The Bucs find themselves in a pinch as we countdown the hours to kickoff of the Eagles-Bucs game. Simply put, if the Bucs lose another game, it’s time to start breaking down cornerbacks in next spring’s draft.

Oh, don’t worry. The Bucs are aware of this all too well. Joe got a chance to talk to right tackle Demar Dotson last week about the Eagles.

“They play real hard, they play tough, their record doesn’t show how hard they play. They get up the field with two inside guys really good and Trent Cole is good. Then you have Andy Reid one of the best coaches. They will fight to the end.

“We have to get back rolling. It is do or die time. We have to get a streak going.”

As Joe stated before, it’s hard to believe the Bucs can suffer another loss and be playing in January. Yes, the Eagles are talented; they also stink. You are what your record says you are.

Time to man up and do the 2002 champions proud while they are in your house.

This is a cool video. Former Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb (remember him, Ronde?) talks about the Bucs offense. McNabb seems frightened by a certain running back he constantly refers to as “The Muscle Hamster” in this CSNPhilly.com video.

After watching this video from the “Playbook” team at NFL Network, it’s almost in double digits now how many experts Joe’s heard claim that the Eagles defense has quit on the 2012 season.

This time, Brian Baldinger, Sterling Sharpe and Donovan McNabb show the alleged quit in the Eagles on film and on the stat sheet. Baldinger is adamant the Eagles have quit, and McNabb calls the Philly defense “non-effort and non-effective.”

Every sign points to the Bucs lighting up the scoreboard tomorrow. If Josh Freeman can play consistent football, this game should be a laugher by late in the third quarter. There’s just no reason to believe the Eagles should be able to slow down the Bucs.

Rice ripped off sacks like few others in the history of the game, and definitely was among the unique NFL characters of all-time. “I was unblockable,” Rice said today recollecting the 2002 Super Bowl champs.

Who else starts an interview with “What’s up playboy? What’s good?” That’s how wild, wacky, intelligent and football-nasty former Bucs defensive end Simeon Rice opened an interview with J.P. Peterson on WDAE-AM 620 this afternoon.

Rice is always a fun and intelligent listen. Asked who tried to block him during the Super Bowl, Rice said, “It was a white guy.” … “I’m one of those people who compartmentalize. I move forward. So a lot of that, it’s a blur now. Like some guys remember everything. Me, I went out there. I wanted to make a point. I wanted to show I was the best defensive end in the game. I played that way. I trained that way.”

Rice went on to say he put away his Super Bowl ring when he got it and hasn’t touched it since.

Enjoy Rice and Peterson below.

Former NFLer Brian Westbrook breaks down the attributes and faults of talented Eagles rookies quarterback Nick Foles and running back Bryce Brown in this CSNPhilly.com video.

Say what you want about Michael Vick, but the guy has played in a couple of playoff games, even once beat the mighty Green Bay Packers in a January game at Lambeau Field, a rare feat.

So when Joe got a chance to speak with Bucs defensive end Da’Quan Bowers earlier this week, Joe did a double-take when Bowers waxed poetic about Eagles quarterback Nick Foles, a rookie from Arizona, who has supplanted Vick as the Eagles signal-caller.

“Noles is just as good as Vick is,” Bowers said without blinking. “He doesn’t have the footspeed Vick has but throwing-wise, and mechanics-wise, he is just as good as Vick. He presents a challenge.

“We will have to bring our A-game.”

It is hard to believe Bowers would say this about a rookie. But Bowers explained to Joe that Foles isn’t playing like a rookie, thus he should be respected.

“That rookie is like a second- or third-year player in the NFL,” Bowers said. “He’s starting for a reason.”

Don’t put off that dangerous tire situation anymore. Make Joe’s friends and service professionals at Ed Morse Cadillac Tampa your personal, high-class tire shop.  It is just silly to go to a national tire chain when you can get the same prices but far better service at Ed Morse Cadillac Tampa.

Now this is just way cool to Joe.

As part of the festivities to honor the Bucs’ 2002 Super Bowl champions, fans can have their very picture taken with the same piece of Tiffany hardware Chucky held aloft in victory on a glorious San Diego Sunday night nearly 10 years ago.

Per TBO.com, beginning at 10:30 a.m. Sunday morning, fans can line up to pose with the Vince Lombardi Trophy.

The trophy, awarded each year to the NFL champion, will be at a Super Bowl Fan Zone from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in the South Plaza of the Raymond James Stadium, off Tampa Bay Boulevard.

Other highlights of the day include all the captains of the 2002 team, along with Super Bowl MVP, the good Dexter Jackson, serving as the Bucs’ honorary team captains for the coin toss.

Additionally, Tampa resident Shannon Magrane, American Idol finalist and daughter of former Tampa Bay Rays broadcaster Joe Magrane, will sing the National Anthem followed by a flyover from two F-5 fighter jets.

See the headline above? Veteran Ch. 10 sportscaster Dave Wirth explains what that has to do with Sunday in this exclusive Eagles-Bucs preview video for JoeBucsFan.com. 

Yes, the Beagles stink this year, and Joe is not shedding a tear. Joe just thinks it is rich that the Bucs decided to celebrate the 2002 Super Bowl champions this weekend.

Even if the Beagles stink, the team is dangerous. It’s not like the team doesn’t have weapons.

This is why the football thinktank ProFootballFocus.com believes the key for the Bucs is the blocking of Donald Penn. The PFF folks, through their dogged research, say few NFL quarterbacks get rattled by pressure more than Josh Freeman. So it is their belief that if Penn can’t handle his pass-blocking, Freeman will mentally crumble, opening the door for a Beagles upset.

Trent Cole vs. Donald Penn

With [defensive line coach Jim] Washburn out the Eagles will stray away from the wide-nine alignment as their primary formation. How this impacts defensive end Trent Cole remains to be seen, but Cole has not thrived in the system the way he did last season when he was the most productive pass rusher in the league. His PRP has dropped from 14.9 to 9.8. He still ranks 12th with 38 total pressures and three sacks in 298 pass-rushing opportunities, but he hasn’t been his usual force.

This might be his chance to improve those numbers though because he draws Buccaneers left tackle Donald Penn. Penn has struggled this season and ranks 60th among offensive tackles in Pass Blocking Efficiency. He has allowed 40 total pressures and three sacks in 422 pass blocking situations. Penn containing Cole is so important because Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman in among the worst in the league when under pressure. Freeman’s completion percentage is just 42.9% when under pressure to go along with six interceptions. Penn will need to protect his blind side if Freeman is going to have a successful day.

This is an interesting thought about Freeman. Earlier this week, Joe was flamed for suggesting Freeman has to learn to adjust to pressure and, like elite NFL quarterbacks, find a way to overcome obstacles and make plays.

Joe wasn’t the only one who noticed this as well. So if one is to believe the premise the PFF crowd fronts, then Penn will have to lock down Cole, which Penn is capable of doing.

Much like Greg Schiano, Joe’s heard  a lot of “baloney” in his day. And it seems like WDAE-AM 620 Bucs beat writer Tom Krasniqi, affectionaly known as Tkrazz, digested a dose of it today at One Buc Palace. 

Chatting with Donald Penn about Sunday’s game, Krasniqi reports via Twitter that Penn said the Eagles look like an undefeated team. Apparently, Krasniqi wasn’t buying any of it.

@TKras – #Bucs are treating the #Eagles like they’re the ’84 49ers…LT Donald Penn: “On film, they look like a 12-0 team” Ohhhhhhh K

Now Joe’s a huge Penn fan, but that take is way over the top.

Film junkie and former NFL personnel executive Pat Kirwan is bellowing all over NFL Radio about how the Eagles didn’t want to tackle against Dallas and have made U-Haul reservations. Anyone can see the lost-eight-in-a-row Eagles are circling the drain.

Surely, Penn can see the difference between the and the last two teams he’s studied on film: the Falcons and Broncos.

Regardless, Joe appreciates the mentality, no matter how silly the expression of it might be.

Josh Freeman chatted on his WDAE-AM 620 radio show last night about how the Bucs haven’t seen much pressure fronts and blitzes from opponents this season, which has led to little use of the screen pass.

The way Freeman talked about it, he almost seemed surprised, “You know, really, we haven’t seen a whole lot of pressure this season,” No. 5 said. “You know, a lot of times when you set up a screen you want to call it into pressure so it looks like a back’s trying to block blitzer, and he peels off the blitzer, you dump it to him, and there’s nothing but a wall of O-linemen downfield.”

The comment came after a caller asked Freeman whether he can audible more for screens to Doug Martin.

So why aren’t the Bucs seeing more pressure? The easy answer is that teams believe they’re getting enough heat on Freeman. But that can’t be accurate. Freeman’s taken the third fewest sacks in the NFL, among regular starting QBs.

This week Greg Schiano concurred with Joe and told media that his offensive line is providing Freeman with enough time. As for the pressure on Freeman against Denver, Schiano was very clear that it was nothing unexpected in the NFL, especially from a strong D-line, and the Bucs only allowed one sack.

It’ll be interesting to see how the Eagles approach Freeman. Philadelphia has the second-lowest sack total in the NFC with 20. (Gulp) Only the Bucs have fewer.

Former Bucs great Warren Sapp spoke openly about the double standard that Father Dungy had with the Bucs, which Joe believes may have cost the team as many as two Super Bowl rings.

The neat thing about this weekend being the Bucs’ 2002 Super Bowl reunion is all the quality radio interviews former Bucs are conducting on local airwaves.

Yesterday, as Joe referenced before, former Bucs great Warren Sapp broke down crying while talking about how Joe Jurevicius, with his infant son dying in the hospital, arrived at the NFC championship game and helped turn the game, and the Bucs’ championship season, around.

Sapp on the “Booger and Rich Show,” co-hosted by Sapp’s former teammate Booger McFarland and Rich Herrera, heard locally on WHFS-FM 98.7, also expanded on a subject Sapp briefly touched upon in the outstanding NFL Films “America’s Game” series produced that highlighted the Bucs’ Super Bowl season.

Booger mentioned that when he first joined the Bucs in 1999, he noticed how Sapp and other leaders of the Bucs defense used to gripe about how Father Dungy seemingly didn’t care about the offense, but held the defense to lofty, exacting standards.

Sapp said that apparently, Father Dungy had one objective for the offense which seemingly didn’t include scoring. “Don’t turn the ball over,” Sapp remembered. But that changed dramatically on Day 1 of the Chucky regime.

“That was the difference between Johnny and Tony,” Sapp said of the difference between the two coaches. “It was three yards and a cloud of dust” with Father Dungy.

This is why Joe has never been on the Father Dungy bandwagon. To suggest Father Dungy was not a good coach is outrageous. But his disregard for offense with the Bucs bordered on irresponsible and his standard excuse of “This is the way Chuck Noll did it with the Steelers” was at best a weak smokescreen.

Joe firmly believes Father Dungy’s indifference to the offense likely cost the Bucs two Super Bowl titles.

Pat Kirwan, the respected former Bucs scout, Jets coach, and Jets personnel executive, now a host on NFL Radio and an analyst for CBS Sports, says the Eagles are so ugly on defense they didn’t want to tackle in their secondary against Dallas last Sunday.

Kirwan goes on in this video to share a conversation with Dan Marino, where they watched Josh Freeman and agreed Freeman needs to “change the clock in his head,” essentially acknowledging that he has a little less time to throw but still enough time. Kirwan suggested shorter passing routes to compensate for the bending of Freeman’s offensive line.

This is one of Kirwan’s best breakdowns of the season, and his game prediction is rather soothing.

The college football world was abuzz earlier this week with a Sports Illustrated report of Buccaneers covert defensive strategist/operative Butch Davis being a hot candidate for the vacant head coaching job at Florida International University.

Well, that chatter is dead. Per the Miami Herald, Davis is not interested.

It’ll be interesting to see if Davis’ big name is linked to other college openings. As Joe’s written before, Monte Kiffin is eagerly seeking a return to the NFL, and the Bucs could look to him if they sought another defensive advisor to replace Davis. Kiffin has Greg Schiano’s love and could actually work with Buccaneers hands-on, unlike Davis.

Of the seemingly endless public reminiscing and storytelling this week from the 2002 Bucs Super Bowl team, which will gather at Sunday’s Bucs-Eagles game for a 10-year reunion featuring all the big names, perhaps Joe’s favorite nuggets came from Brad Johnson.

The Bucs’ Super Bowl QB painted a different picture of the famous story of Jon Gruden simulating ex-Raiders quarterback Rich Gannon in practice and working with Tampa Bay’s scout team to get the Bucs defense used to Gannon’s tendencies and preferences.

Last night, Johnson told the dean of Tampa Bay sports radio, Steve Duemig of WDAE-AM 620, that Gruden’s quarterback play against the vaunted Bucs defense was more about Gruden wanting to grab the spotlight and keep the team loose.

“John just wanted his moment. He wanted to take over,” Johnson said.

Johnson said Gruden kicked aside Shaun King and Rob Johnson, who were running the scout team, and wanted to call Raiders audibles, but they were unrealistic considering a real game would have had a 40-second play clock.

“It took [Gruden] about a minute and a half to call each play,” Johnson said. “He completed about five or six balls. I think the defense let him complete his balls. … He kept it light that week. He had us dialed in, because he knew all the pressure that was being built up.”

Johnson went on to say Gruden was obsessed with his own game film from that practice as it related to his QB performance.

Johnson also told a personal story of how he and Gruden and Keyshawn Johnson were on the Super Bowl sidelines during the game crafting a play. Johnson said Gruden was barking and he was agonizing trying to memorize it while Keyshawn’s mind was on other things, “Man, doesn’t that popcorn smell good?” Keyshawn said.

Also intriguing, was Johnson talking about hiding injuries from the Buccaneers, saying he would pay his own doctors for medical testing and would demand the Bucs head trainer’s silence on those issues.

Great stuff also came from the Booger and Rich show on 98.7 FM. Here’s a link to a Warren Sapp interview in which Sapp opens up and cries while talking about Joe Jurevicius.

And this was a fun one, Monte Kiffin sat down with Booger and Rich. Kiffin rarely does interviews and it’s always fun to hear his unique voice and energy. Kiffin was very clear that he wants to return to the NFL next season, and he also shared plenty of 2002 memories. Interestingly, Kiffin laughed and explained how he broke various NCAA college coaching rules shortly after he left the Bucs for the University of Tennessee.

Recently, Bucs rock star general manager Mark Dominik appeared on a podcast with NFL.com’s in-house college football scout Bucky Brooks.

During the podcast, Brooks asked Dominik about how he built the Bucs and what went through his decisions to draft certain players and to sign certain free agents. Here are some highlights:

On drafting Josh Freeman:

If you don’t have a franchise quarterback in this league, you will be looking for one every year. We wanted to give Josh the best chance to succeed. He is in the fourth year of his five year contract. We try to surround him with talent because we believe he can throw the ball around to get it to [weapons].

The thought-process on when to draft Doug Martin:

Running back is devalued a little bit; that’s why we stayed back [until late in the first round]. He’s just scratching the surface.

On why he drafted a safety (Mark Barron) so early in the first round:

It helped a little bit with Eric Berry [being drafted high by the Chiefs] playing well. Mark Barron, watching him on tape and seeing how physical he is and how he splashes, the game is such a vertical game and Mark has the physical attributes to do both. Played consistent for all season long for a rookie.

On how Lavonte David caught his eye:

When we watched the tape of Nebraska, we loved how he was able to cover [the whole field] and his instincts, but it was his ability to be an every down backer is what [stuck out], where you can put him in the slot or put him on tight ends on third down.

On hiring Greg Schiano:

With Greg, he had the leadership everyone knew about and what he did at Rutgers looked pretty impressive. We wanted him to change one side of the ball [defense] but also make sure he changed [the culture], and the more and more we interviewed Greg we knew he was the right choice.

Here is the link to the full podcast. Dominik appears at roughly the 32:00 mark.