Boomer Esiason: Josh Freeman Needs To Take Craft More Seriously
By Josh Sanchez
Former NFL MVP and current NFL analyst Boomer Esiason has been making the rounds on the radio as we gear up for another Sunday of NFL action. Esiason was talking to WHFS-FM 98.7 in Tampa and started to discuss Buccaneers quarterback Josh Freeman. Freeman is a very talented passer but has yet to jump into the top level of quarterbacks in the league.
Esiason had some advice for Freeman and it began with telling the young signal-caller to grow up and take his job more seriously.
“Here is Josh’s reputation in the eyes of a lot of us that cover this league: tremendous talent, tremendous arm, tremendous football player,” Esiason said. “The sky is the limit for him and usually what makes people get to that next level is his commitment that he makes to his craft: the study in the playbook, understanding where you are in the offense and taking everything you do as a quarterback and taking it seriously and not hanging out on Friday nights and not hanging out on Tuesday nights and being above all the stuff that unfortunately a lot of young men find themselves in the midst of, and that is young men enjoying themselves when they are on their off time.
“I get all of that. We all went through that as players and that other stuff. But he if wants to be the next group of players, if he wants to be mentioned in same breath as Drew Brees, who you will see Sunday, or Tom Brady or Ben Roethlisberger, and even Ben Roethlisberger had some growing up to do, and I remember us challenging him to grow up as well, then he is going to have to take his craft a helluva lot more seriously.
“While I think he is a tremendous football player — he had a great game last week. Now I think we are starting to see the fruits of the Vincent Jackson signing and throwing the ball down the football field. This could be a really exciting football field if he gets plugged in and gets plugged in in a way that we all believe he should be in order to reach what we believe is a very, very high potential ceiling.”
Freeman will have the opportunity to prove Esiason wrong today when he leads the Buccaneers against the New Orleans Saints. It is a pivotal matchup in the NFC South and could do wonders for Freeman as he looks to show that he is taking his job as an NFL signal-caller seriously.