Tony Dungy knows Karl Williams gives him a potent option at punt returner
Each Saturday night before a Tampa Bay Buccaneers game, Buccaneers.com listens in to the thoughts of Head Coach Tony Dungy. This Saturday, Dungy addressed the following issues:
On his team's play: "We still aren't playing like I would like us to. We can't seem to put together that mistake-free game that a good team needs to be able to do. We'll have a game with six turnovers, then another one with four or five dropped passes, then one with a lot of penalties. We just haven't put it all together yet. We haven't played very well, and some people were writing us off a few weeks ago. Now we're tied for first, but we still haven't played much better."
On the Bucs' injured players: "Brad Culpepper (heel contusion) will play, but Anthony McFarland will get some more snaps, up from 10 or so to about 20. Derrick Brooks rolled his ankle in practice on Friday but seems to be okay and will start tomorrow. I think Tony Mayberry will be fine, too. He didn't practice on Wednesday or Thursday but made it through Friday's workout okay. Paul Gruber hasn't practiced much at all as he fights through an abdominal strain, but he should be out there on Sunday. Todd Washington (ankle) will run right before the game; if he can't go, we'll active George Hegamin."
On Sunday's game: "The first quarter will be the key. We have to play mistake-free football, which is something we haven't done in the early going recently. We need to run the ball well and keep control of the tempo. They want to explode early, to get up on a team by 10 points and then dictate the tempo for the rest of the game. They haven't really had to play from behind much this year, so we want to see if we can get up on them early."
On the NFL's shifting standings: "It's tough these days. You have to make monetary decisions every year. You end up depending quite a bit on rookies and guys you get from other teams. It makes it more difficult for teams to play with consistency. You see a lot of that in the league today. Not a lot of teams have been able to play good football every week. You just have to get hot for a three-to-four week stretch. Look at us…we win four of our last five and we're back into first place. Maybe this is what the league wants now, instead of just having three or four phenomenal teams."
On lineup decisions: "Marcus Jones will start at left defensive end, but Chidi (Ahanotu) will play. I think we'll have Reidel Anthony returning kickoffs and either Karl Williams or Jacquez Green on punts. I don't know which. Karl gets his 75th return last week and is now the all-time leader (in punt return average) and we can't get him out on the field! Bert (Emanuel) and Jacquez will start at receiver but Reidel will play a lot."
