Some people are fans of the Tampa Bay Bucs. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Tampa Bay Bucs. This 2012 Deadspin NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read the other Why Your Team Sucks 2012 previews here.


1. Greg Schiano is a WEASELLY WEASEL GLORY BOYYYY COACH. I'm not particularly concerned that Greg Schiano supposedly screwed over all the Rutgers players he left behind. That's what college coaches do. What I find far more alarming is that there was still an NFL franchise out there stupid enough to bring in a college coach. And not even a GREAT college football coach. The scary thing is that Greg Schiano doesn't have anything close to the kind of resume of past college-to-pro flaming shitwrecks like Steve Spurrier, Bobby Petrino, and Lou Holtz. He has a career record of 68-67. He had one truly great season—2006—in which Rutgers went 11-2 and everyone went, "Awwww, so cute! Rutgers thinks it's a big boy school!" I would have understood if a pro team had felt compelled to lure Schiano away THEN.

But that was six years ago. In the five seasons since, Schiano has averaged a little more than seven wins a season playing in the shittiest conference imaginable. Only an organization as lost as the Bucs would be like: "Hey! That Schiano's still a hot ticket!" They wanted Chip Kelly and they got his nonunion Mexican equivalent instead. To make matters worse, they're already throwing around the dreaded D-word in camp:

[GM Mark] Dominik cleaned house and [...] found a no-nonsense disciplinarian who would no doubt get the young Buccaneers into shape in 2012. [...] You're either with Schiano's program or you're not. And if you're not, you won't be wearing the pewter and black this season.


Oh God, that's always the first sign of DEATH. There's nothing worse than some redass college coach strolling into a pro locker room and being like DURRRR I'M THE NEW SHERIFF IN TOWN DURRRR GIMME 50 PUSHUPS HARDCORE. And then the media latch onto the whole "disciplinarian" angle and yammer on and on about how things are totally different this time, and that the Bucs mean business. That routine sticks for roughly three weeks before open mutiny is declared and half the roster starts leaking stories to the press about Schiano being a petty, controlling dickhead. He's fucking doomed. Aqib Talib will pull a gun on him by October.

2. Vincent Jackson is your new Alvin Harper. I've made my opinion on Vincent Jackson clear in the past, but to reiterate: HE IS A PIECE OF SHIT. Congratulations, Bucs. You just shelled out $26 million in guaranteed money to a guy who has 74 catches in the past two seasons. Vincent Jackson has waited two full years to get himself a fat contract so that he can go directly into the shitter, and the Bucs gave it to him. No one is better at leaving a game in the first quarter with a tender hamstring than Vincent Jackson. And now he won't even have Marmalard around to inflate his numbers. I hate him. HATE HIM.

Drew Magary writes for Deadspin and Gawker. He's also a correspondent for GQ. Follow him on Twitter @drewmagary and email him at drew@deadspin.com.


3. Ten in a row. It's not just that the Bucs had 10 straight losses to close out the 2011 season. It's that they got their asses kicked in virtually ALL of those losses. It was one of the worst mail-in jobs in NFL history, and it included a 41-14 ass-whipping courtesy of the Jaguars, who had maybe the most inept offense in football last season. And even that doesn't come close to illustrating just how thoroughly this team collapsed last season. This team was supposed to be mildly promising. They had Josh Freeman, Mike Williams, and LeGarrette Blount. ALL of those players turned to dogshit last year, with Freeman leading the charge (25/6 TD/INT ratio in 2010 went to 16/22 last season). That's the kind of shit that happens when your starting quarterback SHOOTS HIMSELF by accident during the home stretch. And now Schiano is the guy to clean up this mess? No fucking way. The rest of this division will destroy them.

4. Presenting your new backup QB.

5. Hear it from Bucs fans!

Anthony:

Evidence of Sucking: For the first 20 years of their existence they wore orange pants and used a swishy pirate to instill fear in their opponents. The team owner (Malcolm Glazer) put his three trust fund kids in charge of the team. Their first act after "saving" the team from being moved out of town was to hold the county hostage with an offer of "increase sales tax by 1% to fund a new stadium or we're moving to Orlando." And like the dumb redneck sheep we are, we approved the tax. As part of the stadium deal (not made public) the Glazer family gets to keep all the money for parking, concessions, etc. for ALL events held at the 100% publicly funded stadium. They were also given the property west of the stadium gratis and were given money by the county to build a new headquarters/training facility. Also, they don't have to pay property taxes on any of these buildings, further bankrupting our local government. The Bucs did win Super Bowl 37 with the Glazers in charge, but that was against a Raiders team coached by Bill Callahan, who makes Mike Tice look intellectual. It probably shouldn't count because Callahan didn't bother to change any of the offensive signals before facing his former head coach. In 2011 the Glazers signed a player to a minimum contract and immediately put him on IR in order to meet the NFL salary floor requirements. To replace Super Bowl winning coach Jon Gruden, the Bucs hired Raheem Morris, who was lured away from his job as a Subway night manager with a wage increase to $12/hour. The Glazers make Bucs fans speak fondly of Hugh Culverhouse. Culverhouse was not only the cheapest owner in the NFL, but he was likely racist, and refused to pay QB Doug Williams top-30 QB money even though there were only 28 teams in the league in 1982. Oh, and they have a life sized statue of Mike Alstott in front of their headquarters. I probably could have just skipped ahead to this reason).


Ken:

We suck. Reason One - Whenever you have the chance to hire a head coach who has trouble competing in the Big East, you gotta do it. Props to Chip Kelly for telling us to go fuck ourselves. Reason Two - Our secondary is very good at driving drunk, punching cabbies and pistol whipping, but can't cover NFL receivers with a Wimbledon tarp. Luckily, no one really throws the ball in the NFC South! Reason Three - Our (very expensive, young) defensive line looks like the Crimea in 1854. Torn biceps, torn triceps, torn achilles, and even experimental surgeries like, in the case of the poor, beleaguered Brian Price, reattaching the hamstring to the pelvis with screws. Fucking ouch. I tried looking up the last time the Bucs had a player with double digit sacks, but I'm not trained as a nineteenth-century historian so I'm unable to research that far back. I could go on with this shit.

By all means.

Wanna be part of the Deadspin NFL previews? It's simple. Just email me and give me ample evidence of why your team sucks. I'll throw any good material into the post and give you proper credit. Next team up: THE PANTHERS.