Why the Bucs changed coaches

Angry Bucfan has been answering the question as to why Jon Gruden should not coach the Bucs for years. He's no good (with a variety of sub-rationalizations).

I don't happen to agree with that sentiment; neither did the team ownership. And I've already admitted that the coaching change surprised me. So why did the Bucs change coaches?

My reservation about coaching changes has to do with the value of the replacement. In general, one should not replace a good coach with a coach who isn't as good. Coach Dungy was better than most. Coach Gruden was better than most. You don't change without good reason, and the Glazers appear to understand that.

When Tony Dungy was fired, the team had attempted to force his hand in juicing up the offense. Dungy resisted, and when the results did not follow the Glazers replaced him. The move paid off with a Super Bowl championship the very next year--what the Glazers were hoping for, but probably not that quickly.

The situation with Gruden is different. Gruden has been able to lead the Bucs to the playoffs on occasion, but he has two legitimate weaknesses.

First, Gruden appears to have the type of personality where he tells players things he can't back up. Just to invent an example, maybe he tells Ben Troupe that he envisions him catching 40 passes and a half-dozen TDs. And Gruden probably isn't lying. He does have that vision in his head. But he might have a similar vision for the rest of the tight ends on the team. But there's no way that every tight end ends up with numbers like that.

I know people like that. They're generally nice people, and if you realize what sort of person you're dealing with the difference between the talk and the reality is usually no more than an annoyance.

With the Bucs, I think Gruden probably did enough of that sort of thing that he created a cancer of attitude among the players. Not a severe cancer, but one that made a difference.

Second, Gruden and general manager Bruce Allen did not deliver in terms of talent evaluation. That is not to say they were utter failures, but the Glazers have high standards for the team. The last superior defensive lineman drafted by the Bucs was Warren Sapp, and that is a problem for a defense that relies on the performance of the front four.

So, why change coaches? Reading between the lines, the Glazers thought that Gruden had lost touch with the team to some degree. Probably not to the point that the Gruden haters among the fanbase appear to think, but at least to the point where the team thought it had a clear upgrade in Raheem Morris.

Relating to the second reason I cite for Gruden's firing, I have already noted that we have some reason to think that Morris has good instincts with respect to talent evaluation.

That's the "why," in my view. Now we'll see what happens.


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Since announcing Morris' promotion to head coach, the team dismissed offensive line coach/offensive coordinator Bill Muir. Muir was originally hired after Tony Dungy was fired and the Bucs expected to sign Bill Parcells to coach the team.

The Bucs have a solid offensive line, so the team can go pretty much any direction it wishes in terms of offensive philosophy. But I don't see much sense in keeping Jeff Garcia if the team ditches the West Coast offense. Luke McCown and Josh Johnson both have arms suitable for a conventional offense. If the team drags its feet in announcing the new offensive coordinator the decision on Garcia might serve as a partial indicator as to the offensive philosophy the team intends to adopt.

Bucs boot Coach Gruden, GM Allen

I had intended to write a wrap-up/postmortem on the 2008 Tampa Bay Buccaneers season for some time, now, but I've been slowed by the fact that I haven't yet watched the final two games along with the realization that I don't really know what went wrong down the stretch.

I mean, sure, the run defense went way south. Yes, there were injuries to the defensive tackles and to linebacker Derrick Brooks. Yes, Monte Kiffin announced that he would coach alongside his son Lane up in Knoxville with the University of Tennessee. But I wouldn't ordinarily blame the abysmal performance on either one of those factors. The combination? Just maybe, but I hesitate to say.

Then today the team announced the firing of Jon Gruden and Bruce Allen. That surprised me. I thought the signing of Raheem Morris to replace Kiffin provided evidence that Gruden would remain, and I figured the defensive line coach Larry Coyer would figure in the new coaching staff.

But I misread the signs.

Morris was apparently few degrees hotter as a coaching prospect than I suspected. The team is apparently elevating Morris to the head coaching position. Joe Barry, the former Bucs linebackers coach who spent the past two years in Detroit as defensive coordinator under Rod Marinelli, re-signed with the Bucs and is the odds-on favorite to assume the role of defensive coordinator.

Mark Dominick apparently will rise from within the organization to replace Allen as general manager.

My two cents:

My problem when the Bucs dismissed Tony Dungy was the question about the quality of his replacement. I can't stand Bill Parcells, so I wouldn't have been happy with that. I didn't see Steve Mariucchi as a superior coach to Dungy. Gruden (and I said this soon after Dungy's firing) was the only available coach I saw as a possible upgrade, though I use "available" loosely.

Raheem Morris is less well known than was Gruden. The buzz surrounding the young coach is impressive. Jim Flynn of The Pewter Report tapped Morris early on as the type of coach who might follow the footsteps of former Buc assistants Herm Edwards, Lovie Smith and Mike Tomlin. I suppose I could throw Rod Marinelli in there, but the list looks more impressive without, given his record with the Lions.

So, this coaching change is a gamble. Promoting Morris might be the best move the Bucs ever made. If Morris was instrumental in drafting Tanard Jackson, Sabby Piscitelli and Aqib Talib over the past two seasons then we at least have an indication that he is a good judge of talent. At least for defensive backs. And Morris' abilities as a motivator have been acclaimed early and often.

Ironically, the Gruden/Allen combination have assembled personnel on the offensive side of the ball to make the old Tony Dungy style of offense work well. It remains to be seen what type of offense Morris tries to make of it.

Best to both Gruden and Allen. I thought both men served the team well. Allen did a particularly nice job at getting Tampa Bay's salary cap situation in order in the wake of the Super Bowl run.

Go Bucs.