Bucs Get Roughed Up By Broncos Roy Cummings, The Tampa Tribune, published 5 October 2008 It wasn't meant to be a bury-the-hatchet moment. No one said I'm sorry, let's move on, but that's pretty much what Bucs coach Jon Gruden and his estranged quarterback Jeff Garcia did late Sunday. During a break late in what proved to be a 16-13 loss to the Broncos at Invesco Field, Garcia heard all he really needed from Gruden to feel comfortable about being his quarterback again. The message was a short one: be yourself. It was effective, too. Garcia looked like the Garcia of old after hearing it. Good thing, too, because Garcia may be the quarterback who is asked to rally the Bucs from their latest loss. Though the Bucs probably won't know the true severity until at least today, the elbow injury that knocked starter Brian Griese out of Sunday's game could keep him out of this Sunday's game against Carolina as well. That would force Garcia back into the starting role, and if the Bucs can get the kind of play out of him that they got after Gruden delivered that message, they'll feel good about their chances to win. After pulling within three points, the Bucs attempted to ricochet the ball off a Denver player on the kickoff, but it missed and bounced down the field. Denver fell on it at the 14-yard line. Though his rally attempt fell short in the end, Garcia gave the Bucs a chance to beat the Broncos by engineering a near-flawless 13-play, 90-yard touchdown drive in the game's waning moments. The sharp accurate throws that made Garcia the darling of this team a year ago were back during that drive. So was the sound decision-making and the scrambling skill that make him seem so much younger than he really is. "It felt good to have the old me back again," Garcia said. "In terms of the movement and finding receivers and having receivers making plays and just stringing together a drive in a difficult environment, it was good." Gruden couldn't disagree. After sitting Garcia for a month, ostensibly for poor play, although Garcia never bought that line of thinking, Gruden said he first started to see signs of the old Garcia in practice a week ago. Garcia was elevated from third to second string for this game as a result, and when Gruden turned to Garcia in the wake of Griese's injury he saw more or what he eventually was looking for from him. "I had to see with my own eyes," Gruden said. "I wanted to see him throw the ball on time, crisp. I wanted to see his movement again. Now I'm seeing more and more of that." He didn't at first. Garcia's first couple of series were as disjointed as the play that earned him his seat on the bench. He even threw an interception, uncharacteristic for Garcia. During a break in offensive series, though, Gruden called Garcia over to him and gave him the simple speech that seemed to bury a month's worth of hard feelings while also sparking Garcia's personal comeback. "He told me to just get back to being you," Garcia said. "He said to stop worrying about what has happened and about trying to score two touchdowns in one series. That's not going to happen, he said, so just take it one play at a time and be yourself, scramble, make things happen. Be the guy you've been in the past." Had the Bucs been the team they've been in the past, the game might have turned out differently. The takeaways and the defensive scores that have aided them in previous weeks were missing this time. Also missing (again) was poise and discipline on the offensive line. That unit was whistled five times for penalties, including three times for false starts. It also surrendered three sacks. "You're not going to win if you have five penalties and you give up three sacks," Gruden said "And we didn't get much out of our return game today either." The Bucs averaged 4.8 yards per punt return and 16 yards per kick return. Their average starting position on offensive drives was their own 20, with only two drives starting beyond their 30. "It's hard to score when you start every drive at your own 20," Gruden said. "That hurt us. Not a lot of teams can do that in pro football." Both teams struggled to score in this one, with the Bucs and Broncos each notching just a pair of field goals through the first half. A 10-yard touchdown pass from Jay Cutler to Brandon Stokley changed that, but a third Matt Prater field goal proved to be the difference when Garcia's rally fell short.