Tampa Bay Buccaneers Josh Freeman speaks about violations by New Orleans Saints

In the wake of a joint admission by New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton and general manager Mickey Loomis that a “pay for performance” system occurred for the past three seasons, Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Josh Freeman gave his feelings on the matter.

Freeman said in an interview with the Tampa Bay Times that he wasn’t too shocked that this system was in place.  In fact Freeman said that they were warned by their coaches to watch out for “cheap shots”.

"We just knew that everytime we played the Saints, they were going to take some cheap shots.  I mean, it was always something we acknowledged.  We knew Gregg Williams’ defenses were physical and they were going to get after you.  Knowing what we know now, it’s not surprising that was the system that was set up for them.  It was unnecessary stuff."

He stated that their was just an “overall feeling” that the Saints had something going on and only saw that type of play when they played the Saints.  Freeman said he felt sometimes the Saints “crossed the line”.

Although in light of the recent findings, Freeman said he still has a good relationship with mant members of the team.  He told the Times that, “I like a lot of the guys on the team”.

He actually worked out with Saints quarterback Drew Brees during the offseason of 2010 and got pointers from him on how to improve after his rookie season.