One of Joe’s favorite stories about the greatest basketball team ever assembled, the 1984 U.S. Olympic men’s squad, was when coach Bob Knight took the team on a barnstorming tour just prior to the Olympics.

Knight used these stops as both a scrimmage and a grueling practice, knowing that his backups were likely better than any other team in the world.

In a particular practice at an Indiana high school gym that seats over 10,000, Knight abruptly halted a practice after Oklahoma forward Wayman Tisdale had a defensive stop.

Knight had ridden Tisdale mercilessly throughout the practices for his lack of defensive hustle. In Knight’s eyes, if one couldn’t play defense, one couldn’t play basketball.

Knight stopped practice and demanded someone bring him a magic marker. Knight walked to where Tisdale was standing on the court, knelt down and wrote on the basketball floor with the magic marker “Wayman Tisdale played defense” and wrote the day’s date below.

That story raced through Joe’s mind when linebacker Quincy Black picked off a Drew Brees pass late in the game in the end zone. It was a play that turned the game and all but sealed the win.

Joe just wanted to run on the field and spray paint “Quincy Black made a play.”

Joe has been harsh on Black over the past few years. While people screamed bloody murder over Barrett Ruud not making plays, Joe wondered why the same standards were never applied to Black? Joe can think of four splash plays now that Black has made in not quite three seasons.

“It was man-to-man defense and Drew Brees doesn’t make those mistakes that often,” Black said of his interception, which was a drag route and Black was assigned to John Gilmore. “I was at the right place at the right time.”

Black didn’t seem to want to talk about the Bucs stirring win over the Saints. He surely didn’t want to talk about the alley-beating the 49ers laid upon them last week when Joe asked how the Bucs made such a dramatic bounce-back in a week.

“That doesn’t matter,” Black said.”We won the game today and we have a game in London next week that we have to prepare for that.”

The defense rose to the occasion today forcing four turnovers and Black, for a change, was a big part of that at a critical time no less.

“To create turnovers at home, the crowd was going and it was an exciting atmosphere,” Black said. “Glad to get out with a ‘W.'”

Joe only hopes Black’s play today is a harbinger of things to come.

First, the really good news. Earnest Graham told Joe he feels 100 percent coming out of the Saints game. No bruises. No tweaks. No cobwebs in his head.

And considering Graham ran for 109 yards on just 17 carries and Joe can’t find anyone that thinks LeGarrette Blount will play Sunday in England, that was critical, especially considering Graham’s history of injuries.

Watching Graham rekindle his 2007 glory today, Joe wondered briefly whether Graham could be more versatile and dangerous than Blount?

Don’t get Joe wrong, Joe thinks Blount is a stud, but Graham was stellar, running hard and flashing elusiveness Blount doesn’t have.  Joe asked Donald Penn about Graham, and Penn suggested Graham might be the better back.

“We knew Earnest Graham was going to bring it to the table. You remember that year when he came in and took over for Cadillac and almost had 1,000 yard rushing? We knew Earnest Graham would come through. Earnest Graham knew Earnest Graham he would come through,” Penn said.

“You know, he’s a veteran. Blount’s still learning and he’s got a great guy to learn from, but you know Earnest Graham has been there a lot. He knows how to read those holes a little better. You know, Blount’s still learning. You know, Blount’s probably going to sit down with E.G. and watch this film and be like, ‘Damn, OK. Let me see what [Graham’s] seeing.’ And it’s going to help him out. We’re going to be a lot better.”

Joe’s just grateful right now that the Bucs can afford to have Blount miss the Bears game Sunday (then rest/rehab during the bye week) and really get his knee healthy. The Bears have one of the worst run defenses in the NFL, which doesn’t hurt.

As for Graham, he says he’s down to 225 pounds, from 235 as a fullback in 2010, and looking to get down to his 2007 playing weight of 220 soon. He said he’s feeling some extra quickness. And Joe’s pretty sure everyone saw it.

Just an injury update here on center/captain Jeff Faine, who left the game with a bicep injury midway through today’s beating of the Saints.

After the game, Faine said there’s a slim chance he would return next Sunday in England but the likely scenario would have him back on the field in New Orleans on Nov. 6 to face the Saints.

Faine wasn’t too downtrodden and spoke warmly of the Bucs’ resiliency.

Joe has been a big Jeremy Zuttah fan from Day 1. As a rookie, he started four games to replace an injured Davin Joseph.

Zuttah’s name was never mentioned by Gene Deckerhoff. And for an offensive lineman, there can be no greater praise.

When Bucs center Jeff Faine went down with a right bicep injury today, Zuttah, who was starting at left guard, made the transition smoothly back to center.

Last year when Faine went down with an injury, Zuttah again stepped in and one could argue the offensive line may have been better. It certainly wasn’t worse.

Zuttah just shrugged off the move in mid-game. Just another day at the office, Zuttah suggested.

“It is what it is,” Zuttah said. “I played way more at center this year in practice than any other position. So it didn’t bother me.”

As for having to flip positions in the middle of a game, Zuttah said, “You have to do what you have to do sometimes, yeah.”

Zuttah didn’t want to talk about himself so much, but rather the win. After getting mugged on the streets of San Francisco last week known better as the Massacre at Candlestick, it was a fantastic bounce-back. To do that against the Saints and in the process, reach a tie for first place was something Zuttah and the rest of his teammates were celebrating.

“It’s nice to get a win over such a good team,” Zuttah said. “This is the Saints and Drew Brees.”

Zuttah gave a lot of credit to the Bucs defense. It was the Bucs defense that forced four turnovers and allowed the offense to not panic. The Bucs’ offense didn’t need to score a touchdown each possession.

“The defense did a great job,” Zuttah said. “We still have to do a better job of scoring points when we get down there. We need to turn some of those three points into seven points. The defense helped us out. We have to help them out too.”

The comeback of Tanard Jackson still amazes Joe. What an unreal physical and mental challenge. Joe had a man-to-blogger conversation with Aqib Talib after the Bucs-Saints game to get his take on Jackson’s return.

JoeBucsFan.com: Tanard Jackson’s on the couch and working out himself for a year and comes back and plays well against one of the best offenses in the league and even gets a pick. What does that say to you?

Aqib Talib: Man, he was out, but I assure you he wasn’t on the couch though. He wasn’t just at home on the couch, you know what I’m saying. He held up pretty good. He cramped a little bit at the end. While he was out he worked. He worked hard. And I know because half the offseason I was working with him. So he wasn’t home on the couch.

Joe: Fans might be wondering what’s the value of training camp and preseason when a guy can come back like that and perform at a high level? Does that mean training camp isn’t as valuable as everyone thinks it is?

Talib: No. Everbody their own person. I’m sure he would have been in even better shape if he was in camp. So training camp is important. But everyone is their own person. You know I don’t speak for everybody.

Joe: When you guys were working out through the lockout, what were you doing?

Talib: Just playing football, lifting weights, playing football. That’s what we did. Football drills.

Joe: What sort of difference does Tanard bring back there? No slight on Corey Lynch, but what’s different with Tanard in there?

Talib: They different people. They bring a different mentality to the game. Tanard’s going to come down and he’s going to hit you. He showed that tonight. He’ll come down and hit you. He looked like he never left. He knows all the calls, knows all the run fits. He’s a starter.

Roughly an hour after the Bucs beat the Saints and Joe is still shaking his head, but not in a bad way.

This is why Joe doesn’t like to gamble on the NFL. What sober person saw this coming?

A defense that was beaten like an unwanted stepchild last week by the 49ers, without one of its best players (Gerald McCoy) and so desperate for a safety it started a guy who had a grand total of four practices in the past 54 weeks, and facing Drew Brees no less, forced four turnovers.

A team that was without its best running back, relying on a 31-year old tailback, a senior citizen by NFL standards, ran for over 100 yards.

A team that has been pistol-whipped by the Saints at home the past two seasons turned the tables and did the same to the Saints.

The Bucs are now in first place, tied with the Saints for the NFC South lead and currently holding the tiebreaker edge and undefeated in the division through five games.

A stunning turn of events along Dale Mabry Highway.

What a game!

Damn, Joe is wiped out. Joe nearly had a stroke at the Bucs’ reluctance to run the ball to kill the clock late in the fourth quarter, and kill the clock at the end of the first half. And the Bucs only once handed the ball off on consecutive plays before the close-out drive by Joe’s count.

But it didn’t matter. Josh Freeman turned in a beast of a game in a “signature” matchup against Drew Brees. Freeman won the battle, even though it wasn’t his greatest performance.

A 109-yard game by Earnest Graham! An interception by Tanard Jackson, couchbound just a week ago!. The Bucs stopped the run! The Bucs’ secondary caught the balls that hit their hands.

Crack open the ice cold adult beverages. The Bucs lead the NFC South with a 4-2 record and the tiebreaker edge on the Saints.

Stick with Joe through the night for all kinds of takes and reaction from the Bucs locker room.

OK boys and girls, have at it. Let your feelings be known about how the Bucs are playing against the Saints today. As always, any and all commenters who post addresses of pirated streams of the game, even spelling the addresses out, will be banned. You are welcome to post your e-mail address and share the pirated feeds amongst yourselves.

Now behave! 🙂

Q.: But Joe, why don’t you have live chats?

A.: They were more pain in the ass than worth it for Joe. The software for the live chats only allowed 15 unmoderated users. Any more than 15, each and every comment had to be approved. Joe’s trying to do work (read: watch the game) and too may people were b!tching about how their comments were not posted quick enough, so Joe decided to deep-six the live chats for Bucs games.

Here are the inactive players for the Saints-Bucs game today.

Bucs inactives: Wide receiver Sammie Stroughter, running back LaGarrette Blount, tight end Luke Stocker, defensive tackle Gerald McCoy, GMC, offensive tackles James Lee and Derek Hardman, and linebacker Zac Diles.

Saints inactives: cornerback Johnny Patrick, linebacker Will Herring, tackle Zach Strief, center Matt Tennant, tight end David Thomas, wide receiver Adrian Arrington and defensive end Jeff Charleston.

Week 6
Saints at Bucs
Kickoff: 4:15 p.m.
TV: Blacked out locally. Viewers outside the Tampa/Orlando TV markets can enjoy the game on DirecTV 714. The game will be available at midnight on NFL.com’s Game Rewind feature for free (locally) for a 72-hour window and will be available at midnight on NFL Sunday Ticket’s Short Cuts feature.
Radio: Buccaneers Radio Network (in Tampa WFUS-FM, 103.5 and WDAE-AM, 620); Sirius Channel 136.
Weather: Per Accuweather.com, simply dynamite weather. Kickoff is expected to be 85 degrees under partly cloudy skies. There will be a bit of a breeze with winds expected to be at 12 mph. Those winds will gradually decrease along with the temperature, expected to be 79 at game’s end.
Odds: Per SportsBook.com, Bucs +6.5.
Outlook: Joe has a very bad vibe about this game. We all have the memory of the Bucs’ seal-clubbing at the hands of the 49ers fresh in our heads. Now the Bucs will try to bounce back after being beaten up. It’s hard enough trying to pull that off against the Vikings, for example. It’s a far different thing to try to bounce back short-handed against Drew Brees and the Saints. With LeGarrette Blount out Joe is not expecting any short of ground game from the Bucs. With Gerald McCoy out, Joe expects a ground game from the Saints. For the Bucs to win, Joe believes it will be in the hands of Josh Freeman. He will have to win a battle of the air with Drew Brees. He’s done it before, the final game of last season. If Freeman is off and the Bucs receivers can’t get open, this very well could turn as ugly as the first time the Bucs played the Saints last year when the game was over by halftime.

James Varney, Mike Triplett and Jeff Duncan discuss the status of the Saints and look at today’s game with the Bucs in this New Orleans Times-Picayune video.

One of the more interesting developments of the past week was the Bucs releasing running back Allen Bradford, their 2010 sixth-round pick. Bradford gets the boot when the Bucs are thin at running back?

Recruited as a linebacker to the University of Southern California, Bradford had success running the ball in college and was a standout on special teams. But the Bucs didn’t have enough space for him and Pete Carroll and the Seahawks claimed him off waivers and put him on the active roster. Maybe Bradford will be pals in Seattle with former Bucs defensive tackle Al Woods, who played quite a few snaps when the Bucs beat the Saints to close the 2010 season. 

It’s just a growing trend of the Bucs getting plucked where they used to be the pluckers.

The Bucs have been paying top dollar to practice squad players to try and keep them around, and young castoffs are landing on other rosters more frequently. Sackless Kyle Moore and tight end Nathan Overbay are property of the undefeated Lions.

Time will tell whether the recent Bucs draft picks like Bradford and Ahmad Black weren’t good enough for the league, or just not good enough for the Bucs.

Derek “Old School” Fournier of WhatTheBuc.net peels off the onion skins on the Saints-Bucs game this Sunday. As “Old School” points out, virtually everyone is expecting an ugly game. But should they? Find out by watching the video below.

In an effort to tap every corner of multimedia to reach just about every type of Bucs fan, TBO has a weekly Bucs podcast.

This week, Woody Cummings of the Tampa Tribune sits down to talk all things Bucs and in particular Cummings discusses what ails Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman.

Unlike many, Cummings does not believe Freeman is regressing during his third season.

“I would not say there are clear signs of regression,” Cummings said. “We see signs of improvement in other areas. He is making a lot of plays but those are being wiped out by penalties and drops. He’s still one of the best in third down efficiency. With six interceptions, he clearly has to clean up some of his game. I think his confidence is getting the best of him. ‘Hey, I did this last year I can do it now.'”

You can listen to the rest of the podcast by clicking this link.

The Bucs offense is not what it was.

First, there’s LeGarrette Blount, out with a gimpy knee. Before Blount became a major cog in the Bucs offense last year the Bucs rushing attack was Connie Chung-like. Actually, before Blount started, Joe is of the mind that the Bucs had no rushing attack.

Second, there is wide receiver Mike Williams, who classified his play this season as “terrible” earlier this week.

Lastly, there is quarterback Josh Freeman, whose touchdown-to-interception ratios is among the worst in the league, a drastic turnaround from last year when his same ratio was second in the NFL to Drew Brees.

But don’t try to tell Saints defensive coordinator Gregg Williams Freeman is struggling. The long time NFL defensive guru believes no other player on the Bucs offense can hurt a defense more than Freeman, so he told Kevin Spain of the New Orleans Times-Picayune.

If there’s a guy on the Tampa Bay offense that you’re afraid of, who is it and why?

“What we do is we take a look at all the targets and we take a look at all their players. I think they’ve done a really good job of getting young and good players, but they have a lot of different guys. We don’t just isolate on one, we try to surround the formation and try to play as hard and as fast as we can and minimize every inch of grass that we can. Sometimes that’s easier said than done. This division has become such a great quarterback-driven division, and Josh (Freeman) has played very well against us. We have our work cut out for us again with having to play him this week.”

It’s a good thing Freeman has played well against the Saints. With no Blount, with Williams admitting he’s not having a good year, it will take a fantastic game from Freeman for the Bucs to be able to knock off the current NFC South leaders.

The national media is smelling blood in the water when it comes to the Buccaneers these days.

In today’s off-the-bandwagon edition from NBC Sports, ProFootballTalk.com guru Mike Florio claims smart guys around the NFL believe the “Buccaneers grossly overachieved” last year and that should be evident for the second straight game on Sunday. And Peter King, showing perhaps one of his drunk on oatmeal and popcorn moments, seems to the Saints will win because Drew Brees lit up a “good” Bucs defense in Tampa in 2009 and 2010.

Joe sincerely hopes the Bucs take out the Saints, which also would fend off the pundits for a couple of weeks.

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

Saints defensive lineman Turk McBride talks about what he expects from the Bucs offense in this New Orleans Times-Picayune video.

Josh Freeman tells a story of Aqib Talib obsessed with improving his hands

Joe’s already harped on the dropped potential interceptions from Aqib Talib, the ones that keep him from the class of elite cornerbacks.

But Talib himself won’t let them go, so said Josh Freeman on The Josh Freeman Show on WDAE-AM 620 Wednesday. Freeman painted a picture of friendly quarterback warmup tossing at Wednesday’s practice that turned into a hands workout for Talib. Freeman, Mike Williams, Josh Johnson and Talib were loosening up when Talib took it up a notch.

“Aqib’s having Josh [Johnson] throw him hard passes, up, all over,” Freeman said. “I’m like, ‘Why don’t you just have him throw it to you?’ He’s like, ‘Man, I gotta work on my hands. I have at least three miss-ops this year. I could easily have four picks.'”

Joe’s glad to hear of Talib’s commitment. Actually, he’s often working with receivers in training camp.

As the headline says, the Bucs rank last in interceptions in the NFC with two picks, a stat that probably has to change Sunday if the Bucs are to pull out a win.