On October 24th, 1993, a 39-year-old Steve DeBerg became the oldest player in the history of the franchise.  On the other end of the timeline, can you name the youngest player ever deployed by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers?

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In 1997, with hopes of energizing one of the league’s poorest offenses, head coach Tony Dungy drafted 20-year-old Gator Reidel Anthony midway through the first round.  The skinny receiver was college football’s most devastating deep threat in 1996; his 18 yards per reception and 18 touchdown catches carried the University of Florida to a National Championship and earned Anthony All-American honors as a junior, and Tampa Bay looked to use his speed to soften defenses for rookie runner Warrick Dunn.

The season kicked off against the San Francisco 49ers.  After six minutes and a blocked field goal, the Tampa Bay offense took over at the 41 yard line, and across from receiver Horace Copeland, the 20-year, 315-day-old Reidel Anthony succeeded 1987 running back Charles Gladman as the youngest Buccaneer to ever take the field.  Three weeks later, Anthony became the youngest player in NFL history to catch a touchdown (and the third-youngest to cross the goal line).

His career floundered after a promising sophomore campaign, and Tony Dungy never built the offense he envisioned.  Neither man was a Buccaneer after the 2001 season.  But Anthony’s early successes are almost unprecedented in professional football; he was the ninth-youngest player of the modern era.  None of the other eight, so far, have survived more than five seasons with the team that drafted them.

In 36 years, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have had 32 players selected to the Pro Bowl.  Two players earned the designation without starting a single game.  Who were they?

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The first was tight end Dave Moore.  In 2006, he was the last addition to Sean Payton’s NFC all-star roster.  Moore had proven himself as one of the league’s most consistent long snappers — a position coach Payton needed to fill.  But more than that, Moore had been the model of longevity on the top shelf of professional sports, and his selection was as much a show of admiration as it was utility.  In 1992, as a seventh-round rookie, Moore had barely stumbled out of camp before he was cut by the Dolphins.  Sam Wyche and the Buccaneers nabbed him from the waiver wire, found a place for him, and watched him outlast most of his contemporaries.

There were only two men from the 1992 draft class to play longer than Dave Moore: kicker Jason Hanson, and quarterback Brad Johnson.  Only three tight ends in history — Trey Junkin, Tony Gonzalez, and Pete Metzelaars — have appeared in more games.  Moore’s hunger led to a productive 15-year career, and at age 37, that unrivaled experience earned him his only Pro Bowl appearance and a perfect punctuation point on an ample body of work.

Two years later, an undrafted unknown named Clifton Smith earned a camp invite in Tampa.  He failed to make any impact from scrimmage and wasn’t given a fair shake at the return duties — the Buccaneers decided to employ speedy second-round pick Dexter Jackson on special teams — and Smith was cut before the start of the season.  But weeks passed, and the Dexter Jackson experiment was failing.  The minute wide receiver from Appalachian State had the speed and shiftiness of a world-class return man, but Jackson had a bad habit of collapsing mid-stride before contacting the defense.  After nine weeks of mounting frustration, Jackson was demoted and Smith was promoted to Tampa’s active roster.

Clifton had a decent debut in Jackson’s stead, but the following week, Smith exploded into the national consciousness.  His 97-yard kickoff return touchdown — the second in Buccaneer history — sparked a three-touchdown comeback against Kansas City.  Two weeks later, a 70-yard punt return score versus Detroit helped stretch the lead against the Lions.

Despite missing the first seven games of 2008, Smith’s 1310 return yards ranked second in Buccaneer history, and proved enough to earn him a trip to the Pro Bowl.  He became the only undrafted rookie Pro Bowler of the 21st century, and the first non-kicker since Seattle’s Rufus Porter in 1988.

Neither Moore (a second-string tight end) nor Smith (the replacement return man) started a single game in their all-star seasons.

Months ago, when the Glazers chose coach Greg Schiano to inherit the ruins that Raheem Morris left behind, we assumed their selection was based on Schiano’s character and method — a roughshod drill sergeant who was, for all intents and purposes, the exact opposite of Morris.

We weren’t wrong in that assumption.  In fact, the opening day victory (the first by a rookie coach in Tampa Bay since 1992) showcased exactly how different Schiano and Morris are in their approaches to coaching.  Using roughly the same roster (plus and minus a few players here-and-there), Schiano and staff transformed the league’s worst run-stopping defense into a suffocating iron blanket.  He changed the offense — Greg Olson’s parade of disorganization — into an efficient, straightforward punch in the gut.  The entire team looked uniform.  Energetic.  Revitalized.  Professional.

Rookies Doug Martin and Mark Barron helped justify their draft statuses with some outstanding opening day performances.  Martin carried the ball 24 times and caught four Josh Freeman passes to help carry the offense.  His 28 touches are tied for the Week 1 lead league-wide.

When Barron wasn’t deflecting passes or locking down his deep half, he was laying some absolutely skull-shattering hits on his opponents.

Lavonte David finished the game with six tackles, and was part of a swarming hive of Tampa Bay defenders that held Carolina to a franchise-low 10 rushing yards.

It’s a stunning reversal from a season prior, and a wonderful illustration of the power of scheme and coaching.  If the Buccaneers build on their win over the Panthers — if they continue to improve on their precision and tenacity and aggressiveness — then we’re looking at the foundation of something big.  Something great.

Football’s fun again.  Rejoice.

Thank God the preseason doesn’t count, because the Buccaneers were just shellacked 30-3 by Washington’s second-stringers.  Tampa’s depth chart has all the depth of an inflatable kiddie pool.  Seriously, is there any position with adequate backup?  The Redskins’ second and third units absolutely wrecked Tampa Bay, and created some serious questions about the unified strength of the Buccaneer roster.

Third-string quarterback Brett Ratliff, a 27-year-old undrafted passer out of Utah, made up for a lack of experience with shoddy mechanics and slow downfield reads.  And the porous blocking didn’t help.  New England castoff Tiquan Underwood was Ratliff’s most reliable target, and may have solidified a roster spot with his solid contribution on Wednesday night.  And on the other side of the ball, outside of a pair of Sam Baker interceptions, most of the defense struggled against Mike Shanahan’s patented blend of off-tackle rushes and intermediate passes.

One bright spot from the Washington game (and a week earlier, against the Patriots) was kicker Kai Forbath.  Which is an unfortunate place for a quality backup, because if there’s a reliable starter anywhere on this team, it’s Connor Barth.  Forbath has, in my estimation, almost no shot at making the roster; Barth’s 2011 was the best kicking season in franchise history.  The quiet kicker nailed 26 of 28 field goal attempts (93%), and clunked one of his misses off the uprights early in the season.  He was perfect in the clutch, and showcased a leg fit for any situation.  It’s unlikely Forbath has a chance.

And that’s a shame.  Kickers don’t garner much trade value in the NFL.  Teams rarely keep two on a roster, and if a backup shows any sort of promise, the interested parties will take their chances with the waiver wire instead of committing draft picks or players.  This will likely be the case with Forbath, who might be the best backup on Tampa Bay’s roster.

A week ago, Forbath drilled a 51-yarder and a 55-yarder against the Patriots, with room to spare.  Against the Redskins, he fired a torpedo through the uprights from 43 yards out for Tampa’s only points.  Kai went 5-for-5 on kicks in the preseason — four of them from more than 40 yards out — and looks to be one of the few second-teamers on Tampa’s roster with any real promise.  And the Bucs won’t get an ounce of use out of him.

Tragic.

It’s been a year and a half since Josh Freeman looked comfortable throwing long routes.  The gargantuan passer showcased improved footwork and decent timing, but the nagging inaccuracy from a year ago still pulls his throws off course.  It’s preseason, and as fans, we’re privy only to the superficial workings of Mike Sullivan’s offense… but so far, despite long-ball promises from the coaching staff, Josh seems hesitant throwing down field.

Tampa Bay’s first-team defense creamed New England, but the 20-7 end result of the first-string scrimmage was a product of Mark Barron, Ronde Barber, Michael Bennett, and smothering, opportunistic defense.  The offense stumbled in both passing and running, and the struggles aren’t mutually exclusive.

If the Buccaneers expect the running game to flourish, then Freeman needs to throw deep.  It’s why they spent $55 million on Vincent Jackson.  Josh doesn’t need to complete deep passes, but the threat of a quick score synergizes wonderfully with the power running game; it softens safeties, imbalances the pass rush, and supercharges a rushing offense.  A strong ground game opens the play action attack, and the cycle restarts.  One thing leads into the next.  Doug Martin, LeGarrette Blount, and the Bucs have the talent to run for 2500 yards, and if the offense is built and conducted properly, Tampa Bay’s record should be directly attached to their rushing numbers.

But it starts with Freeman.

The defense looks to have found some footing.  Losing Gerald McCoy and Adrian Clayborn to injuries in the first quarter didn’t hinder the front seven, who, for the first time in a long while, brought the boom of a professional defense.  The sheer physicality of the defensive line — especially Bennett — shattered the Patriot pocket for most of the evening.

The Patriots (admittedly without Wes Welker) looked outmatched against the Tampa Bay defense.  Michael Smith looked like Maurice Jones-Drew on kick return duty.  Vincent Jackson’s single-drive appearance was brief but promising.  Doug Martin did his best Earnest Graham impression in the passing game.

It doesn’t pay to get excited over preseason action, but Friday’s game was a lot more comfortable than the 31-14 beatdown New England delivered a season ago.

Turnover rates are high in professional sports.  Coaches and players are fired and replaced weekly, and a plethora of fresh talent and innovative instruction is tossed into the machine, where it either succeeds or gets gnawed and digested to make room for the next man up.

It’s a nasty, unforgiving process.  But it’s also exciting.  The perpetual evolution of our favorite teams keep us addicted to sports, and few teams have suffered more change through the last couple years than the Buccaneers.  In four seasons, we’ve gone from Jim Bates, Byron Leftwich, Jeff Jagodzinski, and Cadillac Williams… through Raheem Morris, Josh Freeman, Greg Olson, and LeGarrette Blount… and we find ourselves smack dab in the molten nucleus of the newest era in Tampa Bay football.

And it didn’t look so good tonight.

But failure’s part of the process.  Don’t judge a team on their missteps; judge them on how quickly — and confidently — they regain their balance.  Greg Schiano’s attention to detail has been so thoroughly discussed in local media that it’s becoming part of the Buccaneer mythology — alongside Tony Dungy’s honest stoicism, Monte Kiffin’s excited rasps, and Jon Gruden’s inability to convert third downs.  Trust the detail-driven Schiano to right the mistakes, lest they catch fire and spread, and burn him like they did his predecessor.  The team isn’t great, but hey, Schiano didn’t inherit a great team.  He didn’t inherit a competent team.  If there are serious mistakes, thank the football gods that it’s preseason, and that the Bucs hired a coach who — superficially, at least — seems capable of scaring the hiccups out of his crew.

That being said, there were a few points of concern.

• LeGarrette’s injury looked bad.  When John Lynch — the Grand Poobah of Pain Infliction — prays that your “leg is intact,” it adds an extra twist to the knot of guts in your stomach.  Thankfully, Blount was walking the sidelines in the second half, no ice and no brace strapped to his leg.  But losing the “one” out of a “one-two punch” spells trouble early for the Schiano era.
• Freeman looked an awful lot like 2011′s lumbering, timid, slow-armed patsy.  Awful being the operative word.  He stared down receivers, threw into coverage, and seemed reluctant to scramble.  His only saving grace?  Dan Orlovsky looked even worse.
• Quincy Black must have one hell of a handshake to still have a job in the NFL.  He impresses the coaching staff during every training camp, then deflates when the season rolls around.  He’s the Michael Clayton of linebackers, but without the exciting rookie year.

Those are, of course, three pessimistic notes from a night rife with positivity.  For the second consecutive week, Doug Martin and Lavonte David showed the athleticism and instincts required to excel in the NFL.  Ahmad Black and his 4.7 40-yard dash were all over the Titans’ starting offense and special teams; the diminutive safety returned an interception to the two-yard line (setting up Tampa’s only touchdown), then saved a touchdown by snagging Tennessee’s Darius Reynaud from behind on a long punt return.  Situational pass-rusher Dekoda Watson and his explosive speed proved a handful for Tennessee’s blockers, and despite only one career sack, has been one of the few Buccaneers to produce consistent pressure on opposing passers since 2010.

Sometimes the bad outweighs the good — as was the case against the Titans.  But half the fun of a new era is watching the team rebound from adversity.

Six days to kickoff.  We await their rebuttal.

There’s never much to glean from the first preseason game.  In four weeks, after cuts and injuries whittle down the roster, we’ll be analyzing a different team with different goals and different setbacks.  But despite the turnover, every team displays subtle tendencies in the preseason — like tells at the poker table — that forecast the coming year.  These indicators shine under the scope of retrospection: Sabby Piscatelli being burned to a crisp in 2009, the Mike Williams jump ball in 2010, and Josh Freeman’s odd obsession with checkdowns in 2011.

Unfortunately, until the season reveals its high and low points, there’s no real way to discern the difference between a prophetic preseason tendency and a string of flukes born of early-season inexperience and abbreviated game plans.  But a few things caught my attention regardless.

• Lavonte David looked especially comfortable on the weak side.  The rookie linebacker made some outstanding plays from scrimmage, and a great one-on-one tackle on a punt return.  And on a slippery field, no less.  His superior instincts create little wasted movement, and that physical efficiency combined with his on-field awareness makes him fast.  Faster than advertised.

• Tiquan Underwood plays with a savvy that betrays his late draft status and career numbers.  The stringy speedster has been one of the hits of camp, perfectly embodying what head coach Greg Schiano wants in a football player.  He hauled  in three passes (all for first downs), including a 44-yard stunner between two Dolphin defenders.  If he can play with consistency and confidence, he’ll lock down the slot receiver position and help lift Tampa Bay’s offense to heights higher than his haircut.

• Stay onside, defense.  For the love of all that is good, stay onside.

• Much maligned Myron Lewis experienced a resurrection of spirit in training camp, but still hasn’t shaken his hesitance in coverage.  We’ve been fed stories about his resurgent run defense and fundamental coverage game, but Myron looked the same to me.  Cut his dreadlocks and scramble the jersey numbers, and we still could’ve picked him out of the defensive backfield.  Yeah him.  The guy giving up all the first downs.

• It’s early, of course, but Doug Martin seems to have that knack — that ball carrier’s intuition — to squeeze through a hole, absorb hits, and fall forward into the pile.  It’s that Warrick Dunn run-and-cut.  The Emmitt Smith shimmy-and-drive.  It’s plausible (and hilariously ironic) that the 5-9 215-pound runner acts as the ox in Mike Sullivan’s offense, and the 250-pound juggernaut makes his bread as the breakaway threat.  A total reversal of archetypes.  Interesting.

• And speaking of running backs, who else was excited to see four consecutive runs inside the five yard line?  Maybe it’s three years of conditioning via Greg Olson, but I would’ve bet money on a shotgun fade or a tight end in-route through traffic on third-and-goal.  How refreshing.  LeGarrette Blount’s goal line plunge in the first quarter expunged three seasons of shoddy offense.  And it was liberating.

Who knows what’ll stick?  Most of the conjecture spewed over the next few weeks will fall away as the year progresses.  But a few things — little tendencies here and there — will define this team down the road, because the seeds of the coming season are sewn in exhibition.

Doug Martin

Martin looking to catapult himself as lead back

Recently signed DE Wallace Gilberry formerly of the Kansas City Chiefs. Whom some feel is a near lock to make the Buccaneers 53-man roster after second-year DE Da’Quan Bowers suffered an Achilles injury during off-season conditioning is showing why he was signed.

By all accounts he’s a scrappy player who has clawed tooth and nail, to persevere and realize his dream of playing in the NFL. Gilberry returned to his hometown to give back to Baldwin County youth. To hold his first Wallace Gilberry football camp at Spanish Fort High School in Alabama.

An undrafted player out of Alabama in 2008 Gilberry has registered 14 sacks in his NFL career. He has appeared in 53 games, starting in three of them during his tenure with the Chiefs. Even though he was brought in to help bolster an anemic pass rush, more than just his playing experience and his pass rush prowess will be counted on this coming season. He personifies head coach Greg Schiano’s “Buccaneer Way” and “Buccaneer Men” fundamental core beliefs both on and off the field.

He’s not listening to the masses who feel he’s a shoo-in. Instead he’s preparing to arrive in Tampa looking to fight for a roster spot.

“I’m excited to go back down there and fight for a roster spot,” Gilberry told Tommy Hicks of AL.com. “That’s how I look at it. Some people say, ‘You’re a shoo-in,’ but to me, I’m fighting for a roster spot. I’m fighting for the opportunity to impress the coaching staff and show them they got the right guy. That’s how the game is. It always changes and change is good. The staff they have in place is definitely a good staff and they’re going in the right direction with it.”

Martin's deal worth $6,787,528 million with a $3,376,384 million signing bonus (Photo Credit: NFL.com)

Even though 620 WDAE, ESPN and various other media outlets have reported that Martin and the Bucs agreed to a  five-year deal, the reality is that it’s a hard four-year deal with the team holding an option for a fifth year. Referencing the Collective Bargaining Agreement specifically:  Article 7 Rookie Compensation and Rookie Compensation Pool: Section 7. Fifth-Year Option for First Round Selections. Paragraph (f) Fifth-Year Option for All Other Selections in Round One. Subsection (i);

Fifth-Year Option for All Other Selections in Round One. For any other Drafted Rookie selected in round one, the Paragraph 5 Salary for the player’s Fifth-Year Option shall equal an amount that would apply in the fourth League Year of the Rookie Contract if one calculated the Transition Tender for that League Year by using the same methodology as set forth in Article 10, Section 4, but using the applicable third through twenty-fifth highest Salaries (as “Salary” is defined in Article 10) (as opposed to the ten highest Salaries) for players at the position at which the Rookie participated in the most plays during his third League Year. No other Salary (other than the minimum offseason workout per diem and compensation for community relations/sponsor appearances or promotional activities (subject to the maximum amounts permitted in Section 3(b)(iv) above)) is permitted for the Fifth-Year Option.

Article 7 Rookie Compensation and Rookie Compensation Pool: Section 7. Fifth-Year Option for First Round Selections. Paragraph (a) Exercise Period

Exercise Period. A Club has the unilateral right to extend from four years to five years the term of any Rookie Contract of a player selected in the first round of the Draft (the “Fifth-Year Option”). To do so, the Club must give written notice to the player after the final regular season game of the player’s third season but prior to May 3 of the following League Year (i.e., year four of the contract).

In other words the team must exercise their intent of the “Fifth-Year Option” by formally submitting a written notice to the player, after the final regular season game of the players third season, but prior to May 3^rd of the following League Year. As mentioned in the opening, the deal struck between Martin and the Bucs is currently only a four-year deal with a club option for a fifth-year at a calculation rate of the top 3 through 25 Cap Percentage players at his position from the previous League Year or 120% of his Prior Year Salary.

Now that all the inner workings of the salary cap are out of the way on to the real reason you’re hear. Martin’s contract breakdown.

Total Value: $6,787,528 million
Signing Bonus: $3,376,384 million
Year 1 Cap: $1,234,096 million (Base Salary $390,000)
Year 2 Cap: $1,542,620 million (Base Salary $698,524)
Year 3 Cap: $1,851,144 million (Base Salary $1,007,048)
Year 4 Cap: $2,159,668 million (Base Salary $1,315,572)