It's the same old line for the Bucs Gary Shelton, The St.Petersburg Times, published 5 November 2001 The truth is a yard away from you. Extend your arms, and you will find it at your fingertips. It is third and 1, and everyone in the free world knows what is about to happen between here and that 36th inch. The Tampa Bay Bucs are going to give the ball to Mike Alstott. Of course they are. The offensive line will cave in. Of course it will. When the chains are brought out, the Bucs will fail to measure up. Of course they will. No first down. No holding onto the ball. No holding onto the lead. This is the most predictable failure. It is money time, and the Bucs, supposedly a running team, will attempt to run the width of your coffee table. And they will fail. And they will punt, and eventually, they will lose. By now, people living in caves know the formula. Oh, you can blame other culprits, if you wish. When the scene of the crime is as familiar as Lambeau Field, the list of suspects is always long. Sunday, the Bucs were unable to master things as simple as spiking a pass or falling on a fumble. They were unable to pad a lead or to protect one. They could not cover a punt. There was too little defense and almost no offense. But if you boil the game down to its most essential element, if you strip away every possible layer of debate, you come to this. The Bucs, for the life of them or their season, cannot block. Take Sunday, when the Bucs spent their day outlined against a greenish brown November turf. The offensive line was simply overwhelmed. Brad Johnson looked like a man standing on the freeway. He was sacked seven times (for the season, the number is 27 and growing). Just as importantly, the constant rush altered the Bucs' attack. As for the high-powered running backs, they ran 20 times for 35 yards. Remember the midweek discussion over whether Mike Alstott or Warrick Dunn should start? Alstott averaged 1.8 yards per carry; Dunn 1.7. Such an effort may well jeopardise the team's lofty 28th spot in the NFL rushing statistics. It has been this way for some time. The most underachieving part of the Tony Dungy era is the offensive line. It has not mattered how many high draft picks, how many free agents or how many Pro Bowls are represented. The bottom line on the Bucs line is that old players always play as if they are too old, and young players seem as if they are too young. It is as simple as a step, and as ugly as a fall. A football team has to block the same way a boxer has to jab, the way a basketball team has to rebound. It is elementary. It is also true. When the Bucs can block, they can run. When they can run, they can throw. When they can do both, they can score. When they can score, they can win. They can dictate field position and keep teams off-balance and look darned clever in the process. When they cannot, this is what happens. The offense looks lost, chaotic, outnumbered. Against a good defense, the Bucs always seem to be moving uphill, against the wind, and it is always third and 11. Consider: Tampa Bay ran 61 plays Sunday. Of those, 35 gained two yards or less. The Bucs ran the ball 12 times on first down and gained 16 yards. That's a lot of second and nines. On the other hand, did you notice Green Bay's offensive line? The Packers lost left tackle Chad Clifton on their first possession and you couldn't tell the difference. They still managed to open holes for Ahman Green (169 yards) and protect Brett Favre (one sack). It didn't matter that you haven't heard of any of the guys on the line. It didn't matter that there isn't a No. 1 draft pick in the bunch. It mattered only that they were better on the plays that mattered. Good offensive lines are like that. They always have a seventh-rounder, or a free agent, who has come from nowhere to develop into a pretty good player who opens pretty big holes. When is the last time the Bucs had such a player? For that matter, when is the last time the Bucs had such a hole? If you are to compare the Bucs offensive line to a wall, sadly, the one you would have to pick is Jericho's. If you are looking for the difference between last week's victory over Minnesota, and the way everything on offense clicked, and the loss to the Packers, where almost nothing did, this is your answer. For the Bucs, the frustration should have peaked in the last quarter and a half. Despite not playing well, the Bucs led 17-7 halfway through the third, and their field position was good enough to put the game away. But on their next seven possessions, the Bucs could manage only three more points, and that came after a 27-yard pass interference call against the Packers. In the fourth quarter, the Bucs managed only three first downs in five possessions. "We had multiple chances to get it back to a two-score game, and we weren't able to do that," offensive co-ordinator Clyde Christensen said. "I was extremely disappointed in how we played with a lead." Sounds like the same old line, doesn't it? Unfortunately, it looked like the same old line, too.