Home Field Advantage: Bucs Chick

All right, I’m back. I spent the greater part of this week with my head in the clouds but it’s time to get back to life, and back to reality.

And that reality, Jets Chick, is that the Bucs suck. We do have a single win under our belts now, but then the Oakland Raiders have two. And have you seen the Oakland Raiders play? Oh yeah, I think you have.

Since we’re not playing each other and can’t do a head-to-head battle, I’ll lay out a few points to prove that the Bucs are the suckier team this week. Starting with:

1. The Bucs play a tougher team. If you take the Miami Dolphin’s 3-5 record at face value, you’ve got yourself a maybe-win for the hapless Bucs. But then it would be a serious mistake, Jets Chick, to take the numbers at face value. Miami’s losses include games against the Saints, the Colts, the Patriots, and the Chargers. Your opponent, the Jaguars, have won 4 games. Three of those were against KC, St. Louis, and the pre-VY Titans.

2. The Bucs match up badly against the Fins. So, ok, the Bucs match up badly against the Dillion Panthers, but they match up badly against the Dolphins. The Bucs D has proven time and again that they are neither strong nor savvy enough to stop any good/fair rusher. Opposing teams have averaged over 4.5 yards per carry in 5 of the 8 Bucs games this year, including that time Carolina’s DeAngelo Williams and Jonathan Stewart each ran for more than 100 yards. (Yes, in the same game.) The Tony Sparano-led Dolphins have a similarly awesome tandem in Ricky Williams and Ronnie Brown–who have 13 TDs and just over 1,000 yards combined this season–and they will no doubt run early and often, a terrifying prospect for the Bucs D. Not to mention that the ‘Fins have a million billion Wildcat plays at their fingertips (with Pat White playing, maybe we should up it to a million billion and twelve?). And though the ‘Fins haven’t been as effective of late with their tricky play-calling, something tells me that they may soon play a team dumb enough to take any bait…

3. Your defense has had some troubles recently, but come on. According to Trey Wingo of ESPN, your D is still rated #2 in the NFL. The Bucs are rated #28. That means you’re better.

4. Your QB is way older and more experienced. Mark Sanchez has 7 games on Josh Freeman. In rookie years, that’s like 49 games. Also, Sanchez is hotter.

Jets Chick Rebuttal

The thing is Bucs chick, I have seen the Raiders play. I saw them beat a pretty good team (the Eagles), and I saw the Jets get lucky against them. Really lucky.

The Jets are like that hot guy you’ve been dying to hang out with, and then you get a chance to, and he’s dumb as a box. of. rocks. and you’re stuck with him for the night. Don’t believe me? Check out the current freefall. The sad part is, it’s nothing new. I’ve been dealing with this for many years. So sure, it may look like the Jets are a decent team, but take a closer look…

After starting out 3-0, the Jets went on to lose 3 of their next 4 games, including some sucktastic gems against Buffalo, and Miami. While the final scores may not have reflected their ineptitude fully, they managed to embarrass themselves and all of us fans who had been lead to believe things would be very different.

1. If there is one game you are supposed to win as a Jet-it’s against Miami. They lost said game TWICE. Of course, in the process, they managed to have their defense exposed, their offense shown to be one dimensional, and their special teams to be as porous as swiss cheese. Ted Ginn much? That dude hadn’t made a play since the Ohio St./Florida game, and ran back two of the longest kicks touchdowns ever (no really-ever) in less than 15 minutes.

1a. The Jets made the Bills look like a decent team. Missed kicks, ineffectiveness in the red zone and turnovers are never good. Against the Bills-who lost to Cleveland? Disaster. The sad part is that even at the end they had a chance to win, but what happened? You guessed it-choke-a-rama.

2. Jacksonville is hungry. We all know what a hungry team can do against a team that’s playing just hard enough to get by. The Jets are missing two of their best players, and the QB is about as hit or miss as a Diddy track. While the odds point to the Jets winning, I know better, and this could turn out to be an even worse loss than the ones handed out by Miami or Buffalo.

3. Jacksonville has no place to go but up, and the Jets have no place to go but down. A quick glance at the rest of the Jets schedule this season shows that they should be able to make a nice run. The key word is should. Many of these teams are improving as the season rolls on, and after Sunday, the Jets can look forward to playing more than one team that doesn’t look so good on paper, but has just enough in the way of talent to trip them up.

4. The Jets have only won once in the past month. Sound familiar? They’re saying the right things, but outside of New Orleans, they have lost (quite handily) to teams they should have or could have beaten. It takes a special kind of talent to fall apart at the seams so quickly.

5. The Rookie is just not getting it done. Unless Mark Sanchez has been infused with the spirit of Joe Flacco and Ben Rothleisberger over the bye week, he will continue to make the kind of rookie mistakes that have killed the Jets over the first 8 games. The 3 pick gem against NO? The 5 pick gem against Buffalo? The last second snatches of defeat from the jaws of victory in Miami? Right. Granted he had some help and others didn’t make plays, but really? Cute only works at strip clubs and shopping malls.

6. Jacksonville is quietly the number 9 offense in the NFL. That’s better than Miami and Buffalo-and they both beat the Jets. Yeah.

One can hope that David Garrard’s road woes continue, but every dog has it’s day, and this season it seems like every dog is getting it’s day against the Jets. So yeah, they suck. Maybe not in that obvious 1-7 way, but in that-I’m going to rip your heart out of your chest, stomp on it, and hand it back to you in itty bitty pieces way-and it ain’t nothin’ nice.

Bucs Chick Rebuttal:

Ok, Jets Chick, valid points. But nothing the Bucs’ miserableness can’t overcome. Don’t believe me? Here’s proof:

1) Well, I can’t really argue that we lost to the Dolphins, too, but I’ll get back to you Monday.

1a) The Jets lost to the Bills, eh? Well, the Bucs lost to the Bill 33-20. That would be a double-digit loss. And not in overtime, like the Jets. Aww yeah.

2) Jags may be hungry, but the Dolphins probably saw the Bucs/Packers game, and if they want to preserve the notion that they are better than their record, they absolutely have to win against the Bucs. They’ll be prepared. As for the Jags, they’ve really only played well against horrible teams, so hunger might not matter. Plus they’re probably moving to L.A. soon anyway.

3) Ok, you got me here. Jets have more expectations for the season than the Bucs. One point Jets Chick.

4) Jet’s won 1 this month, Bucs won 1 this season. Boo yeah.

5) Mark Sanchez isn’t always so great, but he’s a rookie. But he’s played some good games. Give him a break. And did I mention he’s hotter than our rookie?

6) Jags are #9 on offense? Really? How the heck is that true? Did you make that up, Jets Chick?

Anyway, those were some good arguments if you were Suck Fest-ing against a mediocre team, but let’s make it clear: The Bucs are leagues, miles, eons worse than the Jets. The only reason the Jets can disappoint fans so much is because they got the city excited enough to care, to be invested. The Bucs have played with a lack of talent, lack of spark, lack of good coaching for so long that it’s hard to be upset when they fail–it’s almost a foregone conclusion. And while it sucks to get your hopes crushed, I’d say it sucks more to have no hope to begin with.

Jets Chick Rebuttal:

1. No matter what happens, you won’t be able to say the Bucs lost to Miami (a team with a losing record) TWICE this season.

1a. So you’re saying the Bucs scored 20 on Buffalo? Must be nice. The Jets scored 13.  They’re all recorded the same at the end-even if your team did score more than the Jets during the alotted 60 minutes.

2. The Jags are hungry and playing a bad team? And they only seem to play well against bad themes? Yeah.

3. The expectations were set entirely too high. Agreed.

4. Interesting that both teams have the same amount of wins over the past three weeks.

5. Again, being hot is only good in malls and strip clubs. Give it a few games. It takes time to accumulate a comparable number of fumbles and interceptions to what Sanchez has.

6. Nope, real stat…look here.

I can agree with you that the Bucs are bad, but winning begets winning, so your team is most likely on it’s way up. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same about the Jets, who have probably already reached something close to their win total on the year-and we’re nowhere near the time for the start of the annual late year collapse. Good times!