Spurrier: Graham Needs To Get To Practice
Steve Spurrier had stern advice Thursday for a former Gators running back caught up in a contract squabble with the Bucs.
After greeting several other former players following a voluntary workout at One Buc Place, the former Gators coach and current University of South Carolina coach said Earnest Graham needs to get his "butt back out to practice real soon."
"Earnest needs to get back out here, and I guess he will be out here next week,"
Spurrier said.
Workouts go from voluntary to mandatory next week, but Spurrier said he has not spoken to Graham about his holdout, so he has no first-hand knowledge of Graham's plans.
Like Spurrier, the Bucs believe Graham will end his offseason-long absence and report to the team's three-day minicamp Tuesday to avoid being fined as much as $8,000 per day. Graham, a former special teams standout who seized an opportunity to play regularly last year by leading the Bucs in rushing, has been locked in a contract dispute with the team since the end of last season.
Whether it was to make a point or to protect him from injury, Graham skipped each of the team's voluntary offseason workouts, the last of which was Thursday.
Spurrier, who recruited Graham to Florida and coached him from 1999-2002, is in the Bay area this weekend to attend a gathering of 1960s Gators football alumni at Innisbrook Resort in Palm Harbor.
While meeting with the media following the Bucs' workout Thursday, Spurrier touched on a variety of subjects, including the status of his redshirt freshman quarterback, Stephen Garcia.
The former Jefferson High standout has been suspended from the Gamecocks squad three times since he signed early and enrolled at South Carolina in January 2007.
"Looking back, maybe he would have been better off staying in high school than coming up there,"
Spurrier said. "But it's history now, and all we can do is go from here."
"If Stephen fulfills the requirements and things he must do this summer, he'll be back up there with us. He's still got four years of eligibility left, so we we'll see how it plays out."
•On whether he or Bucs coach Jon Gruden is tougher on quarterbacks: "I don't know. I haven't watched Jon coach a lot until today. But now I understand why his voice is a little hoarse. He yells and screams, and I tell you what, I admire the passion he has for this game. He does it year-round. I'm a little different than him in that I need to get away from football. He can do it and never get tired of it."
•On the prospect of South Carolina winning the Southeastern Conference this year: "We've got a chance. We've got a lot of good players. We've got to coach 'em a little bit better, and they need to play a little bit better at crucial times."
•On the new Bucs facility, which replaced the outdated and dilapidated One Buc Place that Spurrier worked out at during his time as a Buccaneers player in 1976: "It really is first-class. So many NFL teams have these beautiful buildings and so forth. But like Coach Gruden says, the Bucs won a Super Bowl in that old, rundown place. He'll start bragging on this maybe when they win a Super Bowl out of here."
•Finally, after saying he doesn't miss the NFL, where he was a player with the Bucs and 49ers and a coach for the Redskins, Spurrier said he still pays attention to it: "The Bucs have a good-looking team. That's the team I pull for, as well as the 49ers. Those are my two NFL teams."
