PORTRAIT OF A LOSER : Tampa Bay Buccaneers Have Proven Inept in Nearly All Phases of Game

I know what I want this Christmas--I want to get out of Tampa Bay. I don’t care where I’m going, I just want out. --SEAN FARRELL,

Tampa Bay Buccaneer guard

They stood outside One Buccaneer Place waiting for the team to arrive after a charter flight from Chicago.

Five of the 12 were wearing orange Buccaneer jackets. As they milled outside club headquarters Sunday night to greet the 2-12 team, a few began discussing the 48-14 loss to the Bears. One fan asked another to determine the game’s turning point.

He fumbled for a cigarette, then looked away, into the darkness at the edge of town.

Last spring, Hugh Culverhouse reaffirmed his intent to sell the team if the Buccaneers develop a legacy of losing. Start drawing up papers, Hugh.

The Buccaneers reached the playoffs in 1979 during their fourth year in the NFL--faster than any team in league history. Now, under Coach Leeman Bennett, Tampa Bay is making a persuasive case as the most disheveled franchise in the league. A series of inept draft picks and trades, hostility between players and upper management, lack of player confidence in the assistant coaches, dwindling fan interest and a little bad luck have combined to create a crisis atmosphere.

“I know what I want this Christmas--I want to get the hell out of Tampa Bay,” guard Sean Farrell, a first-round draft choice in 1982, told Buccaneer boosters Dec. 1. “I don’t care where I’m going, I just want out.”

Since the strike-shortened 1982 season, the Buccaneers have won just 12 of 62 games, the NFL’s poorest record in that span. John McKay, who compiled a 44-88-1 mark as coach for the first nine years of the franchise, lost his first 26 games as an NFL coach but guided the Buccaneers to the NFC Central title in ’79 and a berth in the conference title game. That was heady success for a 4-year-old.

At their current level of play at age 11, the Buccaneers don’t deserve to reach puberty. The success stories of the league’s perennial glamour teams have been well documented, but Tampa Bay offers a vivid example of how to ruin a franchise.

“Obviously, I thought our talent was much better than it was,” says Bennett, who won only four of his first 30 games after replacing McKay on Jan. 23, 1985. “I thought we could turn it around in a short period of time, but anyone who takes an NFL head coaching job feels he is the answer. Our fans are frustrated and so are we. It’s already proven that they will support a losing team when it’s new, but when the newness wears off, they’ve got to feel we’ve got a chance to win.”

After beating Buffalo 34-28 on Nov. 2, Tampa Bay lost its next five games by an average margin of 26 points. Despite a defense-oriented draft, the Buccaneers have yielded the most yards and points in the league and the offense has surpassed the 20-point plateau just twice. In what will surely evolve into one of the great lost statistics of ‘86, Tampa Bay defensive linemen combined for a mere 6 1/2 sacks in the first 14 games--none since game six.

Pity the person in charge of the club’s highlight film.

Speculation over Bennett’s dismissal has circulated on radio talk shows every day the last two months. Although he still has at least two more years left on his contract, Bennett knows Culverhouse is contemplating change. When in doubt, fire the coach. That’s the way of the world in professional sports.

But the Buccaneer problems go far beyond Leeman Bennett, who earned two NFC Coach of the Year awards in six seasons at Atlanta. Fired by the Falcons after a playoff season in 1982, Bennett was out of football for two seasons before coming to Tampa.

“I like Phil Krueger, he’s a good financial man and a good football man,” says San Francisco 49er Vice President and General Manager John McVay, whose son, Jim, recently joined the Buccaneers as marketing director.

Not everyone is equally respectful of Krueger, a former college coach who was named assistant to Culverhouse nine years ago. One player, who requested anonymity, called Krueger a “cancer on the team.” Asked if he thought he was speaking for a majority of the players, he said: “No question about it.”

Krueger, who left a head coaching job at Utah State in 1975 to become the first assistant coach hired by McKay, is the chief contract negotiator. He describes himself as an administrator, not a general manager. He claims observers often exaggerate his influence in personnel and draft decisions.

“The coach has always had the final say,” Krueger says. “There have been people brought in that I didn’t like as players, but my job is to sign them.”

Two that got away were Doug Williams and Bo Jackson. Williams, a black quarterback whose leadership often overcame unrefined technique, joined the U.S. Football League after the 1982 season because of a contract dispute. The inability to sign the club’s catalyst helped form a rift along racial lines.

“We were affected negatively quite a bit by the strike,” Krueger says. “It created a split among management and players. When this team was winning, we had a love affair here and it was fun. We had a chemistry in 1979 and 1981. After the strike, there wasn’t a good feeling between the players and management. We weren’t able to get Doug Williams signed and we had a very poor year (2-14) in 1983. Our hopes were high in ’84 but we lost some very close games. I thought going into this season we had the best raw talent in my 11 years here, but the internal chemistry hasn’t developed.”

Nor have the club’s draft choices for most of the last seven years. After drafting defensive end Lee Roy Selmon in 1976 with the first pick in franchise history and selecting Williams in the opening round in 1978, Tampa Bay has made an alarming number of inept draft picks.

The No. 1 choice in 1979 was traded to Chicago for Wally Chambers, a defensive end who played just 28 games for the Buccaneers. In 1982, the club dealt the first-round choice in the ’83 draft to the Bears for the right to select defensive end Booker Reese, who made seven starts as a Buccaneer. What turned out to be the top pick in the 1984 draft was dealt to Cincinnati for quarterback Jack Thompson, who lasted all of two seasons. A second-round pick in last year’s draft was sent to Denver for Thompson’s successor, Steve DeBerg, who is now backing up Steve Young.

“Money is no consideration,” Culverhouse said after the 1986 draft when Tampa Bay chose Jackson with the league’s No. 1 pick. Jackson stopped by Tampa to visit some Buccaneer players. They went to a posh restaurant and were joined by Miami linebacker Hugh Green. The same Hugh Green who walked out of One Buccaneer Place 14 months ago complaining about the inflexible scheme of defensive coordinator Doug Shively.

Shortly after hearing Green’s version of Pass The Buc, Jackson announced he would pursue a career in baseball.

“Losing Jackson was quite a blow,” says Bennett, who often praised the 1985 Heisman Trophy winner as the best running back prospect since O.J. Simpson. “The common denominators of winning franchises are organization, philosophy and belief. Everyone in those franchises realizes that we’re all here to give ourselves the best chance to win. Mr. Culverhouse wants to win--whether it’s a $5 Nassau golf game or a football game.”

Two months ago, Bennett began to question whether some players wanted to win. One day after a dreadful 38-7 loss in New Orleans, Bennett announced the release of three veterans, including four-time Pro Bowl tight end Jimmie Giles. Wide receiver Kevin House and running back Ron Springs were also waived in a sweeping move that rid the club of disgruntled, high-priced talent.

“It was simply their lack of production,” says Bennett, who was forced to recall Springs when injuries depleted his backfield. “Their attitude had nothing to do with the decision.”

One ex-Buccaneer, waived several years ago, does not believe Bennett’s explanation.

“That move came from the top and was dictated by the size of their salaries,” he says. “It certainly wasn’t based on talent because Giles is playing and catching touchdowns for Detroit and House is playing for the Rams. There used to be a real togetherness between Tampa Bay players and their fans. Right now, there’s a moat between them.”

The Buccaneers do not have an official with the title of general manager. And Bennett would welcome a capable executive along the lines of Washington’s Bobby Beathard or New Orleans’ Jim Finks to help build a contender. The crowd for the Dec. 14 game against Green Bay could break the club’s record for low attendance (25,577) at 72,000-seat Tampa Stadium.

“For me to continue to show up, they’ll have to play better than this,” says Todd Laufenberg, 24, of Largo, Fla., who has attended at least one Buccaneer game a year since 1976. “As bad as they are, I still like the team and I think they could be competitive in a year or two . . . but they won’t. I don’t like the way Bennett runs the offense, but I don’t think it’s really his fault they’re so low. They were fun to watch in their expansion season, but they’re not fun to watch anymore.”

The 1979 season was the best thing that ever happened to the Buccaneers--and the most damaging. The euphoria about reaching the NFC title game in only four years hurt McKay’s ability to assess his team. That ’79 team led the league in defense but the offense was mediocre, illustrated by the 9-0 loss to the Rams that propelled Los Angeles into the Super Bowl. The 1981 team returned to the playoffs with a 9-7 mark, but next year’s model (5-4) allowed more points than Tampa Bay scored while securing another postseason berth.

McKay won just eight more games in his final two seasons and the 2-14 record in 1983 left him lashing out in all directions.

“You people are working for the other teams, you aren’t working for the Bucs,” McKay told local reporters writers after a tough loss to Pittsburgh. “You ought to cover them, forget us. We’d be better off and so would you be.”

Bennett’s plan of breaking in 1985 first-round pick Ron Holmes opposite Selmon at defensive end fizzled when the most decorated player in club history was sidelined by a herniated disc. Selmon retired in 1986 without suiting up for a team coached by Bennett. Despite last year’s 2-14 debacle, Culverhouse entered the new season optimistic his club’s embarrassing days were over.

“I think we have an excellent chance of being 8-8 this next year,” Culverhouse said after the 1986 draft. “I like nothing better than to give the fans competitive games on Sunday afternoons.”

By the time Bennett shook hands with Culverhouse to close the deal, Tampa Bay required a major rebuilding job. Only one-third of the players McKay coached his final season are still on the team, but Bennett may not survive the drastic makeover.

“Any personnel decision I’ve made has been based on what’s best for the future of the team,” Bennett says. “When you come in with the idea of rebuilding, your mind has to be on the long haul. I’ve never been through anything like this (4-26 record) and I don’t know how to react. It sure gives you a gut check. I can’t control the rumors or what other people are thinking.”

Bennett replaced Shively as defensive coordinator with former USFL coach Jim Stanley, but the unit has actually slipped from 26th in the league to 28th. Culverhouse, who is declining all interview requests until the end of the season, has grown disenchanted with offensive coordinator Jimmy Raye. If Bennett returns next year, he will probably be forced to replace much of the coaching staff he assembled in 1985.

“We’re at a real crossroads now,” Krueger says. “I think our talent is better than they’re playing and at the present time, we’re underachievers. Yes, we need to upgrade talent, but the major challenge is to get our underachievers to overachieve. I remember how proud I was when we were winning, but now it’s not a nice feeling. We realize we are an area of ridicule. America loves an underdog and right now we’re pushed about as far down as you can go.”