Excuses matter little for Buccaneers head coach Todd Bowles
By Rob Leeds
There has been a lot working against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and head coach Todd Bowles in 2022, but the excuses don’t matter in the end.
The Todd Bowles experiences has not been what was expected in year one with the Buccaneers.
From a bad record to a poor outlook in the postseason for the first time in three years, Bowles has deservedly caught some flak from the fanbase and analysts alike.
On the other hand, there have been plenty of people that have defended Bowles and pointed to what has been working against the team for most of the season.
Rampant injuries, various player departures, and limited time in the head coaching role during the preseason are all valid reasons to defend Bowles and the product we have seen so far.
However, these excuses only tell half the story.
If Bowles was truly only held back by issues that were out of his control, there wouldn’t be nearly as many fans calling for his head after winning the NFC South. The true faults in Bowles as a head coach have far more to do with issues that were actively within his control.
Hyper-conservative coaching is one of the first areas that point out flaws in Bowles’ game every week. Punting in opposing territory, avoiding analytics, and kicking field goals from too far out against the stats on the year have impacted the Bucs in some very negative ways.
To make matters worse, Bowles has been far too passive in how he makes changes to the roster. Rather than putting the best players on the field from the start of the year, Tampa’s head coach has waited for injuries to serve as the only basis for unseating starters that weren’t living up to the standard (Luke Goedeke, Leonard Fournette, Cameron Brate).
Todd Bowles isn’t the future of the Buccaneers, and it isn’t because this roster isn’t good enough and the coaching staff doesn’t have Bowles’ name on it. Bowles isn’t the future of the Bucs because he isn’t a good modern NFL coach, and that is enough to ignore most of the valid excuses in his performance.
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