Thank you Glazers for helping us avoid disaster. Here's why they made the right choice in retaining Dirk Koetter.
There was excitement in the air amongst Bucs fans because Gruden is rumored to be returning to the sidelines at RayJay stadium. But Bucs fans may have fuzzy memories about former coach Jon Gruden. What do you remember? Jon hoisting the Superbowl trophy? Well that seems to be enough of a memory for Bucs fans to say hell yeah sign me up for some more Superbowls. No brainer, right?
In a word or two, not really. If you stuck around after the Superbowl for a few years you would have seen the offense struggle and prove inefficient enough to completely waste a top NFL defense until it reached it's decline.
The defense was poised to create a dynasty, but the offense never improved enough to allow that to happen. To this day, that one Superbowl is all we have to show for a defense that ranked in the top-10 6 out of Gruden's 7 years in Tampa Bay.
In Gruden's 7 years in Tampa Bay, his offense was never even top 15 in TD scored. Not once. Not only did Gruden fail to create a dynasty, he never even got close to repeating the great season he started off with, despite having a consistently dominating defense. Gruden dropped the ball.
After 2002 we never contended again under Gruden. In 2005 the 8th best defense carried him to the playoffs, only to lose the first playoff game 17-10 to the Redskins. In 2007 the 3rd best defense carried him to the playoffs only to fizzle out 24-14 to the NY Giants. Both performances highlighted the inefficiency of the offense. In a few words, Gruden's offenses were utterly terrible.
Gruden is the guy who couldn't put Galloway and Bryant on the field at the same time. This offensive genius couldn't figure out how to get his two best WR's on the field at once. Meanwhile, the offense struggled. His final two years in Tampa Bay his offenses attempted to run the ball the 11th highest of all NFL teams. Dungy took a beating for his conservativeness but Gruden ended up with the same philosophy as Dungy. Pound the rock and hope the defense can score. Offensive genius? Frankly, yes I was offended at the suggestion that Gruden was considered an offensive mastermind.
The bottom line is that the defense carried Gruden. In the one year the vaunted defense struggled in 2006 Gruden's offense could only muster 13 points per game. It was pathetic. Koetter has been dealing with a bad defense the whole time he's been here and his offense is the most consistent and productive offense in Bucs history and he has done it despite the struggles of a rookie QB and a lack of talent on the offensive line.
The numbers below confirm that the Glazers made the right choice. At the end of the day Gruden, the offensive genius was barely able to improve upon Dungy's poor offensive production.
Tony Dungy - 18.93 ppg
Jon Gruden - 19.24 ppg
Dirk Koetter - 21.23 ppg
