So, it turns out that Rod Marinelli was the glue that held this defense together.  Everyone said Marinelli was the best defensive line coach in the league.  Looks like they were right.  How else would you explain why the same four guys that were #6 against the run last year are currently #30 and had their worst showing of the year yesterday?  Another game, another 100 yard rusher that the Bucs allowed.  Deuce McAllister made the defense look positively slow yesterday and embarassed the Bucs for 8.2 yards per carry.  Even if you take away the one 57 yard run, Deuce still had a healthy 4.7 ypc.  Tampa’s two highest paid players, who also happen to occupy spots on the defensive front four, had a sum total of one tackle yesterday.  ONE!!  Anthony McFarland was MIA on the stat sheet again, posting the same number of tackles that I did.  You know who did have a tackle yesterday?  Anthony Davis... an offensive player!  In a just world, McFarland would be homeless.

The passing defense was miserable as well.  Drew Brees had enough time to go through all his reads, wait for receivers to come open, draw a nice sketch of the play to remember it by, and hit his target in stride.  For the first time this season, the Bucs posted no sacks.  Monte Kiffin‘s scheme requires that the front four, specifically the defensive tackle, get pressure up the middle and force the quarterback to hurry his throws or scramble.  If Kiffin has to blitz to get pressure, it leaves the corners one-on-one and that’s not what they’re good at.  The whole system breaks down without the right players.  On top of this, they had no interceptions and forced no fumbles.  Brees hit 63% of his passes, well above what this defense is used to.

And to bastardize a McKay-ism, they didn’t force any turnovers, but they made up for it by not tackling.  On McAllister’s 24 yards touchdown run, Deuce shook Will Allen off like he was made of Teflon and absolutely ran over Ronde Barber in one of the poorest displays of tackling I’ve ever seen, and that includes Raiders games.  Throughout the game, the defense took poor angles and got beat to the outside on several occasions.  Jermaine Phillips got handled so soundly by Deuce on his 57 yard run that he was soon replaced by Kalvin Pearson.  Special teams tackling didn’t do anything to help the cause, either, allowing Reggie Bush (I think I’m legally require to mention his name when writing about this game) to run up the right side with only poor Josh Bidwell to try and chase him down.  Jon Gruden agrees: “That’s an understatement,” Gruden said when asked if poor tackling was a problem again.

I don’t know if it’s age, complacency, coaching defections, or if every other team in the league has just figured them out.  But this offseason, there will be more across-the-board changes than you’ve seen since the orange and white days.  Write it down… it’s happening.  I seriously can’t talk about the defensive performance anymore.  I’ll be back tomorrow with a happier topic: the offense.  I really didn’t think I’d live long enough to ever say that.