallen in just a few months. He now leads the NFL in interceptions — more than Rex Grossman!

This simply is a chilling statistic.

Wondering what the Bucs’ bye week schedule looks like?

Well, Joe’s got a handy dandy email from the Buccaneers laying out what’s next.

The team will practice Wednesday morning (tomorrow) and then get the next five days off before returning for work on Tuesday of next week.

Before you start hyperventilating because you think Raheem Morris is going too soft on his young squad, there are league rules in place that demand players get a certain number of consecutive days off. How many that is, Joe doesn’t know.

As for Joe, as regular readers know, there’s no bye week on these pages. Joe brings it every day, and Joe is planning a couple of bye week surprises.

One of the things that unnerved Joe about the loss to the Bears Sunday was that the Bucs couldn’t take advantage of bratty Jay Cutler.

The Bears quarterback, why tough as nails, is easily pounded into submission because of one of the most porous offensive lines in the NFL.

Once Cutler gets pounded a play or two he is vulnerable. Alas, even though Cutler teetered and appeared to be on the verge of yet another meltdown, the Bears survived and the Bucs didn’t.

Joe finds it refreshing when very public individuals admit the error in their ways. But this one is a bit unique.

Popcorn-munching, coffee-slurping, fried chicken-eating, oatmeal-loving, beer-chugging Peter King of SI.com always has what he calls his “Fine Fifteen” in each edition of his must-read Monday Morning Quarterback.

In this week’s column, apparently King had the Bucs ranked higher than the Bears and this caused irritation in the Windy City. Thus, King has relented, admitting the Bucs aren’t as good as he thought, so he wrote today in his Tuesday mailbag.

YOU’RE ALMOST CERTAINLY RIGHT. “The Chicago Bears’ three losses this year are to Green Bay (7-0), New Orleans (5-2) and Detroit (5-2). They have played two teams with the same record as they have (Atlanta and Tampa Bay) and beat both, crushing Atlanta in the opener and having their way with Tampa in a game whose score ended up closer than the game really was. On what basis do you have those two teams ranked in your top ten and the Bears not ranked at all?”
— Mark L., of Muscatine, Iowa

Mark, you and many others are probably right. I had the Bucs too high and the Bears should have been in the Fine Fifteen this week, somewhere. I can’t sit here and defend the Bucs so high and Houston and Chicago not in there at all. My mistake.

Joe just finds it a bit amusing how quickly the rats are racing for the starboard side of the ship.

Now this is a story right up Joe’s alley.

Joe constantly gets complaints from Bucs fans saying they no longer go to games because of the price of beer.

Now Joe understands this, and when Joe once owned season tickets he refused to buy beer at a game. Joe would get well-lubricated before the game and by sitting in the 90 degree heat, Joe would sweat out the alcohol so, by the time the game was over, Joe was sober.

Joe also understands this is life in America. Go to any major sporting event, and fans get completely gouged for beer. To expect otherwise is folly.

(Joe, a few years ago, visited friends in Pittsburgh and went to a Penguins game at the Igloo. In line just ahead of Joe were a couple of chaps from Mississippi attending their first NHL game, in Pittsburgh for a business trip. When they learned that the beers were $7, they reacted as if the beer vendor told them he raped their daughters.)

But Joe learned through an interesting website called SaveOnBrew.com that beers at The CITS are one of the cheapest in the NFL.

Per the site, beers at Bucs games were $5.75 for a 16-ounce glass. At Lambeau Field those beers are $5.25 and at Cleveland Browns Stadium, beers were $5.00 for a 16-ounce.

But the cheapest beers in the NFL are found at Reliant Stadium in Houston , where fans can chug a 21-ounce beer for $6.00, and the Georgia Dome in Atlanta where a $24-ounce beer can be had for $7.00.

The worst culprit was MetLife Stadium (Jets and Giants) where fans are robbed for a 16-ounce beer for $8.75, which comes out to a cool $79 a 12-pack.

So Bucs fans, if you are not going to games because you claim the beers are too expensive, that just isn’t so.

Armed with this information, Joe’s going to crack open and enjoy a bottle of Sam Adams Oktoberfest.

Mike Florio, the creator, curator and overall guru of ProFootballTalk.com discusses the downward spiral of Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman in this NBCSports.com video.

Breaking sports news video. MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL highlights and more.

There’s a reason Joe refers to Steve Duemig as the dean of Tampa Bay sports radio.

And if you want to understand why, then click here to Duemig’s page on 620WDAE.com and hear his show monologue from yesterday. It was an epic Bucs breakdown for the ages.

Duemig lets it rip on Kellen Winslow, Josh Freeman, Aqib Talib, Raheem Morris, the British, and Duemig identifies the “main problem” with the Bucs.

If you can’t listen to the whole thing, (though you should) pick it up around the 12:40 mark.

Trey Wingo sympathizer Tom Jones, the St. Pete Times media writer who recklessly torched Joe last year by publishing inaccurate “gut feelings,” multiple “guesses” and revealing a shameful agenda, is now curiously trying to convince readers the Rays are more popular than the Bucs.

You can read all about it here on TampaBay.com.

Jones regurgitates some clearly garbage data from Scarborough Research.

Using a formula that takes into account television and radio listeners as well as attendance from August 2010 to September 2011, Scarborough determined the Rays had just more than 1.5 million fans. The Bucs came in second with about 1.49 million, and the Lightning had just fewer than 700,000.

This is all sounds fine and dandy, but anyone paying attention knows the Bucs have a far greater fan base than the Rays.

Television ratings for Bucs games dwarf those of Rays games, including Rays playoff games. Jones knows this, or could have looked it up, but chose to omit this pesky fact from his story, which included information about Rays TV ratings.

Way to go, Tom!

Also, the Scarborough formula referenced above claims to take into account ticket sales. That’s funny. Joe’s never heard anyone assert that the Rays are doing better than the Bucs in that area.

As for radio listeners, well, Joe could see how the Rays might win that battle. However, is anyone taking into account the tens of thousands of Bucs fans watching blacked out games online? There’s nothing in Jones’ story to suggest Scarborough did.

The Buccaneers have more followers on Facebook and Twitter than the Rays’ official social media pages, and there’s plenty of anecdotal and measurable evidence around the local sports world that reveals the Bucs are the No. 1 game in town. But showing that would have taken a little effort.

Joe’s just not going to sit on his hands while Jones and his newspaper, proud sponsors of the Rays, spread BS propaganda.

"You wanna make this team? You better run through my fuc*n skull."

Just a hunch, but Joe suspects that if Chucky were still calling shots at One Buc Palace, Tiki Barber already would be on the Bucs roster sharing carries with Warrick Dunn and Ricky Williams.

“Jimminy Christmas, Olie. You’re the freakin’ quarterbacks coach, just tell Carson Palmer to stop calling audibles and hand the damn rock off to Ricky when I tell him to. I don’t care why Ricky was in Jerramy Stevens’ trunk, that guy’s the ’98 Heisman Trophy winner.”

But Chucky’s gone. The Bucs are young. And they’re running damn thin at running back.

While rockstar general manager Mark Dominik probably won’t sniff Tiki Barber this week, which Joe thinks is perfectly reasonable given the circumstances, it’s likely Dominik already has a fresh list of go-to running backs at the ready.

Speaking on the Buccaneers Radio Network last week, Dominik explained that he tweaked Chucky’s old method of constant hands-on player evaluation. Dominik said Chucky liked to check out an endless carousel of free agents, “Let’s continue to roll people through,” Chucky would say.

It’s a system Dominik admits he kept in place and adapted.

“We do that now, but we really focus and try to make it a tighter group. It’s usually two, three, maybe four at the most at a particular position that we really selectively watched on tape to make sure they can really make an impact,” Dominik said. “I never like to bring  one player in at a position because I don’t think you can subjectively see how they compare to the other guy. And so we bring in groups of three or four at a position, specifically targeted, and then rank them and they go into our emergency list, claim list, whatever it’s going to be. And we draw from that list if we have to.”

What happens next with the Bucs at running back is anyone’s guess. But clearly they have to make a move. The Bucs showed little confidence in Kregg Lumpkin against Chicago, and LeGarrette Blount could be another knee knock away from an additional month off.

Former Bucs quarterback Shaun King believes the Bucs passing attack is no more potent than an option team throwing to a fullback.

The warm numb of alcohol could only last so long.

Monday when Bucs fans began to slowly shake off the cobwebs of a hangover, brought on in a desperate yet futile attempt to wash away the memories of an ugly loss to the Bears Sunday, Bucs fans grew angrier by the moment.

Angry about how the Bucs offense has sputtered worse than a 1989 Cavalier. Angry with silly personal fouls. Angry that a second-round draft pick of a wide receiver is thrown at just once and isn’t even on the field for much of the fourth quarter when his big-play abilities are needed most. Angry at teammates griping at quarterback Josh Freeman. Angry that a team yet again sleep walks through much of the game until a light bulb flashes over their head that, yes, there is a game in progress and it’s the fourth quarter.

But what fueled the angst of most Bucs fans has been the stunning regression of  Freeman. His four interceptions Sunday gave many Bucs fans disturbing acid flashbacks to the notorious Trent Dilfer wearing a Terry Bradshaw facemask circa 1974.

But count former Bucs quarterback Shaun King as one of the fortune tellers.

King, one of just three quarterbacks in franchise history to lead the Bucs to an NFC championship game, now a co-host with Toby David on the “too Jewish” (Blazing Saddles reference) sounding “King David Show” heard on WQYK-AM 1010, spoke Monday that he saw this coming, but maybe not this bad.

King, before the season, expected the Bucs to take a step back and forecast a 7-9 record for the 2011 season and began talking about the loss to the Bears.

“I could see this coming before the season, I tried to tell you people,” King said. “The offense just doesn’t have a dynamic weapon.”

King went on to rail how impotent the Bucs passing attack has become.

“Look, 5.2 yards a pass is like an option offense that throws to the fullback all the time!”

The problem with that is Tommie Frazier and Tom Rathman aren’t walking through the front door of One Buc Palace any time soon. Nor should they be.

The answers to the Bucs ills lies not in the living room of Clinton Portis or Tiki Barber or Larry Johnson (yes, Joe’s actually received e-mails and Twitter messages from fans of the mind that Portis would solve the Bucs’ ills). No, the answer to the Bucs offensive problems is within the very walls of One Buc Palace itself right now.

Clearly, quite a few cogs of the offense are not on the same page for reasons unknown, both players and coaching staff alike. It’s high time they start reading from that very same page. The Saints wait in less than two weeks. That should be plenty of time to weed out what is wrong.

Otherwise, this team has bigger problems than Josh Freeman forcing passes to Kellen Winslow.

Many Bucs fans are up in arms over the Bucs offense in the ugly Bears loss (as ugly as a beating from the outfit in the gutters of Chicago) as well as Josh Freeman’s unthinkable four interceptions.

Well, Chris Harris is giving Freeman props for making plays when he had to.

When Freeman hooked up with Dezmon Briscoe for a touchdown in the second half, it was Harris, the Bears safety, that got roasted and Harris doffed his cap to Freeman for making a sharp play, so he told Brad Briggs of the Chicago Tribune.

“It was a great throw and a great catch,” Harris said. “That is a little dead spot in Cover-2, the coverage we play, and (Josh Freeman) found it. He threw a laser in there. Touchdown. Me and Peanut (Tillman) are both responsible for that and it’s a little dead spot, like 15 to 18 yards that’s kind of the hole there.”

Too bad Freeman didn’t expose that Cover-2 more often than forcing throws time and again to Kellen Winslow.

Make the plays that are there, not the plays that aren’t there!

Dan Jiggetts, Jim Miller and Howard Griffith celebrate the Bears win over the Bucs in this CSNChicago.com video.

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!

What’s wrong with Josh Freeman?

Former Bucs signal caller Shaun King weighed in with some answers this afternoon on WQYK-AM 1010. And there were multiple reasons offered.

In no particular order, reason No. 1 is Kellen Winslow.

“That’s an issue. The dynamic of the relationship between Josh Freeman and Kellen Winslow. … How many picks are forces to Winslow?

“I’m telling you as a former quarterback, when that guy’s in your ear, saying ‘Give me the football,’ that plays a part,” King said.

Reason No. 2: the Bucs don’t have the talent around Freeman.

“They threw 51 passes and no wide receiver with 100 yards. Nobody with 80 yards,’ King said. ” We averaged 5 yards an attempt. That’s something an option team does throwing to its fullback.

“They don’t’ have the dynamic playmakers. … Yesterday was the perfect example of what happens when they try to be a throw-first team.”

And King’s reason No. 3 is perhaps the most troubling.

“The decision-making is really starting to worry me. I don’t see a guy in his drop that’s really diagnosing the coverage,” King said. “For whatever reason it’s not happening. I don’t see a whole lot of reading coverages. … I don’t see a lot of seeing holes in the zone. I see a guy who’s deciding in the huddle, ‘I’m throwing the ball here.'”

Maybe it’s easy to say King doesn’t know what he’s talking about when it comes to his takes on Gerald McCoy, but surely not about Freeman. And King has said on air multiple times that he secures and watches coaches film for Bucs games.

Regardless, Joe buys in to what King is saying except the talent aspect. No, the Bucs aren’t loaded with Pro Bowl explosive players, but there was more than enough talent on the field for Freeman yesterday to beat the Bears and stay in first place en route to a playoff berth.

John Mullin (and others) scoff at the Bucs’ offensive gameplan against the Bears in this CSNChicago.com video.