“You Know When Your Offense Is Playing Decent Football”
February 29th, 2024
Todd Bowles likes his evolution as an aggressive head coach.
Mutliple times this week at the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, Bowles mentioned how he has increased how much he attacked on fourth down.
Bowles loves to blitz and has long been one of the most frequent blitzers as a defensive playcaller in the NFL. But on offense, Bowles trends a lot more conservative.
That changed a bit last season.
The Bucs went for it on fourth down more often and, early in the season, Joe even referred to the head coach as Todd “Big Balls” Bowles.
This week, Joe asked Bowles about the moment on the final drive in Atlanta — 4th-and-1 with the game on the line.
For those who forgot, Rachaad White got that handoff in Atlanta on 4th-and-1 at the Bucs’ 45 yard line with exactly 2 minutes remaining. He got three yards.
Without that conversion, of if the Bucs were crazy enough to punt — Bowles had two timeouts in his pocket — Tampa Bay would have been sure to lose and fall to a 5-8 record. That would have doomed the season.
Bowles talked about being more aggressive on fourth down and explained some of his thinking.
“When I was with the Jets one time, [the opponent] stoned us on three 4th-and-1s. So the fourth 4th-and-1 I punted. I’m not going to beat my head … (laughs). So I got killed for it [in the media],” Bowles told the Ira Kaufman Podcast.
“You know when your offense is playing decent football, and when they’re superior on the other side and you better play position football.”
Bowles added that he doesn’t believing in playing safe on the road, and that he “never” tells his offensive coordinator whether to run or pass on a given play.
Todd Bowles Sits Down With The Sage And Joe At The NFL Scouting Combine
February 29th, 2024 at 12:02 pm
I think Bowles was more aggressive in 4th downs this year and if I recall correctly we were near the top of the NFL in 4th down success. The offense really struggled in the 1st and 3rd quarters the last two seasons. Why? Too many failed 1st down runs? Too conservative? Execution or game plan? Whatever it is, it’s killing us.
February 29th, 2024 at 12:15 pm
There were times when I thought Bowles did an excellent job…but more often, there were times I thought he was horrible.
You know the old saying about broken clocks and all.
The team seems to believe in him…and that is important. I wish we could see the future…would probably save us a ton of time.
If Baker Mayfield (when) gets paid, and the team bombs this year…yikes for Bowles. We’ll be stuck with Mayfield though.
February 29th, 2024 at 12:21 pm
The story he shared about three 4th-and-1’s reminds me of a trick question people often flub. In roulette, if the ball lands on red three times in a row, what are the odds that it will land on black the next time? The answer of course is that the odds are the same every single spin. Perhaps not quite analogous in football, since player strength and game conditions and lots of other things unique to that moment make the decision not entirely analytical. But I like the more aggressive tone here and there. I still would like to see more contingency planning though. Have a few of the thousand consultants we have on staff come up with a plan B at half time so we can change up what’s been ineffective that day. And also, this next season I’d like to see Bowles hand over primary authority for time outs to someone else. It wasn’t just the playoff game that we blundered there.
February 29th, 2024 at 12:37 pm
What about going for it in the 4th against Detroit?
February 29th, 2024 at 12:39 pm
“ Bowles added that he doesn’t believing in playing safe on the road, and that he “never” tells his offensive coordinator whether to run or pass on a given play.”
So Byron Leftwich and Dave Canales both magically decided to waste our first and second downs running up the middle to nowhere after Todd Bowles became our head coach? I call horse crap
February 29th, 2024 at 2:10 pm
Joe … ‘Mutliple times this week at the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, Bowles mentioned how he has increased how much he attacked on fourth down.’
Interesting self-assessment by Todd Bowles. Not sure the facts totally bear that out however. a number of things can happen on 4th down, but the 3 most common would seem to be (1) go for it; (2) attempt a FG; or (3) punt.
In 2023: Bucs went for it on 4th down 18 times, and made 12 of those for a 66.7% success rate. We attempted 31 FGs last year & made 29 of those. We punted 77 times.
In 2022: Bucs went for it on 4th down 27 times, and made 15 of those for a 55.6% success rate. We attempted 38 FGs in 2022 & made 31 of those. We punted 79 times.
So using those 3 outcomes for 4th down, Bucs would have had 136 total opportunities on 4th down in 2023 versus 144 opportunities in 2022. But our ‘success rate’ (achieving a 1st down or scoring 3 points) actually went down slightly last year … 41 (30.1%) in 2023 versus 46 (31.9%) in 2022.
Sure is nice to have a great kicker like Chase McLaughlin. That 30% success last year would’ve been considerably lower if not for him making 29 of 31 FGs … a whopping 93.5%. Hmmm, maybe we should re-sign him since he’s now a UFA.
February 29th, 2024 at 3:20 pm
Too bad he reverted to the conservative Toad against the Lions.
February 29th, 2024 at 9:41 pm
Yep, decent football. Sweep the slow starts, big dead spots, and school yard plays under the rug.
Then sprinkle around a few buckets of luck and you might come up with an almost winning season.
Read an article that says Baker is getting 4 years and 120 million from the Bucs. I hope they didn’t use up all of their buckets of luck; they are going to need them.
February 29th, 2024 at 10:49 pm
I think that 1st quarter and 3rd quarter success rate is the mist alarming. I wouldn’t hire him as a Head Coach simply by looking at that. It tells me his Game Plans suck (Zero TDs on opening drive), and he isn’t any better after a half time redo.
It might have simply been Mayfields Mojo that WILLED anything to happen honestly. There were very few times all year that I said to myself that was an excellent play call. It did happen, but simply NOT ENOUGH.
Here’s hoping Liam Coen scores on the 1st drive of the season.