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All year long following a great finish to a remarkable 10-6 season, us Buc fans were left to wonder what could possibly be next for our potentially great young offense. We were left to wait out a lockout (thank you Roger Goodell) and daydream to ourselves just how bright the future was for the Bucaneer offense. Josh Freeman looked to be headed to super stardom with 25 TDS to only 6 INTS in his first full year as the starting quarterback. "Starship" he was dubbed and the entire city went from doubters to followers after Freeman led come from behind victories five different times I believe. For the first time since Mike Alstott the Bucs finally had a workhorse running back who could wear down opposing defenses. When they were beaten down to a pulp; LeGarette Blount would become a regular on highlight shows by hurdling opposing defenders. On top of this; when the power run game worked, our play action pass game would make this offense impossible to contain with standout rookie Mike Williams breaking the franchise record for receiving touchdowns with 11 as a rookie. If opposing defenses decided to double Mike Williams, they would pay dearly underneath with Kellen Winslow, Arrelious Benn, Sammie Stroughter, and an emerging Dezmon Briscoe. Heck we even found more receiving talent this season in Preston Parker. I remember making the statement that with all this fire power at our disposal, I didn't think Greg Olson would be the right man to make this weaponry a lethal killing machine.

Fast forward to week eight of the regular season and I now believe I have proven my point. Before everyone jumps the ship and talks about our season last year as a fluke, let's examine the brain power behind our offense. Because Greg Olson has done so little, with so much talent I have decided to spend my very, very un-satisfied Sunday afternoon researching all of his past contributions on the NFL level. His collegiate career isn't much better, but I won't dive into that as thoroughly. Look guys, this information I'm going to share is DISTURBING to say the least. The first offense that "Ollie" was put in charge of was in 2005, the Detroit Lions and Joey "Heisman" Harrington was the first poor sap to be stuck with Greg Olson as his offensive coordinator.

The Lions offense under Greg Olson that year placed 28th in the league in scoring averaging 14.9 points per game. Their passing yardage was good for an improved 26th, while their rushing offense wasn't much better. (Those retarded draw plays that you insist on using didn't work back then, and they still don't work now!) The Lions were 26th in rushing yards per game averaging just over 90 yards per game. The ten rushing tds on the year actually put the Lions in a tie for the seventh fewest rushing touchdowns on the season.

In 2005 Joey Harrington and Jeff Garcia were the two main quarterbacks for the Lions, but just so I don't leave anyone out for arguments sake Dan Orlovsky also made 17 pass attempts. As you can see the passing game was basically impotent, and what is even worse is that when Jeff Garcia broke away from Ollie's coaching and came to work under Jon Gruden he revived his career briefly and even made a Pro Bowl.

So maybe Greg Olson could produce a run game. After all for all of the high draft picks that were afforded to this Lions offense, there has to be some input from their offensive staff on some of these failed draft choices. Here are the numbers individually for Ollie's backs in 2005.

Surely Greg Olson with his exotic plays to make his playmakers (being they sure weren't the running backs) get the ball in their hands. Isn't it great every week watching Rejus Benn either take the same retarded end around for a gain of hopefully two - three yards, or that amazingly discreet quick screen pass that never works. I won't even sort out just the wide receivers because this offense was so impotent. Backs, receivers and tight ends had these gaudy numbers under offensive coordinator Greg Olson.

I will add that Charles Rogers added 14 receptions for 197 yards and a score to these totals. On the season here are a couple of statistics to show just how pathetically ran of an offense Olson was the mastermind of.

Field Goals                                              19/24                                                        24/30

According to Wikipedia, "He was the offensive coordinator of the St. Louis Rams. During his first season in St. Louis, he did not call the offensive plays for the team until near the end of the year. He developed game plans with head coach Scott Linehan, and worked to develop the offense in general. Linehan decided to hand over play-calling duties to Olson so that he could manage games better, without having to focus on one side of the ball.

Olson was fired after the 2007 season. (SI.com, Rams fire offensive coordinator Olson, 2011)"

So according to Wikipedia which references sports illustrated articles which could also illustrate this information just allow me to compare the Linehan ran offense to the Olson ran offense. I will first use the individual player performances, and than I will compare not only the 06 Linehan ran offense to the 07 Olson version, but will also compare to the Rams opponents. Keep in mind here people, in 2006 the St. Louis Rams had one of the most dynamic offenses in all of football. After Greg Olson received play calling duties they became one of the worst.

This here shows just how great of a quarterback Marc Bulger was under Scott Linehan's playcalling in 2006. When Olson took over the playcalling duties you can easily see a gigantic dip in every single passing category listed. There are even more that went down, I just want everyone to see this ASAP so they see just how horrible Olson is.

Ask Steven Jackson how Greg Olson can suck all of the skills right out of a guy. The Rams already had an amazing system in place to get wonderful potential out of not only the passing game, but Ollie also made the Rams running game nearly abysmal. Well compared to the year before, yes Ollie basically ruined the Rams days as offensive juggernauts in the NFL.

Although there were a few more ball carriers, none of which carried the ball more than 11 times and none scored touchdowns. Their yards per carry were also low enough not to warrant including them in this list. Just like my breakdown of Detroit I will also include the receivers and tight ends who made an impact on the season.

Name                   Receptions               Rec Yards               AVG                           Long                       TD                        

In 2006 four other players caught a touchdown. Jim Klopfenstein was the next productive receiver with 20 catches for 226 yards and a score. I will give Ollie in 07 Drew Bennett added 33 receptions for 375 yards and 3tds.

Yes I failed to include a few factors such as sacks allowed. This did not make a substantial difference because in 06 the Rams allowed 49 sacks, in 07 48. The area where there was a major spike from 06-07 was turnovers. Under Linehan the Rams were +14 in the turnover battle, under Olson they went -10.

In 2006 even though Greg Olson had the title of offensive coordinator, Scott Linehan was the head coach who called his own plays. The offense ranked 6th in total yardage, 4th in passing yardage, 17th in rushing yards per game, and 10th in scoring. Very impressive year offensively for the Rams.

In 2007 when Scott Linehan decided to turn over playcalling duties to Olson here were the results.  The offense fell to 24th in total yardage, 19th in passing yardage, 25th in rushing, and 28th in scoring. Olson was fired after just one year of calling plays in St. Louis.

I am starting this petition amongst fellow Buccaneer fans to sign and hopefully we can make a difference. There is no way you can honestly tell me that Marc Bulger, Isaac Bruce, and Steven Jackson all completely failed to reproduce the magical seasons because of their faults. The play calling has to make somewhat of a difference, to drop so significantly in every area was Olson's fault.

Fellow Buc fans, heading into the bye if you are sick of the slow starts, the ridiculously repetitive scripted play calls, and generally featuring an offense that rarely allows our players to do what they do best than sign this petition and together maybe we can make a difference. After the way our defense played today I sure bet they wish they had an even somewhat competent coordinator calling the shots for the offense. Josh Freeman should be rolling out using his athleticism and throwing deep balls to our big targets. LGB should never have to deal with not seeing more than two carries per half. Greg Olson's track record is horrible, he is only dragging down this young team. Hopefully it won't last much longer.

All statistics were looked up at nfl.com and I used Wikipedia to find out exactly which years Olson coached where. I did not skew any statistic while doing this, I was actually somewhat surprised because he is even worse than I had projected. I no longer want Josh Freeman learning from this clown.