Barber recalls blackouts, small Bucs crowds as a rookie

Ronde Barber laughed at the irony of it all.

Tampa Bay's 35-year-old cornerback broke into the league in 1997, the last season the Buccaneers had a home game blacked out locally. Sunday's season opener against the Cleveland Browns already has been declared a blackout by club officials and Bay area fans will instead see the Dolphins-Bills game on CBS at 1 p.m.

"I've come full circle,'' Barber said Wednesday. "Weird isn't it? This is a weird town in that regard. When I first got here, there weren't a whole lot of people in the stands. In 1997, there was nobody here. The Rays are the second-best team in baseball and they can't get 20,000 in the stands. It's a deadly storm. The (economic) downturn coincided with our team downturning.''

Barber is the only remaining player linked to Tampa Bay's 2002 Super Bowl championship club. While he's not promising another Vince Lombardi Trophy this season, Barber likes what he sees.

"I'm cautiously optimistic at this point,'' he said. "We'll know more after three games when we head into our bye week, but right now I'm not scared about how good we think we can be. It's good when you can look in your locker room and say these are the guys. Of course, they're saying the same thing in Cleveland. That's what is good about the NFL. Every fall, there's a new chapter. Actually, it's a new book. Throw the old one away.''

The Bucs are coming off a 3-13 season as Coach Raheem Morris enters Year 2 of a rebuilding process.

"My expectations? They're high, man,'' Morris said. "We've got a lot of talent on this football team. We're young and we don't have a lot of experience. Put two or three factors like that together and people won't give you credit for being a good team. All we can do is go out and prove it. We don't have to sell anybody but ourselves.

"The people in this building are the only ones who have to believe in us. It takes a couple of components to push young teams over the edge. Hopefully, we have that here. I think our quarterback (Josh Freeman) can play well this year. I know (rookie wide receiver) Mike Williams is going to play well. I'm excited. I think it can be good. Everybody thinks they're going to the Super Bowl in Week 1.''