July 20th, 2026
It’s a very safe bet Super Bowl-winning head coach Bucco Bruce Arians sounded an alarm to Team Glazer late last season: “If you fire Todd, you’ll be dumb mother&*%$#@* in my book. And here why.”
Arians is loyal to a fault and Bowles is his guy, though Bowles did launch Arians’ handpicked offensive genius Byron Leftwich.
Arians believes in his coaching tree and did not want to see Bowles get launched after one bad season — one that was filled with serious and significant injuries.
But who else might have lobbied hard for Bowles directly with ownership?
Baker Mayfield? Lavonte David? Mike Evans?
Buccaneers Ring of Honor general manager Jason Licht already has spoken publicly about retaining Bowles. He says he was all for it.
But what about another mighty voice, Hall of Fame head coach Bill Parcells, a man Team Glazer admitted to hotly pursuing and respecting during the new Raise The Flags documentary?
Keep in mind a hearty handful of key moments in Bucs history did not make the cut into the 10-episode documentary chronicling 50 year of franchise history. Team Glazer had final say on what went into the documentary, so the Bucs’ ownership family decided it wanted to share its interest in Parcells.
Parcells recently shared that he has weekly in-season chats with Todd Bowles, who coached for Parcells with multiple teams. So last week, Joe asked Ira Kaufman, the legendary NFL writer and columnist, if he thinks Parcells lobbied directly to Team Glazer on behalf of Bowles.
Kaufman responded with a resounding, “Yes” and didn’t waffle when asked again about it days later. (Kaufman talked directly to Parcells for a story about Bowles last summer.)
Joe is very intrigued. Did one of the biggest figures in NFL history pick up the phone to back his guy to Team Glazer?
Parcells had to know that phone call would have been taken by Bucs owners, people he’s had serious discussions with in the past.
What a fun concept!