Tampa Bay Buccaneers and 7 NFL Teams Everyone Overrated

With each new season comes new expectations. For these teams, maybe we raised the bar a little too high for them.

Some teams go out and sign free agents like they're running through a Sunday grocery list, other teams show improvement in the final weeks of the season to make fans believe there's hope.

Whatever method of improvement these teams gave, they've failed to meet the bar thus far. There's still time to right the ship, but the situation looks bleak for these seven teams.

7. Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Coming into the season, the Bucs were a lot of people's dark horse picks to win the NFC South.

They have an ever improving franchise QB in Josh Freeman, a redemption story in LeGarratte Blount and had just spent their first two draft selections to sure up their defensive line.

The Bucs struggled in their first national televised game against the Colts, and that struggle continued yesterday.

The team is the youngest in the NFL and it shows. Raheem Morris and Bucs' fans will need to learn to go along with the growing pains this season and hope the young guys can learn from their mistakes.

6. Indianapolis Colts

The Colts were a trendy pick to compete for the AFC Championship this year.

Of course those selections were made before we knew Peyton Manning was out for the year. Sorry Colts fans, your knight in shining armor isn't coming back this year to save you.

The absence of Manning has made the Colts, a perennial 10- to 13-win team each year into a very pedestrian team. Obviously Manning should have won the MVP award each year because he's arguably the single most valuable player to his team.

The Colts have been improving the past few weeks but still can't get over the top. When Manning went down, we knew the Colts were in trouble, but nobody knew they were in 0-5 trouble.

5. Miami Dolphins

When everyone talks about replacing your starting QB before the first game gets played, you know you're in trouble.

Yet the Dolphins were picked to compete with the Patriots and Jets for AFC East Supremacy.

Many people thought Reggie Bush was going to resurrect his career and along with Brandon Marshall, provide Chad Henne with some potent offensive weapons.

The Dolphins have put up the third worst points-scored through their first four games. Henne is out for the year now and Bush must think he got in a Delorean because he's back to where he was in New Orleans, on a bench.

Add the Dolphins to the Andrew Luck 2011 sweepstakes.

4. Minnesota Vikings

With the addition of Donovan McNabb, the Vikings were looking to add their name to conversations about winning the NFC North.

Vikings' fans have been clamoring for a Pro Bowl caliber QB as the solution to all their problems and were overjoyed when McNabb arrived.

Unfortunately for the team, McNabb has been dreadful and so has the rest of the team. For some odd reason, the Vikings coaching staff forgot No. 28 was still in the backfield.

Making Adrian Peterson the main offensive weapon again will take pressure off McNabb and off the "We Want Ponder" chants.

3. Arizona Cardinals

The Cardinals traded to get the QB they wanted. With Kevin Kolb's arrival, Cardinals fans were dreaming of Kolb and Larry Fitzgerald putting up monster numbers.

The offense has struggled thus far with Kolb only having five TDs through five games. Worse yet, Fitzgerald only has two.

The defense hasn't been able to stop anyone, which includes Cam Newton using them to give his grand arrival to the NFL.

The NFC West was terrible last year so maybe the Cardinals can still pull something out, but a 1-4 division record isn't the right way to go.

2. New York Jets

The New York Jets have been stuck on the ground the past few weeks.

Following yet another AFC Championship run, the Jets were expected to be one of the top teams in the league.

The defense has always been solid, fans believed Shonn Greene was ready to settle into his own and that Mark Sanchez had finally arrived.

Well Sanchez's arrival has been postponed until further notice. He's still making the same mistakes he made as a rookie. It's a case of one step forward, two steps backward for Sanchez.

It doesn't help his cause that the running game has yet to be established and the New York media are going to focus on the QB, even if all the blame doesn't belong to Sanchez.

1. Philadelphia Eagles

"The All Hype Team."

The Eagles had everyone and their brother talking about them coming into the season. Michael Vick had signed his huge contract while the Eagles front office was busy signing other big contracts.

On paper, the additions of Nnamdi Asomugha and Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie to go with Asante Samuel should've made passing against the Eagles impossible.

The Eagles do possess a top-10 passing defense, but the rushing defense doesn't do them any favors. Only two teams are worse at stopping the run than the Eagles.

On offense, Vick has struggled to stay healthy and seems to show up on the injury report every week with a new injury.

The Eagles should be a lot better than 1-4, and the good news is they haven't really been blown out in any of their games.

Next week's game against the surprising Washington Redskins should tell us if the Eagles are finally ready to take off and make a push for the playoffs.