VIDEO: Remembering When the Bucs Ran One of the Worst Trick Plays in NFL History Against the Saints

In football, when trick plays go right, they are a thing of beauty. Both the players and coaches look like geniuses. When trick plays go wrong, it makes you wonder who could ever think it would have been successful.

Failed trick players are embarrassing, and that is what happened on this Tampa Bay Buccaneers punt against the New Orleans Saints.

On the Saints' 25-yard line, the Buccaneers were clearly in field goal range, though the kicking struggles in recent Tampa Bay history are well documented. Still, with under 30 seconds left of the first half, it would have made sense if Tampa took the points.

Clearly, they felt they needed a touchdown to stay in the game, and they thought they could pull this off. However, they did not account for the defense clearly not buying it.

A fake field goal would have made sense, but a fake punt? The Saints would not have had any room to return the punt anyway, so why would they bite on that fakeout? It was clearly a trick play from the beginning.

On the bottom of the screen with a lot of room, the receiver was left completely alone. Had the punter-turned-passer looked to get the ball to him, we could be questioning how the Saints fell for this fake. Instead, the punter rolled to the already short side of the field and got sacked.

It's tough to blame the coach for the call, despite it being a questionable decision considering the game situation. Still, they had an easy conversion available and did not execute, making this look like one of the worst trick plays in history.

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