About Time!

orange fits with flag on field for anthem

The Buccaneers picked up their first win of the season yesterday, downing the Green Bay Packers 38 to 28. On a day that was originally dominated by our throwback jerseys, and the induction of Lee Roy Selmon into the Buccaneers ring of honor, the talk today is all bout rookie Josh Freeman. /

Freeman led the Buccaneers on two fourth quarter touchdown drives, and the Buccaneers overcame an 11 point deficit to take the W. On the day Freeman was 14/31 for 205 yards and 3 Tds and 1 Int. The praise being heaped on Freeman today is one of almost iconic status, which I think is a bit premature. He did display some real solid attributes in yesterdays win, mainly moxie and a cannon, but I still saw one glaring issue. His accuracy is spotty at best, as evidenced by his 45% completion percentage. He wasn’t a very accurate college QB, didn’t look accurate in camp or the preseason, and while he picked up the win for the Bucs yesterday, that lack of accuracy will bite the Bucs in the ass at some point.

I’m not trying to be a Debbie Downer, I promise, I’m just giving you an assessment of what I saw from my seats. The guy is giant and has a big arm, and made a couple really nice throws, mainly the strike to rookie Sammie Stroughter who made an incredible catch in the end zone to give the Bucs the lead with 4 minutes to play. Freeman also got bailed out by a spectacular grab by Michael Clayton that was an awful throw, to put is in position for that TD. He also got bailed out of an INT on a holding call by AJ Hawk. I will say this though, he looked markedly more poised than I expected. /

I’m not ready to proclaim this team turned around though, even with my excitement from finally getting a W. We still gave up 168 yards rushing, and 266 through the air. The first Aaron Rodgers pick of the game, was a good play by Elbert Mack who wasn’t even gaurding the guy who targeted, but the wind caught the ball and it fell short. It would have gone to the house if not for the wind and savvy play by Mack. The 2nd pick of the game for Rodgers was one that hit Greg Jennings in the hand on the goal line, so once again, I don’t want to get too worked up about the Bucs ability to create turnovers defensively.

I’m also not so quick to praise the Dline (although it certainly was a more inspired performance, that was obvious even from the stands) so quickly either. While we generated 6 sacks, 3 less than our total through 7 games, Aaron Rodgers held the ball way too long. It has been one of the few knocks on the young star thus far through his career, and he was blatantly guilty of it all day yesterday. 6 sacks is 6 sacks though, so kudos to that unit.

I’ve been talking with a friend all year about the way in which we would finally win a game, and the script was set something like yesterdays. Home game, some key special teams plays (Clifton Smith really deserves the game ball), and a couple TIMELY plays. The Bucs surely executed in the timely department yesterday, and thus we have a win to show for it. Can we continue to build on the momentum from this game, that is yet to be seen.

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