Tony Dungy Has An Issue With NFL Preseason

During Thursday night's Bills-Rams broadcast, former Colts and Buccaneers head coach Tony Dungy voiced his displeasure with the preseason.

Dungy said that he noticed a dip in the quality of play between the first and second quarters. The winning coach in Super Bowl XLI chalked this up to players not being conditioned well for having not seen much playing time in the preseason.

“I’m going to jump on my coach’s soapbox here,” Dungy said. “You might want to play your guys a little bit in the preseason. The first quarter was very very sharp. But the second quarter, I thought we saw fatigue set in. Turnovers, penalties, mistakes. Just wasn’t real sharp.”

Dungy echoes a common critique of the preseason which is that most teams rarely give their regular starters much playing time.

While this could be a precaution to minimize the chance of injury or an opportunity to gauge the abilities of other players, most people — especially ones who paid to watch a preseason game — would prefer to see started.

Coach Dungy brings up a great point about the importance of getting starters some preseason reps. Yeah, it's tough for players to get injured while on the bench. But come the regular season they'll wind up gassed by the second quarter of Week 1.

That balancing act between practice and skirting injuries is what coaches deal with during the preseason.

Tony Dungy would know where that line is and what coaches need to do to get their team prepared for the season. In 208 games, Dungy has a 139-69 record.

Follow on Twitter: @Matt_Reigle