Buccaneers GM says they’d ‘seen enough’ of Josh Freeman

Mark Dominik looked back to the end of last season through this week and felt that it was the right time for Greg Schiano to see what he had with Mike Glennon. He didn’t need to see any more of Freeman.

by Kenneth Arthur

Sep 25, 2013, 6:52 PM UTC

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Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports

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Buccaneers general manager Mark Dominik told USA Today on Wednesday that the team had "seen enough" of Josh Freeman prior to head coach Greg Schiano informing Freeman that rookie Mike Glennon would be the starting quarterback moving forward. Freeman was off to a horrific start as the Bucs have opened the year at 0-3, but Dominik took more than just this year into account when the decision was made.

More: Bucs Nation with more on the decision to bench Freeman

“The main thing for us was the performance of the team the last nine games was 1-8 and that’s tough,” Dominik told USA TODAY Sports Wednesday. “He hasn’t played well. That’s a part of it. If you don’t have a quarterback in this league, you don’t have a shot. We felt like we’d seen enough of what we needed to see.”

Freeman has completed only 45.7 percent of his passes this season, and dating back to last season has thrown 12 interceptions in his last six games. Schiano and Freeman’s tumultuous relationship this year has made headlines quite often in Tampa Bay, with rumors being bandied about that Schiano had rigged the captain’s vote so Freeman would not win the honor, and news that the QB had shown up late to a team photo.

Now the team is set to move on with Schiano’s hand-picked choice from the 2013 draft. Glennon was a third-round selection out of NC State, and at 6’7 will be one of the tallest quarterbacks in the league. Dominik thinks the Bucs are setting the rookie up for success as best they can.

”The reason we did it now is that we have a home game this week. We have a bye the next week and then we have a home game coming out of the bye. “Our thought process was like, ‘Hey look, some people make the change at the bye week.’ We felt it was better for Mike that he has a game he can learn from for two weeks, he can go back and watch. This way he’s not just waiting to play.”

The Bucs take on the Arizona Cardinals in Week 4.