"The failure of a football player is an easy thing to discuss.

Players will let you down, all right. There is nothing new in it, and nothing rare. It is merely a public acknowledgement that an athlete has been worth 10 cents on the dollar, and soon after he walks away, the world will forget all about him.

The failure of a football franchise is a bit more complicated.

Yeah, teams will let you down, too. For those who want to believe in their team, that's a harder disappointment. After all, the guys who made the decision about the failed player are busy making others, and nothing makes the customers worry about tomorrow more than yesterday's mistake.

And so, Disappointing Derrick Ward is gone from the Bucs, already and finally.

And who is to blame?

The player?

The team?

Or perhaps both?

They have failed together, the Bucs and their bust of a back. After 14 games of wondering where the Wind went, after watching him average 3.6 yards per carry and 29.2 yards per game, after witnessing a 409-yard season that had 616 fewer yards than the season before the Bucs gave him a contract, Ward is gone.

Around town, I suspect, the common response to his departure is, "What took the Bucs so long?''

Let's be honest. Not a lot of people out there will argue Ward's case. He was overweight, he was ineffective, and he always seemed unhappy. Even after a preseason game in Miami this year, he grumbled about the mud, and his coaches grumbled about him. Yeah, he was a bad fit from the start.

How bad was this signing? Think of it like this: From now on, Ward will be remembered as the Todd Steussie of running backs.

Here's a question: How on earth does a running back suffer a season as disappointing as 2009 was for Ward and then come into camp the next year overweight? Doesn't that say something about Ward's hunger? Doesn't that say something about him?

So, yeah, Ward helped color his pink slip. He was not good enough. He was not special enough. Money changes some players, and it's easy to wonder if Ward was one of those. His running style resembled that of a teenager who has come in late and is determined not to wake up his parents."