Lynch doesn't take important call
Rick Stroud, The St.Petersburg Times, published 28 October 1996

John Lynch hits like a sledgehammer, is an exceptional athlete and a smart man from Stanford. But in the past two games, he has been involved in nearly every boneheaded play that has hurt the Bucs. Calamity found Lynch wherever he tried to hide Sunday against the Packers - even on special teams.

As the up-back who calls the signals for the punt-coverage team, Lynch thought special-teams coach Joe Marciano ordered a fake punt in the first quarter on fourth and 1 at the Green Bay 43. But the signal had not been given and punter Tommy Barnhardt wound up faking out his own team. When fullback Mike Alstott failed to sneak out into a pass route, Barnhardt tried to punt the ball but had it blocked by defensive end Reggie White.

"It comes from the sideline, from Joe Marciano, but we didn't signal it in," coach Tony Dungy said. "We'd practiced it and I think some of the guys just assumed we were going to run it. It wasn't supposed to be a fake punt. We have a signal for a fake punt and we misread it and called it. We didn't want it at that point. We had (fourth and) 2 yards and we had kind of a trick play where we were going to shift and see if we could draw them offside and didn't, so we wanted to take the penalty, back up and punt it down to the other end."

Lynch fell on his sword and admitted the mistake, even though Dungy wouldn't reveal who was responsible for botching the play. "It was a miscommunication," Lynch said. "When we put those guys in this week, it was to run the fake. But you've got to have assurance and I thought it was on. I thought I made eye contact with Joe on the sideline. I thought they called it. Put that one on my shoulders."

Lynch also was called for a late hit on Desmond Howard after the receiver caught a third-down pass well short of the first-down marker. The penalty sustained the drive and enabled the Packers to hold the ball for 8:30 before it ended when Chris Jacke missed a 46-yard field-goal attempt wide left. Last week at Arizona, Lynch also was assessed a 15-yard penalty for a late hit in a flag-marred 13-9 loss to the Cardinals.

"It's like it's something different every week," Lynch said. "It's disappointing because we play our butts off. We play hard and make stupid mistakes. You can't do that. It was a third-down situation, he was a couple of yards away and I had my eyes focused on him and didn't know where the sideline was. Martin (Mayhew) had him down, I was just coming to make sure he didn't fall forward and get the first down. I saw it on the DiamondVision and thought it was a good call."

Dungy blamed the mistakes on overeagerness, but didn't excuse them. "I think what happens when you're not winning, you have a tendency to try and press and you want to do something to make the big play," Dungy said. "You get overanxious and jump offside. You hit a guy late out of bounds. You do things that aren't within the system. And that's what we've got to guard against. Everybody's got to have great effort and intensity and we want that. But you've got to do your job and you've got to play with poise and that's what we haven't done the last two games."

Special teams have been the big culprit. The Bucs had 12 men on the field after a punt in the second quarter, giving Jacke the necessary range to convert a 48-yard field goal. Astonishingly, Dungy admitted he spotted the extra man on the field but didn't call timeout. Michael Husted did his part by missing a 27-yard field goal, his fourth miss in his past six tries. A week ago, Husted missed two field goals and had an extra point blocked at Arizona. "That's disappointing because we spend a lot of time (on special teams) and we've got a great coach who works at it," Dungy said. "Again, I think a lot of times it's guys who in their minds are trying to do the right thing. They're trying to be on top of it. But you've got to have poise and you've got to do things correctly."