The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have a kicker problem.
Yes, a lot of teams have problems with their kickers, but that's not what I'm getting at here. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the happy-go-lucky bunch from Hard Knocks, have a kicker problem.
Last year, the Bucs made the unusual decision to draft Robbie Aguayo, a move that would have only played out worse if Aguayo stole the team's Lombardi Trophy and escaped to Finland. Then there was Nick Folk, who earned a reputation over a decade of professional experience as a sturdy veteran option. But Folk went belly up as well, culminating in a nightmare Thursday night performance that cost Tampa a victory against the mighty Patriots.
It was moments after Folk's third and final miss against the Pats that it started to seem feasible that the Bucs were dealing with some kind of pirate's curse at the game's most delicate position. They've had injury and ineffectiveness haunt them for years. So how do you try to end a possible curse? Bringing in a guy who believes he can communicate with the dead feels like a decent lead.
Enter Pat Murray, who re-signed with the team on Monday. Murray is no stranger to bad Bucs mojo -- a torn ACL cost him his job a couple years ago. Now he's back ... and get a load of this:
For the uninitiated, a medium is an individual with the purported ability to mediate communication between the living and the dead. The most famous medium is probably John Edward, who was on television on a near constant basis in 2006. Whoopi Goldberg's character in Ghost was the best medium, but she wasn't a real person.
Let's bottom line this. Will Pat Murray's connection with the other side lead to more successful field-goal attempts for the Bucs? I mean, maybe? Definitely? Let's just say the entire mediumship industry rides on one man's right leg starting Sunday.
