The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are 0-7. They’ll likely be 0-8 with a road trip to Seattle next week. Fans were chanting “fire the coach” at the end of Thursday night’s 31-13 loss to the Carolina Panthers and billboards have been put up around Tampa Bay calling for Greg Schiano’s firing.
The hot seat for Schiano appears to be increasing in temperature by the day. However, Schiano says he can’t pay attention to the noise surrounding his job status with the Buccaneers.
“It doesn’t affect me,” Schiano said. “People are certainly entitled to their opinion. Here’s the thing, my whole career - player and a coach - you get up in the morning, you work as hard and as smart as you can. It usually puts you to bed tired and you get up and you do it again and that’s the way I do it. I do it the best we can.
“Our coaches and players stick together. Sometimes it doesn’t go your way. We’ve just got to keep doing it, look for new ways to make us better and hopefully go get a win in Seattle. You can sit there and cry about it, feel sorry for yourself but that ain’t going to help anything. You just get back to work, get on this tape and get better.”
The Buccaneers have now lost 12 of their last 13 games and won just 7 of 23 games overall with Schiano at the helm. Schiano lamented mistakes made against the Panthers after the game; the inability to keep Cam Newton contained in the pocket, errant snaps and a struggle to convert third downs.
“Those are the things you get paid to do as a coach is to get your team to perform those things so certainly it falls on me. As the head coach, I’ve got to make sure that all the assistant coaches are getting it across to our players and our players are understanding it and executing it on the field. That’s what matters,” Schiano said.
Whatever the reason, the messages preached by the coaching staff don’t seem to be getting across to the players. If losses continue to mount - and the way the Buccaneers are performing right now, it’s seems likely they will - Schiano may not have much longer to pilot the Buccaneers’ ship.