Baker Mayfield Disrespect, Todd Bowles’ “Eureka Second”

Bucs QB Baker Mayfield – Picture by: Cliff Welch/PR

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Pewter Report’s Scott Reynolds solutions your questions from the @PewterReport X account this week within the Bucs Mailbag. Submit your query to SR every week through X utilizing the hashtag #PRMailbag. Listed here are the Bucs questions we selected to reply for this week’s version.

QUESTION: Why do Tampa Bay followers give Baker Mayfield a lot unwarranted hate when he is one of the best QB the franchise has ever had?

ANSWER: Effectively, I believe you are forgetting about Tom Brady. You recognize, the best quarterback in NFL historical past who performed in Tampa Bay from 2020-22 and helped the Bucs win Tremendous Bowl LV? Brady went 32-19 in purple and pewter, together with a 5-2 mark within the postseason, and helped the group win two NFC South titles whereas additionally setting a franchise document for single season landing passes with 43 TDs. So until Baker Mayfield wins a Tremendous Bowl in Tampa Bay, he should stand in line behind Brady in the case of rating Bucs quarterbacks.

But I do not perceive the pessimism – I believe the time period “hate” is a little bit overblown – about Mayfield. I am advantageous with some skepticism, as I too have some doubts about Mayfield’s potential to make sufficient performs to win massive playoff video games at this juncture. However there are some Bucs followers who’re anti-Mayfield and recommend that he is simply not an excellent quarterback, and I do not perceive that.

Since arriving in Tampa Bay in 2023, Mayfield has thrown 95 landing passes, which is the second-most within the NFL throughout that span behind solely Detroit’s Jared Goff, who has thrown 101. Together with dashing scores, Mayfield has accounted for 100 touchdowns since 2023, which ranks fourth within the league behind Buffalo’s Josh Allen (124), Goff (104) and Philadelphia’s Jalen Hurts (103).

Bucs QB Baker Mayfield – Picture by: USA Right this moment

When wholesome and in a system that performed to his strengths in 2024, Mayfield accomplished a franchise-best 71.4% of his passes for 4,500 yards and 41 touchdowns, which was the second-most TD passes in a single season in Tampa Bay historical past behind Brady’s 43 in 2021. That led to Mayfield turning into the one two-time Professional Bowl quarterback in franchise historical past. If some followers do not suppose Mayfield is elite, I am okay with that notion. However to say that Mayfield is not an excellent quarterback is naive and silly.

Is Mayfield a High 10 QB within the NFL? Effectively, that is subjective, and if he’s I might place him at No. 10 or near it. I believe that is Mayfield’s ceiling, which is kind of good. And his flooring might be round No. 15, which might place him within the higher half of present NFL quarterbacks. That is a fairly good place for a franchise to be in – to have a QB that’s someplace between 10-15 within the league. That is not a nasty comfort prize for not having an elite prime 5 QB.

The query I prefer to ask the Mayfield detractors is who’s going to interchange him if you’d like him gone? The Bucs solely have unproven Connor Bazelak, who was an undrafted free agent and the group’s third-string QB, on the roster. This isn’t an incredible quarterback draft, and the group has extra urgent wants with utilizing premium picks to repair the protection. Nice quarterbacks not often hit free company and this franchise has but to draft an excellent one in 50 years. Mayfield is nearly as good because it will get proper now for this group.

Is he nearly as good as Brady was? No, however Mayfield is healthier than Brad Johnson, and he gained a Tremendous Bowl in Tampa Bay being surrounded by weapons to throw at and enjoying reverse an incredible protection. If the Buccaneers proceed to construct the roster round Mayfield’s skills and fortify the protection I imagine Tampa Bay has an opportunity to win a Tremendous Bowl with him if he stays wholesome and if Zac Robinson’s offense can get his play again to a 2024 stage prefer it was with Liam Coen.

QUESTION: With the mix every week away I believed it may be an excellent time to ask Todd Bowles: “What was your epiphany final offseason, and why did that realization not translate to discipline and lead to wins?”

Equally, “Todd, have you ever had an epiphany but this offseason? If not, might one be to have the protection play easier and sooner with a base protection to fall again on?” The Seattle protection did not look to be “scheming and tricking” the New England offense within the Tremendous Bowl – it simply lined up and performed quick.

ANSWER: You’re appropriate about Seattle’s protection. Outdoors of blitzing nickel cornerback Devon Witherspoon within the B hole and off the sting a complete of seven instances, which was very efficient, Seattle simply lined up and performed nice, bodily straight up protection. The Seahawks protection wasn’t terribly a number of or unique and relied on strain from the entrance 4 most of the time.

ESPN reported that within the common season “Seattle blitzed solely 20.7% of the time, the fifth-lowest fee within the NFL. On Sunday, that quantity really dropped to fifteen.1% – nevertheless it was closely cut up by half. [Seahawks head coach Mike] Macdonald blitzed [Patriots quarterback Drake] “Maye 33.3% of the time within the first half earlier than dialing it again and sending further rushers simply 8% of the time after the break.”

Bucs head coach Todd Bowles – Picture by: Cliff Welch/PR

Generally much less is extra, and the place gamers do not have a fancy defensive scheme to soak up and suppose via the consequence they’ll imply enjoying sooner. Bucs Corridor of Famer Rondé Barber has lamented over the truth that Todd Bowles’ defensive scheme is just too a number of and does not actually have a base scheme to fall again on – both within the group’s 3-4 entrance or nickel protection.

A part of the issue is that the Bucs do not have the horses up entrance to successfully strain the quarterback with a four-man rush, particularly with defensive deal with Calijah Kancey lacking 14 video games and 31-year-old free agent edge rusher Haason Reddick being a bust of a signing.

As for Bowles’ “eureka second” which he mentioned on the NFL Annual Assembly final spring, he by no means revealed what that was. I am going to ask him on the NFL Scouting Mix what it was, however I am not anticipating him to disclose it given how poorly his protection performed for a lot of the 2025 season. And I doubt Bowles will likely be forthcoming about any new eureka moments he could or could have had this offseason given how that assertion final 12 months crashed and burned.

QUESTION: Zac Robinson brings exterior voices and views from school and his previous with Falcons, however this head coach simply promotes from inside after which hires his son to be a part of the workers. It is a center finger to Bucs followers, and now Todd Bowles has a military of sure males. Lovie Smith 2.0 incoming?

ANSWER: I believe Bucs followers are freaking out about this manner an excessive amount of and I am advantageous with Todd Bowles hiring his son as a defensive assistant. This is not like Lovie Smith hiring his sons, Miles and Mikal, to be on his workers in 2014. Hundreds, Smith’s youngest son, was Tampa Bay’s defensive high quality management coach, whereas Mikal was the Bucs’ safeties coach. I’ve no downside with head coaches hiring their sons for high quality management roles to interrupt them into the world of teaching due to the entry stage standing of that place.

However Lovie Smith’s resolution to put Mikal Smith in control of Tampa Bay’s safeties from 2014-15 was disastrous. Mark Barron and Dashon Goldson under-performed beneath Smith’s watch, and a number of sources instructed me that Mikal Smith was an terrible place coach. Seems he was an terrible human being, too. After the Bucs fired Lovie Smith and his defensive assistants, together with his sons following the 2015 season, Mikal Smith was arrested and indicted in Arizona in 2020 for intercourse trafficking, pandering, receiving earnings from a prostitute, cash laundering, conspiracy and unlawful management of enterprise.

Former Rutgers DB, new Bucs defensive assistant Todd Bowles Jr. – Picture by: IMAGN Photographs – Vincent Carchietta

That is a robust case for nepotism not understanding. However let’s not neglect that former Redskins coach Mike Shanahan employed his son, Kyle Shanahan, to be his offensive coordinator from 2010-13 with out play-calling duties. That labored out fairly effectively for the Shanahans with Kyle turning into the 49ers head coach in 2017 and main San Francisco to 2 Tremendous Bowl appearances.

Bowles hiring Todd Bowles Jr., a former school security, to be a defensive assistant on his workers appears innocent. Bowles desires his son to achieve some teaching expertise on the NFL whereas he’s nonetheless employed with the Bucs. You may’t fault the person for that, particularly together with his son not operating a room and simply doing entry stage assignments in his first teaching alternative.

On this planet of careers it isn’t simply what you understand, however who you understand, and Todd Bowles Jr. is solely utilizing his sources – his father – to get his toes moist on this planet of teaching. Search for the youthful Bowles to help new safeties coach Tim Atkins this 12 months.

QUESTION: Devin Culp is 6-foot-4, 238 kilos. He runs a 4.47 40 and has a 40-inch vertical. Mike Evans is 6-foot-5, 233 kilos and runs a 4.53 40 and has a 37-inch vertical. Why do not they transition Guilt to extensive receiver? He completely suits the mildew of an Evans substitute. He has nice arms and stretched the sector at Washington.

ANSWER: The easy reply is as a result of Devin Culp is a decent finish and never a large receiver. And Culp is just not even a starting-caliber tight finish. He is been the Bucs’ third-string tight finish for the previous two seasons. So if he isn’t a starting-caliber tight finish it is uncertain he may very well be a starting-caliber receiver.

Let’s keep in mind that Culp was a seventh-round decide for a cause. Nice participant measureables do not all the time equate to nice gamers. In 4 years at Washington, Culp caught 66 passes for 711 yards (10.8 avg.) and 4 touchdowns. As a senior he had 16 receptions for 208 yards (13 avg.) and two touchdowns. Culp wasn’t even the starter at tight finish. That was Jack Westover, who caught 46 passes for 433 yards (9.4 avg.) and 4 TDs that season.

Bucs TE Devin Culp – Picture by: Cliff Welch/PR

In video video games like Madden you possibly can have gamers swap positions, nevertheless it’s not that method in actual life soccer. Culp might need some fairly good straight-line velocity, nevertheless it’s the fluidity, route-running and acceleration off the road that’s wanted to play receiver and be capable to cook dinner cornerbacks. Guilt solely has six catches for 94 yards (15.7 avg.) and one landing in his Tampa Bay profession, together with his six-yard TD final 12 months.

He is had alternatives the place he is been cut up out and remoted one-on-one in apply over the past two years. But the coaches clearly have not seen sufficient for him to maneuver up the depth chart at tight finish – not to mention play extensive receiver. Let’s have a look at if Culp could make some strides this offseason and in coaching camp. He wants to essentially make some enchancment as an in-line blocker.