Raheem Morris Fired! Tampa Bay Bucs Manager AND Staff Sacked

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers fired coach Raheem Morris on Monday, the team announced.

Dropping their season finale 45-24 to the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday, the Bucs closed the year with 10 straight losses -- the franchise's worst in-season stretch since the 1977 team lost its first 12 games."We want to thank Coach Morris for all his hard work and dedication as head coach of the Buccaneers," Buccaneers co-chairman Joel Glazer said in a statement.

As the NFL's second-youngest team, the Bucs (4-12) might have not handled last year's NFL lockout as well as an experienced club, but Tampa Bay still managed a 4-2 start that included an emotional 16-13 win over Atlanta. That Week 3 victory ended a five-game series losing streak that gave quarterback Josh Freeman his first win over the Falcons.

While Freeman completed a career-high 62.8 percent of his passes this year, he threw 22 interceptions just a year after throwing just six.

When Tampa Bay struggled badly in Morris' first season of 2009, the Bucs still had a reputation for playing hard despite their 1-12 start.

But they won 16 of their next 25 and seemed ready to challenge New Orleans and Atlanta for supremacy in the NFC South.

Everything began to unravel, however, after they beat the Saints 26-20 on Oct. 16. They lost their next 10 -- the franchise's worst stretch since the 2008-09 teams combined to drop 11 straight.

Sunday marked the seventh loss this season by 16 or more points.

http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/7413905/tampa-bay-buccaneers-fire-coach-raheem-morris-10-game-losing-skid