Greg Schiano With A Fresh Take On Penalties: “i Don’t Ever Want To Be The Least Penalized Team In The League”

Greg Schiano With a Fresh Take on Penalties: “I Don’t Ever Want to be the Least Penalized Team in the League”

Greg Schiano is trying to revive a Tampa Bay Buccaneers franchise that just about hit rock bottom in 2011. And while Schiano is attempting to improve the environment in Tampa where player discipline and bone-headed mistakes ran rampant last season, he actually has an interesting take on how many penalties he wants his team to be flagged for as they try to get back to a competitive level in the NFC South.Greg Schiano joined Ron and Ian on WDAE in Tampa to discuss the budding leadership on the Tampa roster, the Florida heat as a weapon as his team prepares for the upcoming season, and his approach to molding a team that’s both aggressive and disciplined.

On the idea that the leadership will eventually take responsibility for pep talks to rally the team:

“I think it’s depending on where the team is from a maturity standpoint and an experience standpoint and leadership standpoint. Hopefully as we move forward with this thing the leadership is going to do it. The best I’ve had the leadership has taken care of most of those issues. Every once in a while you have to step in as the head coach, but there’s no reason to believe right now that that should be established. That’s what we’re building right now, so we’re all educating each other and trying to figure out how is the best way to do it. But there’s some things that I don’t need to be educated on, that I know are right and wrong, and those things we can’t compromise.”

On using the Florida heat to their advantage:

“It can be oppressive at times, and I think that’s something that as long as we learn to fight through it, it becomes an advantage for the Bucs. And that’s what we need to do — we need to make it advantage Bucs. And I’m not naive to the fact that the cumulative effect adds up, too. We gotta be careful that — toughness and everything, that’s great — but we gotta make sure that as we get to October, November, we’re not spent as well. So I think there’s a real fine line there, and hopefully we’ll be smart enough to be able to walk that line.”

On team discipline, which was a big issue last season:

“The selfish penalties are the ones where you’re angry, so you’re going to relieve your anger and do something that hurts the team. Whether you shove a guy, punch a guy, whatever — that’s selfish. The silly penalties are the ones where you line up offsides. That’s just silly, right? You’re just not paying attention to details. And then there’s the execution penalties, where you’re playing hard and you happen to fly over the top and hit somebody out of the hit zone. You’re going to get a penalty for that. I don’t want to slow our guys down too much that way. It’s a fine line between being a physical, aggressive football team and getting a flag. You gotta be careful. I don’t ever want to be the least penalized team in the league, because I don’t think you’re trying hard enough then. But I certainly do want to be in the top 10. That’s where you should be. You should be — five through 10 is a great place to be as a penalized team.”