In a chat with Donald Penn for TBO.com, esteemed NFL writer eye-RAH! Kaufman coaxed a bold prediction from the big fella: The Bucs are headed for the Super Bowl.

Soon.

Buoyed by last year’s 10-6 record, Penn said he’s anxious to get back with his teammates and compete for Tampa Bay’s first playoff berth since the 2007 season.

“My message for our fans is to hold on, we’re going to put on a show,” said Penn. “Josh Freeman will be leading us to a Super Bowl soon. He’s a beast.”

Remember, Mike Williams guaranteed the playoffs for the 2011 season. But with all the inexperience along the defensive line, Joe can’t imagine the Bucs’ brass has 2011 circled as its Super Bowl year.

But why the hell not? Joe’s with Penn.

It seems many Bucs fans are in a lather for the flavor of the year.

Last year, Bucs fans were jumping up and down over malcontent wide receiver Brandon Marshall being signed as a free agent. Not only did Bucs rock star general manager Mark Dominik pass on Marshall, he also passed on a much better talent, Santonio Holmes, passed on him twice in fact.

Now, this offseason, it seems the same Bucs fans are banging the drum — loudly — for Oakland Raiders cornerback Nnamdi Asomugha who, from the way these same Bucs fans talk about him, is the second coming of Ronnie Lott and Deion Sanders all rolled into one.

Speaking on WHBO-AM 1040 yesterday afternoon with co-hosts Ronnie Lane and Tom Krasniqi, Bucs outside linebacker Geno Hayes not only shrugged his shoulders at the thought of the Bucs acquiring Asomugha, but Hayes stopped just short of saying it won’t happen.

After being asked by Krasniqi if Hayes has read Bucs fans Twittering over Asomaugha as if he is Kate Upton, Hayes admitted he did but was not moved.

“My opinion, the Bucs should do what they need to do. The Bucs are well-known for wanting what they want. You don’t need a guy like [Asomugha]. The Bucs are about building in-house.

“Mark Dominik and Rah, those guys are about building guys up. Right now we have a couple of young guys that I have very good confidence in.”

Hayes went on to say in the defense the Bucs play under Raheem Morris, a corner like Asomugha is more luxury than necessity.

Look, if the Bucs were just one dominant corner away from a Super Bowl berth, Joe would be all for this move. But the Bucs have much greater needs than to overpay players in an area of strength and depth.

Hayes himself isn’t exactly irreplaceable nor should Quincy Black be. Joe also would like to see another defensive tackle, as it’s pretty clear Brian Price won’t be playing this year and he may never play with screws in his pelvis. A few more big uglies on the offensive line wouldn’t hurt either.

Joe heard Shaun King yesterday on WQYK-AM 1010 mock his co-host and devout Asomugha proponent Toby David, saying the only reason David was in near tears over Asomugha is that David just wants to buy a jersey.

King, correctly, suggested Holmes, a proven clutch player and also a free agent, would have a much bigger impact on the Bucs than Asomugha.

Now Joe is no Jim Rome fan. Joe was intrigued when Rome first arrived on Tampa Bay airwaves in the 1990s on the old 1040 AM “The Score” back in ’95 or ’96, but his shtick got very old many years ago for Joe.

Regardless, Rome now hosts powerful national radio and television shows that surely have their pick of guests. So it was eye-opening to Joe that Rome returned from a long summer vacation yesterday and chose Josh Freeman to be a guest on his Rome Is Burning TV show on BSPN.

Freeman?

Maybe there’s more respect out there for the Bucs and Freeman than Joe thinks. Given the lockout, that’s not the Bucs PR staff booking Freeman and hounding show producers. That’s Rome and his team busting off a text or phone call to Freeman.

Freeman didn’t offer anything earth-shattering during the interview. He said he thinks the offense is sharp and hasn’t missed a beat without OTAs and a traditional minicamp, saying guys were very sharp on the playbook in Bradenton. 

Asked about the defense, Freeman praised Aqib Talib for working with receivers in the offseason in Tampa — hmm, Joe read somewhere that Talib left town — plus Gerald McCoy and Tyrone McKenzie’s training efforts. And Freeman liked what he saw overall.

“Our defense looked good, man. They were actually throwing some stuff in our minicamp as far as pressures, stuff we wouldn’t normally see. I’m like, ‘C’mon guys, this is just supposed to be laid back, supposed to be just kind of going through some of the base schemes and gettin’ a good feel and get out there and run around as a team.’

“They’re throwing corner blitzes and double-corner blitzes and just crazy stunts and stuff.”

Freeman’s clearly raring to go when the asinine lockout ends. Joe can only wonder how much more national media will come calling if the Bucs land Freeman another toy or two in free agency and he puts up video game numbers.

There was a silver lining to this asinine lockout that continues to drag on… and on… and on…

The longer this asinine lockout lasted, for every day it stretched, it was one day closer to the Aug. 1 deadline that would render the Bucs playing a “home” game in London moot.

It’s T-minus 13 days to hit the deadline. But the NFL doesn’t believe that will happen.

Per creator, curator and overall guru of ProFootballTalk.com, Mike Florio, he received word that the NFL’s office in London is telling all the soccer hooligans (Joe has never been to London. Shoot, he’s never been to Europe, for that matter Joe has never had a passport — hell, he’s never even been to New York. Yet Sunday while trying to enjoy a cold adult beverage while watching the Pirates-Astros, Joe felt as if he was in some foreign land with people watching kickball instead. In America no less! The last time Joe felt this out of place, he was at Innisbrook.)  they can instead watch real football.

(Clarification: Joe is not a soccer hater. Hardly. Joe just finds it demoralizing anyone would watch soccer over a good baseball game.)

In short, that means the Bucs and a handful of fans better pack their bags for London this October.

“Negotiating teams from the NFL owners and players will resume talks aimed at getting a new Collective Bargaining Agreement agreed, which would end the four-month labour dispute and guarantee a fifth consecutive International Series game at Wembley Stadium… ”

Bears linebacker Brian Urlacher, despite knowing the Bucs would have a home field advantage playing at The CITS in October, has already moaned about playing in London.

Instead of the Bears sweating it out in October, they will have close to Bear weather in London.

So much for the home field advantage.

It’s a level playing field across the NFL when it comes to young players missing out on critical offseason development time.

The challenge/problem f0r the Bucs is the they have more young players than most, if not all teams. Bucs icon Derrick Brooks is concerned about the young Bucs, including Josh Freeman, so he explained on The Dan Sileo Show yesterday on WDAE-AM 620.

“Now that he’s a marked man, teams are going to wire in on him,” Brooks said of Freeman. “He’s the focal point of the offense. He was not coached from that second year to that third year. He missed out on that. How will he respond? He’s doing a great job, and I talk to Josh quite a bit, you know, from a leadership standpoint to make sure that he’s doing those things. But when it comes to those Xs and Os, you can not replace coaching.”

Who is Joe to argue with Brooks. And it is a sad truth many Bucs fans want to ignore: The young club, especially one relying on impact play from rookies and second-year guys on the defensive line, has lost a lot valuable coaching time.

However, Joe’s keeping a positive mindset. The Bucs open with the Lions who are extraordinarily young, as well. And Joe’s optimistic Raheem Morris will find a way to make up for lost time.

Bucs fans love Cadillac Williams, and for good reasons. Lesser men may have already been out of football after having one knee surgically rebuilt, much less two.

But Caddy has fought back from ugly injuries and sort of remade himself as a running back, certainly good enough to make an NFL roster.

But the beginning of last year showed Cadillac is no longer a go-to running back. The Bucs’ running attack was simply anemic until LeGarrette Blount burst upon the scene.

Settling into a third down/change-of-pace running back, Caddy excelled. It is for this reason that Caddy, now a free agent, is not “a top priority,” so says Super Bowl winning coach Brian Billick on FoxSports.com.

With the emergence of LeGarrette Blount, who was able to rush for a 5.0-yard average this season, the Buccaneers would be completely content with losing Williams via free agency. That’s not to say they wouldn’t like to have him back, but he definitely will not be a top priority once the signing period begins. The Rams need to add depth behind steady producer, Steven Jackson, and Williams will not demand a high price tag, which could make for the perfect storm in St. Louis.

In fact, teams in the NFL think so little of Caddy, that Billick believes there are only two teams interested in Caddy, the Bucs and the Rams.

If Caddy can be signed for the right price, Joe firmly believes Bucs rock star general manager Mark Dominik will re-sign him. But if Caddy’s agent tries to play Dominik in order to gain a payday from the Rams, well, let’s just say don’t be shocked if Caddy has already carried the ball for the last time with the Bucs.

Joe’s not on the Nnamdi Asomugha bandwagon like many other Bucs fans. Heck, a poll on this here site two weeks ago saw about 27 percent of readers claim Asomugha should be the Bucs’ No. 1 priority in free agency.

Keeping it simple, Joe believes the Bucs don’t need a cornerback, and they surely don’t need one at Asomugha’s projected $19 million price tag.

Former Bucs QB Shaun King offered a take yesterday on The King David Show on 1010 AM explaining, in part, why he has no interest in Asomugha for the Bucs.

“Worst thing you can do is pay a cornerback big money and he comes in and plays a Tampa 2,” King said.

His comments came on the heels of explaining the Bucs play “60-70 percent” Cover 2 defense at this point and Asomugha is a man-to-man specialist who hasn’t been in the Bucs’ kind of system. King added: you don’t build a defense around a cornerback.

Fans can keep dreaming. But Joe would much rather see the Bucs spend the money in other areas. Cornerback has to be a low priority.

Joe reads the comments and hears the sports radio chatter. Inevitably, when talk of the Bucs Ring of Honor comes up, left tackle Paul Gruber’s name shows up on a lot of fans’ short lists.

But former Bucs guard Ian Beckles, Gruber’s teammate in the 1990s, says Gruber is not Ring-worthy and the conversation about him should start and stop with Pro Bowl honors, so Beckles said today on the Ron and Ian Show on WDAE-AM 620.

“Whose Ring of Honor has guys in it who never made a Pro Bowl?” Beckles asked, after referring to Gruber never grabbing that honor in his 12 seasons.

Beckles went on to say the Ring should not be a nice guy competition and, if Gruber gets in, Beckles said, then Tony Mayberry has to be a lock to join him. Mayberry (1990-1999) was a Pro Bowl center in his final three seasons.

Joe’s not sold on Gruber or Mayberry, both excellent players and career Buccaneers. Plus, after the Bucs induct all the guys definitely worthy, if they continue to go one inductee per year, there should be a whole new generation of Bucs in the debate for a spot. Of course, that assumes the Raheem Morris era doesn’t crash and burn.

Joe apologizes up front if his readers do not think this is Bucs news, but it is sort of Bucs related.

We have the first casualty of the 2011 NFL season thanks to the asinine lockout. It is the annual HBO series “Hard Knocks,” which documents life in training camp for a specific team.

In answering a question from SI.com’s Jimmy Traina on Twitter, the Watchdog himself, media columnist Neil Best of Newsday, announced to Twitterverse that Hard Knocks is “dead” for this season.

@JimmyTraina: Dumb question for media people: If NFL lockout ends this week will/can HBO do ‘Hard Knocks’ or is it dead this season?

@sportswatch: Dead.

The reason why this is partially Bucs news is that, after lobbying HBO to be part of Hard Knocks, the Bucs were invited by HBO to be the subject for this season but pulled out.

Of the many reasons given was the Bucs wanted to concentrate on football without distractions, as the team would have a lot of time to make up with such a young roster thanks to the asinine lockout.

After the Bucs politely declined the offer, several NFL teams also passed, for many of the same reasons.

Now Joe hasn’t had HBO since the moment The Sopranos went dark. So it’s no hair off Joe’s behind if the Bucs were not on Hard Knocks, or for that matter that Hard Knocks is “dead” for this season. But the bummer is that the NFL Network always rebroadcasts these series later in the year.

Not this year.

Players are locked out, yet NFL commisioner/hatchetman Roger Goodell has longed claimed he’ll hold players accountable to the league conduct policy during the lockout. That means he’s crack down on alleged offenders whenever the labor mess ends.

It’s the NFL version of dumping your girlfriend and then getting mad her because she was naked in a hot tub with some dude the following night.

Months ago, after Aqib Talib was arrested, Joe talked to a Florida employment lawyer to see if such a move by the NFL could be legal. The attorney gave Joe so many annoying hypothetical scenarios, it was too much to sift through to present simply here. But the overall take from the attorney was that the league didn’t have a stong leg to stand on.

Lawyer and NFL guru Mike Florio, creator ProFootballTalk.com, dives into this point today. Florio, a master at boiling down the boring legal mess of the lockout, isn’t seeing how the NFL and the allegedly disbanded players association can get away with punishing players that stepped out of line since early March.

But we’ll have trouble understanding any understanding that allows the NFL to punish players for arrests occurring during the lockout.  Indeed, a decision by the NFLPA* to expose players retroactively to responsibility for violations of the personal conduct policy could open the door for a fairly potent lawsuit alleging breach of the duty of fair representation, which could open a fairly significant can of worms given that the labor deal will have been negotiated at a time when, technically, the NFLPA* has the power to represent no one.

Common sense applies to Florio’s take. How could the players (non) association negotiate punishments for its members when they’re not being represented? Then there’s still the matter of Goodell playing dictator when he’s closed the door on the players, who are currently without benefits and other terms of their employment.

Joe suspects the legal issues here all but seal that Talib’s situation won’t be addressed by the league until it’s resolved fully by the courts. After that happens, Goodell or the Bucs can always find some sort of loophole to punish Talib, if he doesn’t walk away cleanly from the charges.

Bucs minicamp highlights, exclusive interviews and never predictable. It’s your favorite website on video.

While quarterback Josh Freeman put up some sick numbers last year, one could make a good argument that the MVP of the Bucs was LeGarrette Blount.

Before he became a main element of the offense, the Bucs run game was pretty much impotent. The run game was so weak, that opposing defenses pretty much dared the Bucs to run and only concerned themselves with the pass.

It was no coincidence that when Blount began tearing through defenses and using linebackers and defensive backs has track hurdles, the passing game opened up big time because now defenses had to play honest.

But will Blount’s success continue to grow? That was a question posed to Pat Yasinskas of ESPN in a recent chat; Can be one of the NFL’s elite running backs given a full season?

Scott (Northglenn, CO)

From the point in the season he started playing, LaGarette Blount was the 3rd-leading rusher in the league…can he be a top 7 RB this year, or will his physical running style lend itself to injuries?

Pat Yasinskas

I like Blount and wonder what he can do over the course of a full season. But I do worry about his style of running. Those hurdles make for great highlights, but they’re also a good way to get hurt. That’s why I’d like to see some depth behind him.

Yes, hurdles look cool on TV but those leaps also open up Blount to a serious injury. There’s a reason those moves are penalties in high school football. Joe wonders if those will be outlawed as the NFLPA and the NFL owners haggled over “safety concerns” in the final stages (hopefully) of this asinine lockout.

But what has Joe concerned about Blount isn’t so much the hurdles, but the asinine lockout itself. Raheem Morris has gone on record talking about how a player makes the greatest advances and adjustments from his rookie season to his second year by working out with the team at One Buc Palace all offseason. That was lost this year for Blount and other rookies.

Joe knows there are loads of Bucs fans who would be happy to turn over the keys to the Bucs defense to rookie linebacker Mason Foster. Anything’s better than Barrett Ruud, so they would say.

While nobody’s seen Foster perform as a professional, it’s at least clear from an extensive NFL.com interview that he won’t be outworked.

In the second of a two-part conversation with Jenna Laine, Foster details his offseason preparation. Here’s a nugget outlining his eagerness to learn:

Foster: “Yeah it’s something I’ve done ever since high school. Really, [safety] Nate Webber is one of my best friends, and at the same time I’m working with him [at Washington]. It’s just something you can do -– you can do safety drills and linebacker drills easy. So I try to do a little bit of both -– back pedaling, working on my breaks, everything.

I did the same thing with the D-line when I was in college. I was trying to work on my pass rush moves so I went out there with them and tried to get some extra work in with them. But I feel like with safety drills, it’s a lot more running than at the linebacker [position] so it gets me in good shape, it helps me with my breaks, and in reading coverages. It’s something I’ve always done since high school. Just a little extra work.”

Joe suggests you soak in the entire interview. Foster explains he’s training in two-a-day sessions every weekday at the University of Washington, among other things.

Joe’s hardly advocating the Bucs stick Foster in the starting lineup, though Joe wouldn’t be stunned if Quincy Black moves on and Foster gets tossed into the fire on the strong side.

Much hand-wringing and kvetching and gnashing of teeth has taken place since troubled Bucs cornerback Aqib Talib was pinched for allegedly pistol whipping and firing a gun at a fleeing man earlier this spring in Texas.

After initial reports that Talib was a goner from the Bucs, information has trickled out little by little that the exact opposite is the case.

The latest report that Talib is safe comes from Jason La Canfora of NFL.com, who says his sources tell him that not only will Talib be on the Bucs roster through 2011, the case against him is shaky.

Soon after Talib’s arrest, reports emerged that the Bucs would release him. But according to sources, team hasn’t made a decision on the cornerback’s future and hasn’t set a timetable to do so. There’s every expectation that he’ll be with the team whenever the 2011 league year begins.

The Bucs haven’t made any recent public statements about Talib, instead deciding to wait on decisions by the courts and the NFL before making any determination about whether or not to cut ties with the No. 20 overall pick in the 2008 NFL Draft. Talib’s trial isn’t scheduled until March 2012, and sources with knowledge of the case said the level of evidence and nature of the testimony against the 25-year-old might work in his favor.

It sure helps Talib that his case won’t be heard until next season. Hard to run a guy right now when it is possible his charges could be lessened or  perhaps dropped.

Does this make Talib an angel? Of course not. He still has to face the court of Roger Goodell, who is not bound by Texas law. But it’s difficult to issue Talib a football version of a felony sentence when his criminal charge could be a misdemeanor.

In Joe’s eyes there is no better receiver in the NFL than Arizona’s Larry Fitzgerald. He demonstrates how horrid the Cardinals quarterbacks have been since Kurt Warner retired.

Fitzgerald and his acrobatic catches just fool with defensive backs. But if one is to believe numbers — and Joe knows there are a lot of statheads out there — one could make an argument Bucs receiver Mike Wiiliams is peer in the NFL.

That’s what Evan Silva suggests. The writer for ProFootballTalk.com breaks down how Williams in his rookie season put up eye-popping numbers.

Bucs WR Mike Williams scored a TD every 6th reception as a rookie, a Rice/Moss kind of pace. Larry Fitz’s career best is 1 TD/7.25 catches.

Damn. Joe knows Williams was a stud; Joe wasn’t aware he was putting up Jerry Rice kind of figures.

Later in his Twitter feed, Silva predicts Williams’ numbers will decrease next year because his touchdown-per-reception numbers are “unsustainable.”

That’s one way of looking at it, and Silva has a point. But remember Williams was a rookie still learning the NFL and for much of the season had no protection in that he didn’t have another wide receiver to take heat off of him, or a running back to keep defenses honest until both LeGarrette Blount and Arrelious Benn began to blow up.

Joe wouldn’t be shocked if Williams indeed is able to sustain his numbers.

As Joe engages in intense internal debate about whether to guzzle drafts or bottles tonight, Joe is listening to a recent interview of defensive end Michael Bennett on WhatTheBuc.net.

He of the explosive get-off, Bennett shared a few nuggets Joe found intriguing.

First, Bennett flashed a down-to-earth perspective on the D-line. Asked what he was working on to improve this offseason, Bennett said he’s focused on all phases of his game because he needs work on everything and his teammates should be doing the same.

“Obviously, the stats that we had last year shows that none of us really did anything good,” Bennett said.

Bennett went on to say he looked forward to “when Coach Millard comes in and shows us and gives us a chance to harness our talents.” Joe looks forward to Millard working his magic, too. And, lest he not be forgotten, the other new D-line coach Grady Stretz will be in the mix.

Bennett also said he’s down to 265 pounds. Why? To be ready for “a more a fast paced, fast type of defense like the old Tampa front, so it’s not going to be big and heavy and holding up like we did last year.”

On Brian Price, Bennett was upbeat, saying he talked to Price and felt good about seeing him on the field.

Asked to name standout leaders at the Bucs minicamp in Bradenton, the man who replaced Stylez White late last season singled out E.J. Biggers and Aqib Talib.

Joe’s been a big fan of Bennett, and Tim Crowder, too. Just a couple young guys with a pile of intangibles and potential.

Got 10 minutes? Go back and read former Bucs DE Steve White’s take on Bennett. Joe guarantees it’ll fire you up.

Regular readers of Joe know he pretty much ignores covering anything related to the lockout, other than acknowledging its asinine existence and the hatchetman comissioner that presides over the whole mess.

However, that doesn’t mean Joe isn’t up on what’s happening. So Joe knows very well that signs from all kinds of NFL sources now point to an end to the lockout in a matter of hours. And Joe suspects from the massive traffic numbers on this site yesterday loads of Bucs fans are feeling the excitement and ready to immerse themselves into one of the most interesting Bucs seasons in years.

Joe certainly is.

A quick look at Joe’s calendar shows Bucs training camp was (is?) scheduled to kick off in exactly two weeks, with the first preseason game just four weeks from last night in Kansas City. (Holy crap. That’s a Bucs football game.)

Joe’s not having a pool party, as Raheem Morris enjoys, just yet. But Joe’s going to stock up on beer today to get ready.

Bucs beat writer Jenna Laine, of NFL.com, sits down with Joe to share insight into Adrian Clayborn and more. Joe found Laine’s information on Clayborn’s draft stock and physical limitations fascinating. Makes you realize how much Clayborn has overcome.