Who needs reality television when you have whatever the heck is happening between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Liam Coen? His fall from grace in the eyes of Bucs fans has been stunning to watch, as Coen went from a golden child who a vocal part of the fan base wanted to replace Todd Bowles as head coach to a villain that united everyone against him in the matter of a day.
Coen bowed out of the running to become the Jaguars head coach on Wednesday and agreed to return to Tampa Bay on a record-breaking contract for a coordinator. He never showed up to sign that deal, though, and instead secretly met with Shad Khan to restart negotiations to become Jackonsville’s next head coach.
In between, Coen reportedly failed to return calls and texts from Buccaneers officials who were trying to get in contact with him when he never showed up to the team facility to sign his contract. By the end of Thursday, Coen had agreed to become the Jaguars head coach and in the process gave us one of the wildest moments in NFL history.
Just because his deal in Jacksonville is done doesn’t mean this is the end of the story. As if the drama in the moment wasn’t crazy enough, the mud-slinging fallout between the Bucs and Coen is only just beginning.
Adam Schefter drops new details about Liam Coen’s decision to back out of his deal with Buccaneers
Adam Schefter stopped by the Pat McAfee Show and dropped some more details on the fallout of everything that happened. One of the biggest revelations was that he’s heard Coen’s camp feels like the Buccaneers forced them to take a deal that would make him the highest-paid coordinator in NFL history.
“He felt like the Buccaneers, right or wrong I’m just telling you how he feels, strong armed him into a deal,” Schefter said. “[The Buccaneers] say they reached out multiple times, he says he was in touch with Todd Bowles and informed him of his decision to interview with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Again, there are two different versions of this.”
He followed that comment up by saying the Buccaneers are beside themselves that Coen is trying to spin this as though they should be so lucky to get to offer him the sort of deal they did. For the record, Albert Breer reported that Coen was offered a three-year contract that would have made him the highest-paid coordinator in NFL history, which confirms how hard the Bucs went after their guy to keep him.
It also shows a continued pattern for the team when it comes to taking care of their own. We saw that last year when both Baker Mayfield and Mike Evans returned on deals that did right by them without trying to lowball guys who have been important to the franchise, and their willingness to take those deals shows how strong the relationships that get built inside of the building are.
That’s not the case with Coen, which is what makes the way things went down so stunning. It’s not that he decided to take a deal elsewhere, it’s that he went about it like a teenager trying to hide something from their parents. That part is what has everyone scratching their heads.
Unless you’re the Buccaneers, as Schefter noted they’re doing a little more than simply scratching their heads over what happened.
“Since the turn of the century, I don’t remember the last time I heard one team this hot and bothered about a coach taking another deal,” Schefter said. “[Coen’s] side is like we didn’t do anything wrong we were exploring our rights, we let them know. Again, you believe what you want to believe, I’m just the messenger giving you all side of the story.”
It’s a truly messy situation that has everyone involved caked in mud. Coen reportedly told the Buccaneers that his sick child was why he wasn’t answering their calls, while other reports suggest he had been in Jacksonville since Wednesday afternoon shortly after the team fired general manager Trent Baalke.
We still haven’t even scratched the surface of getting to the bottom of what really happened. What we do know, based on everything that is still coming out about this, is that things will probably get a lot messier before all is said and done.
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