On the Saints

"If you want to define yourself, see how well you're playing on defense, then go play the Saints. They'll let you know pretty quickly where you are and what you are.''
From tbo.com

On dominating the third quarter

"I just told those guys there's no reason for us to wait around until the end of the football game to try to win it,'' "There's no rule that says we can't go out there and dominate – and that's what they did. The defense really responded, as well. I told them it's on us … if they don't score anymore, we win. That's the end of the story.''
From tbo.com

It's about us

"There are always guys that are on the bubble," Morris said. "There's always coaches on the bubble. How you respond to being on the bubble is what defines you as a man, as a coach or as a player. You always hear the theme on television right now - the teams that are not playing for anything. We are playing for us. It's about us."
From tbo.com

Job Security

"Job security is not an issue for coaches," Morris said Monday. "We don't have any. You just go out there and present your best self every day. That's all I can do. We make decisions based on how do we beat our next opponent. There will be no decisions made based on saving Raheem Morris, Mark Dominik or any player."
From tbo.com

Confidence in the defense

"You got to have confidence in those guys and they will bring it home for you. If they cant, then we'll get our butts kicked, but we'll get our butts kicked together doing it our way."
From Pewter Report

Dream a little dream

"You don't just go to sleep and have a dream and wake up and install a defense in the morning."
From tampabay.com

On the loss to the Jets

"They flat out beat our butts.''
From tbo.com

When asked about the speculation on his job security

"If I wanted to worry about that, I wouldn't be coaching. I'd go be a reporter."
From tampabay.com

On recovering the onside kick

“It was one of the few times this year that I enjoyed being a head coach.”
From joebucsfan.com
Nice catch, Joe.

Talkin' bout practice

"we came out a little flat in practice on Friday and those are the results you get when you don't practice hard every day."
From Pewter Report

Nothing going

"Offensively we were not ready to play, and that is on us as coaches," Morris said. "We had no explosive plays, no third down conversions, we didn't get anything going."
From Pewter Report
And that's the good news.

A long December

"That was kind of my cry yesterday to these guys, December football. Good teams play great football in December," Morris said. "Yesterday, we went out there and played OK football in December. You have to find a way to play great football in December, not only this year but for the future."
From scout.com
♫ And it's been a long December
and there's reason to believe, 
Maybe this year will be better than the last. 
Na na na na, naaa, na, naaa, na, naaa, na naaa, na, na,
Na na naaa na, yeah ♫

All your cover 2 base defense are belong to us

"I don't know, I kind of like the joystick right now," Morris said when asked if he was thinking of keeping the coordinator's job. "I've got the joystick in my hand, I'm playing, and I like what I got."
From tbo.com

Feelings

"Just like (Sunday). You say, 'You played better; do you feel like you should've won the game?' No. We didn't win the game. We had an opportunity to win it, and we didn't take it. That's where we are."
From tampabay.com

A cautious approach to brain injuries

"That's a no-brainer," Morris said. "I'm sure there will be (a more cautious approach) with what's going on with concussions and what's going on in society with concussions in the NFL."
From tbo.com

Handshakes and Heartbreaks

“Handshakes across the field are getting easier,” Raheem The Dream said, referring to his team being more competitive.
From JoeBucsFan
Another great quote brought to us from the folks at JoeBucsFan.

Clayton

“I think Michael Clayton’s a better player when he plays less snaps,”
From JoeBucsFan
This is a great quote. "Joe" has been finding some great quotes lately. It's one of my favorite blogs.

Toughness

"The physical toughness we talked about is starting to develop. Our team had pads on today. I don't know what other teams had pads on today, but we're going to take pride in that."
From tbo.com
Coach apparently told the team "Men, you can leave your flag belts in your locker! Today we wear PADS!"

(yeah, i know it was supposed to be a walk-through day, but it's still funny) 

Delivering

"You can't worry about how tough a stretch is or how tough the road ahead of you is. Nobody wants to hear you cry; just deliver the baby."
From Pewter Report
I somehow missed this one last week. Credit goes to GenocideD at the Buccaneers official message board, for pointing it out.

Aggressive play against the Falcons

"I don't know if a long field-goal attempt is outside the box. I don't know if a faked punt attempt is outside the box," Morris said. "I think it's aggressive play. We were a 1-9 football team. I think you have to teach this team how to insert a dagger in somebody and win the game. That's part of the learning, part of the curve and part of what we're going through. For me, too."
From tampabay.com

On the loss in Atlanta

“We were a 1-9 team, and now we’re a 1-10 team. It’s never a step forward when you lose.”
From fifthdown.blogs.nytimes.com

The decision not to punt

"You can't play scared,"
From tampabay.com

Taking responsibility for the defense

"The only person who's going to suffer the consequences is me. So you might as well put yourself in the fire, take it right between the eyes and do the best you can."
From tampabay.com

Freeman's Fantasy World

"We were living in a fantasy world a little bit the last two weeks with being able to come back and being able to strike like he was able to do."
From tam.scout.com

On the loss to the Saints

"The best part about it though, the silver lining, is you have another opportunity to go down there and show them what we really look like and who we really can be."
From Pewter Report

Allowing Saints to score near the end of the half

"At the end there we let the rope go, gave them the ball back,"
From theledger.com

On Special Teams coach Rich Bisaccia

"What he's done around here is the same thing he's done since '02 - coach with enthusiasm, coach with passion and get his guys to play like that," Morris said. "You think I tell the truth too much? Wait until Bisaccia's a head coach and he starts telling people what he thinks. It will be a doozy."
From tbo.com

Being critical of the personnel

"I know you think I tore them down," Morris said, "but I really didn't. We just like to speak frank. It was an opportunity for me to let those guys know (that) outside influences are going to try to tear us down. But we have to stay together and try to talk to each other frankly. That's what we've done. We criticize ourselves. We criticize each other. We have no problem."
From .tampabay.com

Young guys getting experience

"Dre Moore got a chance to get out there and get his whistle wet a little bit."
From tbo.com

Defensive lineman stopping the run

"We are just not made right now to knock people back. That's just not how we are cut"
From Pewter Report

On the unsportsmanlike penalty

"This loss is solely on me," Morris said. "End of the half to get a personal foul as a head coach is unacceptable. I'm taking those points. It's on me. That's how much we lost by. I should be getting all the blame for that.
"That was a discipline issue on my part. I didn't do the right thing. That's a great lesson for me as a young coach and a great lesson to my team."
From tbo.com

Expectations of Josh Freeman

"The young man is still young"
From fantasynews.cbssports.com

Stylez White's status for this Sunday

"We've got him (White) up in the air right now,''
From tbo.com

On Josh Freeman

"The mistakes he made you don't want to see him make again. At least you want to see him make new mistakes."
From Pewter Report

On the dress code

"You make them come to the game looking the right way," Morris said. "Make them look like winners. … There was a presence. You look good, you feel good, you play good. The old Deion (Sanders) deal."
From tampabay.com
That's not a photoshop. Deion really owns a creamsicle suit.

Giving credit for the win

"Obviously, it's not about me. It's about us. It's about everyone that's a part of this. It's about the organization from the top to the bottom, everybody's included. Everyone worked hard for this. I got just as hard of a hand slap from Danny the ground guy to general manager Mark Dominik to ownership. It doesn't matter where you are in the building."
From Pewter Report

On the Win

"Obviously a much better day today. We went out there and won. A great start to how we want to be, how we want to look, how we want to play. These guys played passionate. I don't have the official stats. Stats are for losers and this week we're winners."
From Pewter Report

On Kyle Moore returning from injury

"It's been really hard for me to keep a helmet off of him,"
"He's pushing my buttons every week, and he'll push it again this week."
From tampabay.com
Here we see a rare glimpse of him with his helmet off.

It's all part of the plan

"The plan, bringing [Freeman] in here was to let him sit behind the veteran," said Morris last weekend. "Hopefully the veteran gets you a bunch of wins, but that didn't happen."
From kmtr.com

Lifeline

"I also talked to my offense today, challenged those guys about their demeanor in practice and how they're doing and how they finish,'' Morris said. "They've got to be the lifeline a little bit and I'm asking them to be."
From blogs.tampabay.com

The Haunting of One Buc Place

“You start looking at your longest losing streak, it will continue to be a streak,’’ Morris said. “It will continue to be something that haunts your football team..."
From nationalfootballpost.com

Misery loves company

“Embarrassment would be your word,’’ Morris said. “There's never a sense of embarrassment. The only thing we do … I'm not interested in sharing misery with anybody else in the league. I'm not interested in who else doesn't have a win, I'm interested in getting our own win. That's our job, that's what we have to do. We're responsible to go out and win every day. I'm not interested in sharing anything with the Rams, with the Titans, whoever else is. That's not my job. Our job is to go out and get our first victory. That's the only thing you can look at.’’
From nationalfootballpost.com

Mawage. Mawage is wot bwings us togedah tooday.

"I'm married to him."
From tbo.com
This is an older quote, but it's a good one.

On the turnover at the kicking position

"We have to keep flipping that thing over until you get who you like and who you want,"
From heraldtribune.com

On his relationshiop with Aqib Talib

"We swear to each other every day," said Morris. "I wouldn't call it a disrespect. The swear words that's talk on the football field. We do that all the time. We swear to them on the field talking about a play, and how we can do it better. It is just a form of communication of some sort."
From Pewter Report

On Freeman and his practice reps

"He was always practicing as No. 2 even when he was listed as No. 3 on game day. So he's been a No. 2 practicing for a while and now he's practicing as No. 1 so he's getting the majority of the reps."
From scout.com
Okay, got all that? Clear as mud you say? Okay, good.

Doesn't start yesterday

"...going 0-7 doesn’t start yesterday. It didn’t start at the beginning of the season when we played Dallas. It started in weight training, it started in OTA days, it started in training camp. Everything we’ve done to this point is who we are. These guys are holding up, but we’ve got to do more than hold up. We’re not in here to hold up. Holding up gets you to 0-7. We’re here to fight through, we’re here to power through, we’re here to be our best selves. We’re not about holding up.”
From bucshots.blogs.heraldtribune.com

♫ Bye, bye, bye ♫

"The bye week never comes at a good time when you don't have a win."
"The bye week is always good to get a little healthier, to get a little better, to get more in shape, but right now it makes Sunday just as miserable as it was last week for us."
From tbo.com

BONUS: Classic John McKay quote

“They kicked the living hell out of us and we stood there and took it. If we play like that we’ll never win a another game. We’re going to make some changes. You can only make so many because you only have 45 people.”
From tampabayfootball.net
Wednesday's tend to be a slow day so I'll try to post a classic quote from a former Bucs coach.

On players slipping on the Wembley turf

"The Patriots slipped as well. They slipped to 35 points and we slipped to 7 and gave up 35 and two interceptions."
From Pewter Report
♫ Don't get caught slippin' ♫

Number Five is Alive

"Number five."
From heraldtribune.com
After the Patriots scored their fifth touchdown, Morris went to the bat phone and conferred with Mark Dominik. He then turned to Coach Olson and held up five fingers indicating it was time to put Josh Freeman in the game.

On the Patriots

Morris says the Patriots have many assets, including "their head coach, their quarterback, their receiving corps, their defense. Everything about the New England Patriots is a great model to follow."
From AP (via Google News)

BONUS: John Fox quote, on Stroughter's kickoff return for a TD

"We had some new guys out there."
From gastongazette.com
After a loss, coaches routinely say, "I'm not going to make excuses." Apparently Coach Fox has no problem making excuses.
Again, it's another opposing coach quote, but this one was also too good to pass up. 

Missing Pieces

"It has to come in pieces. Everything is built in pieces. Right now, we're building the character of young men. We're building a team … . Now that's no excuse for losing. We're still responsible for winning and we still want to win. We still want to win every single week."
"In the process, it would be nice to win a bunch of these games on our way to the top."
From tbo.com

Character

"Losing does not build character. It reveals character,"
From tbo.com
I think I've heard others coaches say this, so I'm not implying that Raheem made this up. It's just a cool quote.

On the critics

"I'm glad they are (criticizing). It's only going to make it sweeter in the end. Once you start reading that stuff, you get caught up and start believing it. You get mentally weak and you get soft. You get less violent. We're not going to do that."
From tbo.com

Fun!

"I think our guys appear to be spirited and highly motivated to win. Everyone wants to play the Patriots. That's fun, whether you're a bad team or a good team. It's a lot of fun to play those types of teams.''
From tbo.com

BONUS: Bill Belichick quote, on facing the Bucs

"The Bucs can hurt you in a lot of ways. They're explosive and they're dangerous. I hope we'll be able to be competitive against them."
From tbo.com
Please forgive me for quoting a non-Bucs coach, but this was just too good to ignore.

Kind of an understatement

"B.J. Askew the other morning had a fender-bender. He got into an accident."
From blogs.tampabay.com/bucs/
Due to the injuries sustained in the accident, Askew was placed on the non-football injury list, ending his season. Get well soon, B. J.

BONUS: Classic John Mckay quote

"There were times I felt like leaving the stadium and hitchhiking home."
From tampabayfootball.net
 The midweek tends to be slow so I'll try to post a classic quote from a former Bucs coach.

Tests

"You can't be tired of tests," Morris said. "When you get tired of tests, it's time for you to leave."
From tbo.com

Up Front

"We either need to get better up front or we need to get better people.''
From news-press.com
By "up front", I hope he means the front office.

Writing the story

"This week I held up a white piece of paper and I let those guys know, that’s how this week begins, now you write the story, you tell them how the story begins. They are writing the story right now in practice. We are writing the story right now of what we are going to be this week."
From blogs.tampabay.com

On all the Tony Dungy talk

"I kind of feel bad for Coach Dungy because he's just at home trying to enjoy his family and kids and everybody wants to put him back to work"
From blogs.tampabay.com
Coach Dungy denied being contacted by the Buccaneers.  ”I have had no contact with the Bucs and have no interest in doing anything other than what I am doing,” Dungy said in a statement released by NBC Sports.
From bucshots.blogs.heraldtribune.com 

On how he has to improve as a coach.

"I've got to find a way to make [Michael] Clayton catch the ball."
From blogs.tampabay.com

Facing the music

"We canned the music today. We've got to get back into it," Morris said. "We can't use music to motivate us. We can't go out and stretch and need music to help us. What's going to motivate you? How are you going to be motivated? We motivated ourselves today by reliving that sick feeling from Sunday that we've been having. ... That's how we practiced today. You can tell. You could see the anger in practice."
From tbo.com

On underachieving players

 ”The ones that I got to get better, I will,” Morris said. “And I’ll tolerate them until I replace them, period.”
From bucshots.blogs.heraldtribune.com

On Clayton asking for more chances and then dropping the ball

"You've got to be accountable, so careful what you ask for, careful what you wish for."
From tampabay.com

Toy soldiers

“The only way you get a win is you know you’re not alone. I know I got 53 soldiers. There better be 53 soldiers ready for me to come in and meet with them guys right now. Be ready to deal with getting that next win,”
From JoeBucsFan
♫ Step by step, Heart to heart, Left, right, left, We all fall down, Like toy soldiers ♫

Faces ripped off

“We had our coaches meeting this morning. We got our faces ripped off as a coaching staff, me included,”
From JoeBucsFan
They warned him not to open the Ark of the Covenant.

Raheem, is this a well-coached football team?

Morris pauses. He thinks for a moment. Then he gives you an answer that may be different in your home version of the game.
"I think it's a really well-coached football team," he said.
From tampabay.com
Coaches are judged by wins and losses alone. A winless team by definition is not a well-coached team.

Drop it like it's hot

“The ones that bother me are the excuses being made by each other – by the players and acting like it’s okay because it’s not," Morris said. “I don’t think dropping a ball is mental. I think that’s physical. You’ve just got to catch the ball. You get paid to catch the ball. You’ve got to catch it – everybody."
From Pewter Report

Perseverance

"The drives aren't getting longer," he said." I'm not going to ride the emotional roller coaster. After my radio show, it's done. I move on.
From theledger.com
I rode on Space Mountain once. I was sadly talked into getting on, and happy when it ended. THAT'S an emotional roller coaster!

On kickers

"You never know with kickers," Morris said. "(placekicker Mike) Nugent went 6-for-6 every week here in practice. … That's just something where you've got to throw the young man into the fire, let him go out there and kick it under the lights and with all the people screaming and see how it goes. … I can sit here and make some stuff up to you about technique and operation time and all that type of stuff, but I'm looking at it like you right now. I'm a fan. Does it go in? Good."
From tampabay.com
Kickers give him cat scratch fever.

Ruud: Slient but Deadly

"Realistically, throughout his career, he's always been kind of that silent killer that really doesn't have the big interception that he runs back for a touchdown"
From tampabay.com
Ruud's first interception of the season came eight days later.

BONUS: Classic Tony Dungy quote

“It took a long time to get that first (win). After three weeks, it seemed like every week was 10 or 12 days.”
From thinkexist.com
Classic, yet remarkably relevant. It's like deja vu.

BONUS: Classic John Mckay quote

"We couldn't score against a strong wind."
 From tampabayfootball.net
 The midweek tends to be slow so I'll try to post a classic quote from a former Bucs coach.

On the return of Tanard Jackson

"I haven't seen Tanard in four weeks. We have to get him back in the building, let him practice. To be fair to Will Allen, to be fair to Sabby (Piscitelli), to be fair to Tanard. You have to find out what Tanard is, what he can do and what he can't do."
From Bay News 9
I hope we find out what he is: Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral?

On Johnson in Washington

“His last game on a field in a starting role was at a Division I-AA school out in California and yesterday he was under the big lights in Washington D.C. A big time media market, not that you guys aren’t, but up there in that northeast and the lights were on and they were showing. That was his first game.”
From examiner.com
He wasn't the first Johnson to step into a new role in Washington after his predecessor was taken out by a young gunslinger hailing from New Orleans. 
It took me half a day to come up with that line.

Should they have won?

"I hate to hear people say we should have (won). No, you shouldn't have because you lost," he said. "But those are games you feel like you gave yourself an opportunity, gave yourself a chance... let's just go get those."
From The Ledger

Managers

“We’ve got to become better managers. We’ve got to become better finishers. We’ve got to become guys that come out of halftime and absolutely draw blood when we have the ball. We didn’t smell it today."
From Pewter Report
Did you get the memo about the new cover sheet?

Bounce everywhere

Coach Morris' favorite thing to yell when he wants a livelier practice is, "Bounce around, men! Bounce around!"
From TBBuccaneers Twitter page

On improving the defense

"I wouldn't say big strides, but they made strides," he said. "It's about tackling. It's about hustling. It's about hitting. … The people who were supposed to accept responsibility accepted it. The people who missed a tackle … know how to fix it."
From tampabay.com

Is Stylez "The Answer"?

"Jimmy has done some right stuff before for us," Morris said. "When [Tim] Crowder comes in and plays a little left for us like he's been doing you can sneak Jimmy over for a couple of the reps. I don't think that our Allen Iverson, Stylez G. White, can go 60 or 70 snaps over there."
From Pewter Report

On moving forward

"I go back to when I was little. When I think back to that, I was the cat who, no matter how big you were, I wasn't running. At some point, I was going to catch you slipping. And that has to be our mentality right now."
From tampabay.com

Toughness

"For the most part, it's about mental toughness," Morris said Thursday. "I'm not built like a loser, I guess. But I'm not spoiled, either. I'm not one of those people who react like, 'Man, I've never lost before.'
"What I would say is that I guess I'm not afraid to get my back dirty"
From tampabay.com

BONUS: Classic John Mckay quote

"I really don't have a lot of answers for the offense. We just don't seem to have anybody fast and we don't seem to be able to block anybody."
From tampabayfootball.net
Wednesday's tend to be a slow day so I'll try to post a classic quote from a former Bucs coach.

Changes

"We will have a change in starting quarterback. We'll be going to Josh Johnson."
From buccaneers.com
Morris took some heat for changing quarterbacks less than 24 hours after he said he would not do that very thing. 

A Giant embarrassment

"We were beat by a grown man team today, a team we want to be like one day."
"If I take Byron Leftwich out of the game I might as well take everyone else out with him."
"We don't use words like 'embarrassed' around here."
From buccaneers.com

On stopping the bleeding vs. Buffalo

"Defensively, the plan was to bleed slow, to make this running back beat you. And he did."
From tbo.com

On the signing of Hard Knocks' Corey Lynch

"We call him HBO".
"He's a competitive guy; just watch him on HBO."
From buccaneers.com

If Stovall can't play, who starts in his place?

“Brian Clark ready up and riding baby”
From Pewter Report
Now see? That's what I'm talking about. That's a quote!

BONUS: Classic John Mckay quote

"We stunk. We blocked bad, we were terrible on defense and our kicking game made up for it by being absolutely horrible. I saw nothing that delighted me, we ran on the field fairly well."
From tampabayfootball.net
Wednesday's tend to be a slow day so I'll try to post a classic quote from a former Bucs coach.

Defensive Woes

Asked how the Bucs can keep their defensive woes from getting out hand, Raheem The Dream replied, “It’s already out of hand.”
From JoeBucsFan

Playing defense on third down

"We're actually playing pretty good on third down. It's just a matter of getting to it."
From buccaneers.com
This is one of my personal favorites.

On the loss to Buffalo

"worst tackling performance of this whole regime."
From tampabay.com
It's only week 2 of the regime.

On Stroughter being picked in the 7th round

"I was a bad coach for six rounds"
From tampabay.com

On where Kyle Moore is sore

"He has a little baby groin type of deal that's bothering him.”
From blogs.tampabay.com
If I had the groin of an infant, that would bother me too.

BONUS: Classic Jeff Jagodzinski quote

"It's not a complicated game. Guys make it a lot more complicated than what it is. I know this, there's 11 on each side and the field is 100 yards long."
From Boston.com
He was fired by the Bucs just prior to the regular season. Rumored reason? His playcalling was too simplistic.

The coup de grace of all dares

“I dare somebody to write an article about why Clayton is on the team again,” Morris said. “I dare you.”
From Pewter Report
Marc, we'll take the physical challenge.

On Josh Johnson

"I've talked about him being my Jason Garrett, that career backup," Morris said after Sunday's game. "You might as well force him into his role right now."
From TBO.com
Now, I certainly wouldn't mind making $1 million a year to hold a clipboard, but I can't speak for JJ.