Advertisement

Mike Glennon once again looks like Bucs' QB of future

 
Published Sept. 29, 2014

PITTSBURGH

The hero of the day is gangly and balding and painfully slow of foot. If you were picking a leading man for the highlights, it is fair to say he would probably not have been your first choice.

On the other hand, the guy looks great with the winning scoreboard over his shoulder, doesn't he?

Mike Glennon stole the show Sunday. He saved the day, and he saved his team, and he possibly saved this season. He came from the bench, and he came from yesterday's memories, and he pretty much came from oblivion as he led the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to a theft of Sunday's game against Pittsburgh.

This was Joe Montana stuff, a cool-as-ice, cat-burglar kind of performance. It made his coach a winner again. It stopped his team from being a punch line. It returned the blue to the sky and the oxygen to the air.

With no timeouts left, with the clock running out, with his team in one of the NFL's toughest places to play, Glennon changed the tenor of a season.

Who would have thought it? Glennon was yesterday's news, the choice of last year's coach, the alternative in last year's disaster. This year? One of the first things that coach Lovie Smith did upon taking the head coaching job was to replace Glennon as his quarterback, and no matter how many times Smith praised him afterward, no one seemed to quite believe that Smith saw anything in Glennon that resembled hope.

It had been 273 days since Glennon had started a game, and if things had gone according to plan, it might have been 273 more.

Until this.

Until the 24-year-old became a star all over again.

He threw possibilities. Of all the things you can say about Glennon on Sunday, it comes back to that. He threw for 245 yards in the second half, the fourth-best half a Bucs quarterback has ever had. His last pass came with seven seconds to go, and just like that, Glennon had thrown for 300 yards and the Bucs were in the victory column.

How did it happen? Because of Glennon's right arm, that's how.

"That's normally how you judge quarterbacks," Smith said afterward. "It's based on how they finish the game."

If that's the case, then Glennon was Manning-for-a-day. In the second half, he led his team on drives of 80 yards, 83, 61 and, for the win, 46 yards with no timeouts. In the fourth quarter alone, he threw for 148 yards. On second and 23, the second-year quarterback hit a 21-yard completion to set up a third-down conversion and keep a drive going.

"We didn't win a lot of games last year," Glennon said, grinning. "But I can't think of one that feels as good as this one."

So here's a question.

Why, again, was Glennon the backup?

He isn't anymore. That much seems clear. There were throws that Glennon made that Josh McCown simply cannot. Take his third-quarter pass down the sideline to Mike Evans. Take his 22-yard dart to Russell Shepard in the fourth. Take his 41-yard pass to Louis Murphy on the team's last drive.

"He was dynamite," McCown said. "I'm so proud of him."

Who on the Bucs isn't? This game had the look of a quarterback staking a claim to the position. No, Glennon wasn't perfect. He missed on three straight throws inside the red zone on their next-to-last drive. And if you want the truth, even his winning touchdown to Vincent Jackson was high and outside.

Stay updated on Tampa Bay’s sports scene

Stay updated on Tampa Bay’s sports scene

Subscribe to our free Sports Today newsletter

We’ll send you news and analysis on the Bucs, Lightning, Rays and Florida’s college football teams every day.

You’re all signed up!

Want more of our free, weekly newsletters in your inbox? Let’s get started.

Explore all your options

"I wanted (that last drive) bad," Glennon said. "With some of those throws, it would have been tough to sleep tonight if we didn't get another chance. Those are throws I need to make if we're going to win games."

For the first time this year, however, the Bucs attacked someone from the quarterback position. For the first time this year, the offense didn't feel as if it was about checkdowns and draw plays.

It's funny. Of Glennon's four victories last season, two were fourth-quarter comebacks. But neither felt like it. Both came in the early part of the quarter, against Miami and against Detroit. None were as dramatic as this.

This time, the Bucs won because Glennon was good enough to make it happen.

"It definitely matters," Smith said. "As a young quarterback when you're out there at the end of the game, you kind of visualize having to lead your team to victory and making big plays at the end. You couldn't draw a script any better than that for Mike."

Or for Lovie.

Or for the rest of the Bucs.

From here, who knows? A pessimist might point out that the Bucs were eight seconds from being 0-4, and that the Steelers botched a lot of opportunities, and for crying out loud, could someone cover Heath Miller every now and then? Yeah, Tampa Bay is a long way from success.

For a day, however, things are better. For a day, you can notice progress.

For a day, Glennon is a star. It's a start.