Todd Bowles Is Keeping The Main Thing The Main Thing
Credit: Kim Klement Neitzel-USA TODAY Sports/Imagn Images
It’s easy to get lost in the narrative-driven shuffle that is the NFL’s reaction machine. Everyone from the biggest talking heads on TV to die-hards on X will indulge in the dramatics of week-to-week possibility and criticism. For a head coach of an NFL team, especially one that thrives with a chip on their shoulder, keeping that sort of racket in perspective is difficult.
“Well, we keep the main thing the main thing.” Tampa Bay head coach Todd Bowles said in media availability on Wednesday. “We’re not out to try to prove everybody wrong. We’re out to try to prove ourselves right… The same people that are patting us on the back are the same people that were talking about us and expecting us to win none so – and it’s everybody’s job. I get that. It’s professional, I understand that. We write our own stories. If we play bad, we get talked about. If you play well, you get acknowledged and that kind of comes with the territory.”
Bowles’ mentality is one of putting focus in the right place, and it will be crucial given his team’s path to success. Their quarterback and leader, Baker Mayfield, has had one of the most unique journeys in modern NFL history. From top pick to biggest bust to redemption story replacing Tom Brady, it’s hard to come up with a better story than that and the media knows it. But Bowles keeps the main thing the main thing and focuses on who his QB is in this moment.
Credit: Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images
“Baker is his own guy.” Bowles said. “I keep saying, ‘Nobody’s ever going to be Tom.’ You know, you put his shoes on the shelf, and you buy a new pair, and you break them in, and Baker [has] come in and he’s picked up the system well. The guys have gravitated around him; he has a place he calls home, we trust him, he trusts us, and he’s fit in very well here.”
Football is a game of individual moments that make up a larger outcome. The teams that thrive have the ability to bear down when situations are difficult. Bowles’ group did just that this past Sunday, as depth players stepped up and helped the undermanned defense shut down a high-powered Detroit Lions’ offense. But Bowles focuses on what needs to happen, not the story behind it. “We don’t look at it when [those] guys have to come in – who they’re stepping in for. We look at how they can help us and what they do best. [We’re] not expecting Greg [Gaines] to be Vita [Vea] or ‘Izzy’ (Christian Izien) to be [Antoine] Winfield or anything like that. We’re expecting them to do the things we know they can do and we’re expected to call it that way and we expect them to make plays.”
It sounds simple, but every Sunday coaches and players get lost in the moment and try to do something bigger than necessary. It’s often the teams that do the simplest things best that come out on top. Although it may all sound like coach speak, make no mistake about it, Bowles is a believer in his approach and it’s easy to see it’s working. He’s keeping the job the job, the next moment the next moment, and the main thing the main thing.
“You have to. You know, in your mind, once you get out on the field, football is football, no matter where you’re playing – 10 people or 100,000 people, football is football, so we don’t worry about it.”
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