Tampa Bay Buccaneers Find a New Level of Low Beyond Rock Bottom

Whatever lies below rock bottom, the Buccaneers have discovered it.

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers hit rock bottom last week against the Carolina Panthers, then drilled below that Sunday in Jacksonville, striking a new level of ineptness, embarrassment and despair.

Even the lowly Jacksonville Jaguars saw a team so pathetic, that in the end, up 41-14, cornerback Kevin Rutland picked off Josh Johnson and decided to forgo another possible touchdown, he could easily have hot-stepped his way down the soggy sideline and put up another touchdown for his victorious Jags.

But he didn't. He went 12 yards and called it an afternoon, casually stepping out of bounds with victory in hand.

Someone needs to have mercy on this football team, because it is, for all intents and purposes, totally defenseless.

After getting off to it's best start of the year, a 14-0 lead at the start of the second quarter, head coach and defensive coordinator Raheem Morris watched his team give up 41 unanswered points in a variety of laughable ways.

Turnovers? To find more turnovers than the Bucs produced, you'd have to go to a bakery.

In all, there were seven. Combine those with yet another penalty-fest, add a dozen of those. Take those ingredients, stir them up for 45 minutes, add a Jacksonville team hungry for victory and what you got was another brutal outing by these hapless Buccaneers.

With the Jaguars coming into this game averaging 12.7 points per game, this looked like a great chance for the Buccaneers to end that nasty losing streak. The best the Jags had done all year offensively was 20 points.

But 41?

How in the name of Raheem Morris do you surrender 41 points to a team that has fired its head coach, put in an inexperienced rookie quarterback and has an interim head coach at the helm?

Count Mel Tucker as another guy who has out-coached Morris and out-prepared him.

Josh Freeman got off to a good start, but by day's end, he looked like the leader of the Lost Boys. He was roughed up, battered and finally replaced by Johnson. Freeman passed for a meager 181 yards, had two more picks and now he leads the entire NFL with 18 interceptions this season.

Freeman's rating fell to a lowly 43.9. Blaine Gabbert outplayed him, threw for 217 yards and had a 72.4 rating. Yuck and double-yuck.

Rutland wasn't the only Jag who had mercy on the Bucs. Gabbert was kind enough to throw a pick in the end zone to Mason Foster with his team threatening to put up another score.

This once could have so easily been 55-14.

The defense was battered in so many ways by that little fireplug of a running back, Maurice Jones-Drew, who rushed for 85 and put up 77 receiving yards. He made the Buc tacklers look silly at times, but then a lot of runners have this season.

The Buccaneers return home with no short-term future.

Hope and improved play caught a flight out of town weeks ago.

Only despair remains behind.

And just when you figured this bunch had reached rock bottom, well they surprised everyone.

They have discovered a new level below that.

These 4-9 Bucs are firmly entrenched in the basement level below rock bottom.