Freeman developing into comeback artist

Roughly an hour after engineering the fourth-quarter comeback victory Sunday against the St. Louis Rams, second-year Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Josh Freeman(notes) was shuttled from the locker room to his car at Raymond James Stadium on a golf cart, reminiscent of the way closers used to be brought into baseball games in the 1970s.

It was perfect for a guy who is something of a throwback when it comes to finishing games.

In less than two full seasons as the starter since being the team’s first-round pick in 2009, Freeman has led the Bucs to seven wins in the 15 games he has started or played the majority of the game. (nfl jerseys cheap)Four of those victories have come this season as the Buccaneers have gotten off to a somewhat surprising 4-2 start. While that has led to some big talk from coach Raheem Morris – love ya, Raheem, but calling your team the best in the NFC is a bit of a stretch – it also has led to some lofty comparisons for Freeman

Specifically, one Tampa columnist dared to compare Freeman to John Elway, who along with Dan Marino made the fourth-quarter comeback a specialty.

Through their first two seasons after being first-round picks in 1983, Elway and Marino each had three fourth-quarter, come-from-behind victories. Freeman isn’t halfway through his second season – and he has five.

Projecting that number over a 16-year career would be something like 75, which again is more than Marino (37) and Elway (34) combined. That, of course, is absurd. The Miami Heat has a better chance of winning 75 games in the regular season than Freeman has of getting 75 comebacks over an entire career.

Moreover,(Redskins Jersey) having a lot of fourth-quarter comebacks isn’t a true sign of greatness for a team. It’s a nice quality to have (just ask Joe Montana and all 49ers fans), but you don’t want to live by it because it usually means your team isn’t that good. In a lot of cases, it really means that your team is about average and happens to have a good quarterback.

In this instance, Tampa Bay has someone special in Freeman. He is far from perfect, as his league-average 82.8 season rating shows. But he’s improving quickly (his rating was 59.9 last season).

The quality Freeman has that’s undeniable is his composure in the face of moments when lesser players fold.

“He’s just calm, man,” tight end Kellen Winslow(notes) said. “The pressure gets higher and it’s almost like he’s more relaxed, like he loves it.”

Even before Sunday, (Washington Redskins Jersey)Tampa Bay veteran cornerback Ronde Barber(notes) said, “Josh has some qualities – and not just the physical characteristics – that make you say, ‘Hmmm, this could be really special.’ ”

One of those obvious qualities is his combination of size, strength and mobility. At 6-foot-6, 248 pounds and blessed with enough speed to be a concern for defenses, Freeman is hard for one man to tackle.

Early in the game-winning drive against St. Louis, Freeman and the Bucs faced second-and-11, an obvious passing situation for the offense and an obvious blitz situation for the defense.(2011 super bowl jerseys) Freeman dropped to throw and the Rams brought extra defenders, one of them getting through for a clean shot at Freeman’s front shoulder.

Instead of going down, Freeman shed the tackler and scrambled for eight yards, turning third-and-hopeless into third-and-3.