Awareness? Ego? Or both?
Sometimes, a football coach needs to separate himself from his players for the good of his team.
And, a coach needs awareness, an ability to recognize how a game unfolds. No game is predictable. A game has ebbs and flows, ups and downs, momentum swings back and forth. Every quarter has a different feel to it.
Adjust on the fly.
Being able to recognize all of the above in the moment often separates the great coaches from the good, the good from the average, the average from the bad.
Sunday, Bowles had a terrible sense of awareness and feel for the game that cost the Bucs a valuable win. No, his defense wasn’t playing good ball. In fact, they were playing terrible football, the worst of the season.
The offense, specifically the run game, was having its best game of the season. Bowles failed to recognize both. And it cost him.
Sure, he also failed to recognize his kickoff team couldn’t tackle. That wasn’t going to be fixed midgame. Bowles admitted to Joe after the game he “talked about” kicking the ball out of bounds on kickoffs as Buffalo averaged 39 yards a return.
Instead of just “talked about” doing something, Bowles chose doing nothing. How’d that work out?
Veteran NFL reporter and columnist Tyler Dunne, who runs his own NFL substack site “GoLongTD.com,” watched in disbelief how Bowles apparently made himself believe the Bucs could actually get a stop on Buffalo quarterback Josh Allen, who was in the midst of a record-setting day (haven’t we had our fill of watching quarterbacks set personal records against a Todd Bowles defense?), when in the previous three Buffalo possessions the Bucs coughed up a combined 16 points.
The Bucs, with their best running game of the season, had a third-and-two from the Bucs-39. They decided to throw to a No. 5 receiver and then punt, even though both of their running backs were averaging five yards a carry against a soft Buffalo run defense.
The result was predictable, apparently to everyone at the stadium and the millions watching across the nation on CBS. Except to Bowles.
Naturally, Buffalo scored and the ballgame is over.
In truth, the Bills won this game with 7:38 remaining when Bowles inexplicably opted to punt on fourth and 2. His Bucs trailed, 37-32, from their own 39-yard line. For some reason, he thought the odds of Tampa Bay stopping an unstoppable quarterback were higher than gaining two yards.
A throwback to McDermott cowardice past. (He’s grown immensely in this department.)
Buffalo made Bowles pay with an eight-play, 85-yard drive that iced the game and ought to register as an epiphany for the 2025 Bills. When Allen’s feeling it, two yards from any part of the field are attainable.
Harsh but not inaccurate words. Notice Dunne did not call Bowles a coward. Rather, Dunne wrote the decision to punt reminded Dunne of cowardice from the past of a different coach.
But you may feel free to connect dots. Joe’s not going there.
This, to Joe, wasn’t really cowardice, but a profound lack of awareness and maybe ego.
My players will get a stop.
My defense will get a stop.
Despite the fact Bowles’ players and Bowles’ defense was getting shredded since the second quarter.
Awareness, often, is just as important as coaching ability.
And one could add the most important lesson Joe has learned since he began covering the NFL: Never, ever, underestimate the power of egos within the NFL.
If Bowles had gone for it on fourth down, he would basically be admitting in a very public way his players and his defense weren’t good enough to get one stop and get the ball back.
Killer instinct, huh?