"Daly, man, this reminds of when I escorted Hooters girls out to the parking lot carrying their damn 40-pound purses."

Chucky, who rarely talks much Buccaneers football since he got canned, was forced to talk about his old club last night as color analyst on Monday Night Football.

Joe’s going to spit out various Chucky takes from the game today and tomorrow.

One interesting moment was when Chucky barked out what he believes ails Bucs offense.

“The problem with the Buccaneers is they don’t want to unleash Freeman because they have young recevers that aren’t ready for it yet,” Chucky said.

Joe’s first reaction was the comment was pretty damn funny and ironic coming the guy that couldn’t find a way to get Joey Galloway on the field at the same time as Antonio Bryant.

That said, Chucky’s no mind reader and he does his research. Joe would bet a few bucks that comment came right from the mouth of Greg Olson.

It’s clear the Bucs aren’t taking many homerun shots downfield. Outside of Arrellious Benn standing out of bounds and then stepping in for a pass last night, the Bucs threw only one pass his way. The guy was a top second-round pick from the deepest draft in history.

It continues to strike Joe how good the Bucs are with still so much room to improve.

So how good are the Buccaneers?

The jury is still out, although with three wins in a row and a proven ability to close out games it’s obvious the Bucs are better than most.

Joe knows many readers enjoy seeing what the “experts” think, and the NFL Network and NFL.com braintrust have the Bucs at a consensus No. 9. However, the two old-school personnel guys among the group aren’t as sold. Pat Kirwan and Gil Brandt have the Bucs at No. 12. Both rank San Francisco, the Bucs’ opponent Sunday at No. 20, despite their 3-1 record.

Joe’s not one to put any stock in this statistical nonsense. For Joe, fantasy football is winning a sweepstakes that sends the Bucs cheerleaders to his house for a naked badminton game.

But Joe is confident that if the Bucs take out the 49ers and take care of business against the Saints the following week, these expert types will be talking about the Bucs hosting a playoff game.

Joe’s already ripped BSPN for shamefully ignoring Michael Bennett last night, so Joe feels compelled to give Bennett some extra love.

His performance should be heralded. It’s not like the guy came out of left field. He can play.

Speaking on the Buccaneers Radio Network after last night/this morning’s victory, Bennett explained his superman-like flying sack/strip/recovery in the first quarter.

“I just saw the block and I was like, ‘Man, I need to make one of them Troy Polomalu plays.’ And I just jumped over him and stripped the ball,” Bennett said.

It was a damn special play. Joe hasn’t seen too many defensive linemen send themselves airborne like that.

Bennett went on to say the Bucs just need to keep teams in 3rd-and-long and the pass rush will be there consistently as he feels its been all year.

Joe’s grateful Aqib Talib is not in the slammer or suspended, and Joe knows Talib is a strong football player, but Talib hasn’t taken any kind of next step in his career through the first four games of 2011.

His missed tackle last night on Pierre Garcon gave Joe vivid flashbacks to Maurice Stovall’s heinous sideline non-tackle of Eric Weems’ last year that cost the Bucs a home win against the Falcons. Talib had plenty of Garcon to get him out of bounds. It was just a fail that cost the Bucs’ defense an 87-yard touchdown.

Check out the video of Garcon’s next touchdown; Talib is literally a half-step from Garcon while he’s running after the catch but gets outhustled and Garcon lands in the end zone.

Talib also dropped another interception right in his hands.

This is Aqib Talib, coughing up big plays and near-miss picks are a big part of his game. He’s a very good player who’s just not great. And frankly, as a renowned trouble-finder, he needs to be great — or stay out of handcuffs for the rest of his career.

Joe hopes Talib can take his game to the level of his potential as the season progresses.

Bucs coach Raheem Morris celebrates last night's win with the fans.

Like a moron, Joe forgot to DVR the game last night. “This Joe” was at the game and wanted to hear what hopscotch act Chucky danced through the way he talks about how every player deserves a bust in Canton.

Joe also wanted to hear how the crowd noise came through on the boob tube. (Any day Joe can get away with the word “boob” in a post is a good morning.)

Joe was seated in the press box, the closed press box, which is OK with Joe. But damn, the crowd at times was loud, real loud. Reminded Joe of the old days with Warren Sapp and Simeon Rice bouncing to the music blaring over the PA system, waiting to pounce on their helpless prey: the opposing quarterback.

It would be nice if that type of crowd reaction becomes the norm again.

While arriving last night, Joe did a double-take when he saw his good friend John Cotey of the St. Petersburg Times in attendance. Like Joe, Cotey wonders once the hangovers have faded and the fans have recovered from a lack of sleep, if they will regularly return to the house that Sapp built?

But it was another, dare I say, thrilling Bucs win, the team’s 13th in its past 20 games, and the first in front of a full pirate ship of fans.

Like more than a few Bucs wins lately, it was three quarters of uneven play, mistakes, holding penalties and dropped passes, and then one glorious quarter of Josh Freeman lunging and LeGarrette Blount lumbering.

Did the Bucs make the most of their moment in the spotlight? That depends on the patience of fans and viewers.

Joe is of the mind that no, the fans won’t return in droves due solely to the game last night. What will bring the fans back is if the Bucs prove last night was not an aberration. If the Bucs continue to win, the fans will continue to return and if the Bucs do make a playoff run, another sellout or two is not out of the question.

Joe is trying to shake the cobwebs out of his head after three hours of sleep. He’s got a massive mug of java at his right hand and is sure it won’t be his last blast of caffeine this morning.

For a second this morning through the fog of sleep deprivation, Joe thought all of those yellow flags lying on the ground of the stadium last night was some form of a nightmare.

It wasn’t. The Bucs were flagged more than an undispiplined high school team. But as Donald Penn told Joe last night, a win is all that matters.

That’s the point made by Joe Henderson of the Tampa Tribune. Unlike college football, AP voters do not determine the beauty of wins. A win is a win.

I know it has been a while since the Bucs were on the national stage, but they really have shown the ability to play entertaining football from time to time. They have had long stretches of competence. They have entire games in which they have done many good things.

This time, they were simply good enough when they had to be to beat a bad football team. Head coach Raheem Morris likes to say there are no bad wins in the National Football League, so the Bucs will take their 24-17 victory over (still) winless Indianapolis and insist that, really, it was a thing of beauty.

“It wasn’t the prettiest win. It was a pretty ugly win. But it was a win,” said running back LeGarrette Blount, whose 35-yard touchdown run with 3:15 to play was the margin of victory as the Bucs had marked their return to “Monday Night Football,” with a sellout crowd at Ray-Jay.

Look, if the Bucs make the playoffs — no, Joe won’t break down the percentages of teams that start 3-1 that make the postseason but Joe’s gotta hunch it’s pretty good — not one person is going to wring hands over how the Bucs won on a Monday night in early October.

If the win was ugly, good. Learn from it. There are 12 more games to improve.

America, welcome to LeGarrette Blount.

The man gets stronger as games go on. If Adrian Clayborn is Raheem Morris’  part-man-part-beast “Boy Dog,” than Blount is some cross between a human and an F-150. Other than the Bucs, no team can claim it has stopped Bount in his career.

Again, Blount got his touches last night and look what happened. He broke one, and was punishing to the point that Ronde Barber and various postgame pundits on NFL Network were talking about how it’s obvious that the Colts’ defense didn’t want to tackle him. Looking back, it almost seems like the Bucs committed a crime against humanity for burying Blount on the bench against the undefeated Lions.  

Joe hates to jinx Blount, but he hasn’t fumbled this season, and Joe suspects Blount would have little trouble ramping up the Bucs offense another notch if he saw more action on third down. Obviously, he’s the most dangerous weapon they have coming out of the backfield, even in the passing game.

Last night was to showcase the no-name, rising Bucs on national TV, and it’s Blount who walked off the field with superstar status and 127 yards on 25 carries. The hurdling got him out there in 2010, but now everyone knows he’s a unique and versatile weapon in the NFL.

Joe just hopes the Bucs know how to use him to win games and keep him fresh for the playoffs. Last night, seemed just about the right formula.

Brian Price and Gerald McCoy walk away from their fallen prey, Curtis Painter, in the Bucs win over the Dolts Monday night.

In what has been a nasty habit for the Bucs all too often the past two seasons, the Bucs had an ugly first half.

Between limited scoring and a deluge of penalties, there were more than a few Bucs fans who wished the Bucs had never been selected to play on Monday Night Football.

Bucs defensive tackle Gerald McCoy was as frustrated as the fans. He knew his comrades, as well as himself, could play better.

So GMC laid the law down at halftime.

“I told them we had to go out there an attack,” GMC said. “I told the guys — the d-line: ‘Look. We have to go out and there and get angry. Just play nasty and get angry and it made a big difference in the second half.”

GMC recorded a sack in the second half and probably should be credited with another that was initially given to Adrian Clayborn. GMC didn’t want to talk about that. He wanted to talk about how the defensive line as a unit took over the game late, like a pack of starving German Shepherds.

“I was ready for the next play, get them down and get ready for the next play,” GMC said. “We had to force [Curtis Painter] into bad throws. They were trying to use three-step drops so we couldn’t get pressure on him. But our coverage was so good we were still getting pressure on him. We told our [secondary], if he gets more than three steps we will get to him and we did. If he took three steps and he thought, we were there.”

Like the rest of the Bucs, GMC was happy the Bucs could show a national television audience they can win ugly games.

“We [showed the public the Bucs] can win in adverse situations and that we are young and hungry team, youngry, like what Coach Morris said. We want to win a division and the Colts were another opponent. now it’s San Francisco. Three-and-one feels good. You always want to be in a position like this. It feels good. Enjoy it for a few hours and move on.”

One reason Joe loathes BSPN was on display Monday night.

There was Michael Bennett notching two sacks and a forced fumble (perhaps even a half-sack late in the game), but the Monday Night Football crew had little interesting in talking up Bennett or giving any legitimate background on the guy. Not even a sideline shot.

If that’s Dwight Freeney with a night like that, it’s a lovefest of epic proportions. Hell, they were sucking up Freeney out of the gate for a spin move that ended with Donald Penn shepherding him harmlessly away from Josh Freeman.

Yet part of the BSPN buildup of the game was acknowledging that the game was a meet-the-nation event for the Bucs. But at the end of the day there was little interest in introducing the Buccaneer not named Blount that had the biggest impact on the stat sheet.

It just didn’t fit the script.

Week after week, game after game, it seems Donald Penn is going against an All Pro player. Whether it’s Dwight Freeney or John Abraham, when right defensive ends face Penn this season, one result seems to take place each game:

You rarely hear the name of the opposing right defensive end’s name called.

That’s the level of play Donald Penn has demonstrated this year, and it’s one reason the Bucs have jumped out to a 3-1 start this season.

Penn was near-giddy after the Bucs gutted out a win against the Dolts on national television Monday night. And no, he wasn’t joyous because LeGarrette Blount kept yelling across the locker room for all to hear that Penn is an All Pro.

Penn was happy with the win… but he wasn’t exactly bashful about his level of play either.

“That’s the story of the season so far,” Penn said of going against stud players each week. “I am just trying to help my team win and I got lucky today. I played well and we got the win. That’s what it’s all about.”

When asked by a reporter what the win told the nation and the local community — the first time locals got to watch a Bucs home game on TV in over a year, Penn said, “That I’m an All Pro left tackle and that old Buccaneers football is back.”

Penn then talked about the Bucs “four-minute offense” to kill the clock and how much the win meant.

“I just try to get Josh [Freeman] time and when he has time there’s no telling what he will do,” Penn said. “We wanted it so bad, just like last week. We wanted it. Davin and Trueblood and Faine got pushes every single time. But we came out with a win.

“We showed the world that old Buccaneer football is back. Now [the nation] got to see it first-hand. The defense played great. Preston Parker stepped up. I can’t say enough about Freeman moving the pocket and getting first downs.

“But a win is all that matters.”

Some fans might be talking about the Bucs going for it on 4th-and-1 to end the game, but Joe’s way more impressed by the go-for-it call on 4th-and-1 near the end of the third quarter in field goal range trailing by a touchdown.

That one saw Josh Johnson trot under center for his first snap of the game and run the option right for seven yards. LeGarrette Blount was with him, but Johnson calmly ran the keeper.

What a ballsy and stout call by Greg Olson and Raheem Morris.

Following that play, Chucky said on the TV broadcast that the Bucs aren’t using Johnson as much because they only have two quarterbacks on the roster. The implication was the Bucs are being cautious to avoid an injury to Johnson in the open field.

Joe hopes that’s not the case. Johnson’s got plenty to contribute. Olson just has to find a way to make it happen.

Those that read Joe regularly know where Joe’s going with the headline here. The Bucs have now stuffed the run in a big way in two consecutives games.

That hasn’t happened since somewhere before December 2008.

Tonight against the Colts, the Bucs kept the bad guys to 18 rushes for 62 yards, most in the first quarter. The Bucs tightened up in a huge way, and it was from the defensive line, not heroics from the second level. Last week, big bad Michael Turner only found 20 yards on the ground.

Is a new era of run-stuffing upon us? Frank Gore should answer that question Sunday.

With 14 penalties, many of the extreme bonehead variety, this W won’t go down as pretty. But when it mattered most, Josh Freeman ran the ball with authority and LeGarrette Blount was dominant.

Joe also must give his due to the Bucs’ defensive line, which came up with massive sacks on the Colts’ two drives before their desperation final effort — the first to Gerald McCoy, the second to a combined effort of Michael Bennett and Adrian Clayborn.

There are no bad wins in the NFL, even though the Bucs let an inferior opponent stay in the game. The Bucs are 3-1. Stay with Joe for much more through the night and when the sun comes up.

So the Bucs finally return to Monday Night Football at home in Tampa. Have at it boys and girls. Now behave. 🙂

The Bucs and the Dolts have released their inactives for tonight’s game.

Bucs: Sammie Stroughter, Allen Bradford, Anthony Gaitor, Derek Hardman, James Lee, Zacck Pianalto and Frank Okam.

Dolts: Kerry Collins, Anthony Gonzalez, Peyton Manning, Kevin Thomas, Ernie Sims, Ryan Diem and Fili Moala.

Week 4
Dolts at Bucs
Kickoff: 8:30 p.m.
TV: BSPN, WFTS-TV Channel 28 in the Tampa Bay area.
Radio: Buccaneers Radio Network (in Tampa WFUS-FM, 103.5 and WDAE-AM, 620); Sirius Channel 93.
Weather: Per Accuweather.com, bring your jackets — when is the last time you wore one? By Florida standards, the game will get chilly. Tailgating will be perfect with temperatures in the 70s but once the sun sets, it will get cool enough where a sweatshirt or a jacket will be needed. Temperature at kickoff will be 70 and will drop as the game continues. By the time you leave the stadium, temperature should be 64. No rain whatsoever is expected.
Odds: Per SportsBook.com, Bucs -10.5.
Outlook: This is a game Bucs fans have been waiting for since the last time the Bucs hosted the Dolts. Monday Night Football. Prime time. National attention. The spotlight of the nation focused on the intersection of Dale Mabry Highway and Tampa Bay Blvd. This time the attention won’t be on the Dolts and quarterback Peyton Manning, who is sidelined by a neck injury and his career hangs in the balance. Perhaps if he didn’t bounce around like a banshee all the time or witness first-hand Tom Brady march up and down the field on his team in the postseason so often, Manning would have had less wear and tear on his neck? With the possible exception of Jay Cutler, no NFL quarterback pouts better than Manning. Joe hopes he attends tonight’s game and pouts while Josh Freeman directs the Bucs offense multiple times across the goal line. In Joe’s eyes, the game comes down to the line of scrimmage. If the Bucs can stop the run like they did against the Dixie Chicks, Joe likes the Bucs chances. Joe will take his risks with Curtis Painter making his first NFL start. … Look for the Dolts to try to take advantage of what is now a true hole in the Bucs secondary. With Cody Grimm lost for the season (again), Joe is certain the Dolts will throw at Corey Lynch and Larry Asante. Of course, Drew Brees tried the same tactic last year and it blew up in his face. Again, if the Bucs stop the run and don’t turn the ball over, they should win. Don’t use the Steelers-Dolts game last week as a standard. The Steelers are horribly beat up on the offensive line and for some reason, the Steelers are gagging up tons of rushing yards a game this season.

Derek “Old School” Fournier of WhatTheBuc.net gives his weekly take on the Bucs, this time of course focusing on tonight’s game with the Dolts.

Oatmeal-loving, popcorn-shoveling Peter King, of Sports Illustrated fame, is out with his weekly rankings of NFL Teams and the Bucs have climbed to No. 7.

In his Monday Morning Quarterback column on SI.com, King predicts the Bucs to win 24-9 tonight, and it seems that win already is factored in to his ranking.