King blossoming now for Bucs Gary Shelton, The St.Petersburg Times, published 13 December 1999 An hour and a half had passed when Shaun King stepped out into an otherwise starless night. By then, it seemed as if it had been days since he had been the King of the Lions, and King was worried. He kept talking about how his mama was waiting, and from the sound of his voice, that bothered him a lot more than, say, Robert Porcher. He had run the gantlet. There was the news conference, followed by seven one-on-one interviews, during the last of which he smiled and waved hello to Tokyo. There was the photo with the stadium worker, who hoped he wasn't going to get fired for posing. Finally, King made his way up the empty, gray corridor and into the cool darkness of the evening. And there, waiting for him, was: Mardi Gras. The fans, dozens of them, maybe hundreds, leaned over the railings, touching him, thanking him, loving him as he walked toward the parking lot. For 20 minutes, he worked his way from this side to that, signing programs, hats, helmets, a woman's bare shoulder. "Thank God for Shaun King's parents," one fan yelled. They chanted his name. They asked his mother for her autograph, his brother for his. They want to embrace him, this quiet, confident kid who does not yet realize how difficult this game is supposed to be. They want to pat him on the back and cuff him on the shoulder. They want to turn ownership of the offense, if not the team, over to him. You can feel it as he walks among them, you can see it in their eyes as they look to him. They want him to be special. They want him to be theirs. Which, of course, is nothing new for King. More and more, he gets that in the locker room, too. How do you resist falling in love with this kid? Furthermore, why would you? There is something special about him, magic in a microwave, and it is hard to look at him without grinning. Consider Sunday's game against the Lions, when the Bucs turned to the Boy King and sweetly asked, "Win this for us, please?" Conventional wisdom (which was responsible for King still hanging around in the second round of the draft, so how smart can it be?) says you do not do this. If you are forced to play a rookie quarterback, you make him the least-important guy on the field. You tell him to keep his mouth shut and stay out of the way. Not the Bucs on Sunday. The running game was wretched, and first place was slipping away. So the Bucs, out of desperation more than daring, put the ball in King's hands. He responded by going 23for 37, despite several drops, for 297 yards and two touchdowns. It isn't just that King is running the offense. He appears to be one of its best players, too. There is a calmness to him, a deftness to his short passes that has been missing around here for some time. Nothing excites him, nothing scares him, nothing bothers him, with the possible exception of Warren Sapp referring to him as "Doughboy." The team hasn't had to slow down to let him catch up; it has had to speed up to keep up. Go back to the fourth quarter, when the Bucs trailed 16-9. It was third and 17, and, amazingly, the Bucs called a play that was in the playbook, but not in the game plan. King looked at the sideline to be sure it was the right call. He dropped back and looked right, then half turned and threw toward Reidel Anthony, who, also amazingly, held on for 30 yards. Eight straight times the Bucs threw the ball before scoring, which was sort of like hearing the Lone Ranger say "Hey, Tonto, why don't we take the snowmobile for a change." And so we add to the budding King legend, which is growing both fast and large. Another week like this and reports will start to crop up aboutwhether Trent Dilfer should check out the Houston real estate classifieds. Is this King's team? It is starting to look like it. Even King admits he can see a difference in the way his teammates look at him in the huddle. Try to wrest this job from him. Try to take it away. He was better this week than last, and better last week than the week before. How good will he be next week? Good enough, one supposes, that the defenses around the NFL are going to have to alter the stop- the-run-at-all-costs philosophy of theirs. He has brought balance to the present, brightness to the future. And so he winds his way through the crowd, grinning, gripping, posing. If you wonder, he can feel it too, the growing bond between place and player. He moved near the end of the line and a young woman, afraid she might be the only person without his signature, yelled "This side, Shaun. This side!" He looked at her and flashed that grin, the one where his teeth seem as bright as the diamond earrings that frame his face. "Relax," he said, slowly. And she, like her team before her, did. Man, is this guy going to be big in Tokyo. In Tampa Bay, too.