The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have had a rather successful two seasons with Baker Mayfield in charge, with the franchise winning back-to-back division titles, plus a playoff game.
However, more is expected now of a team that has shown it can be one of the better units in the conference, and 2025 is looming as a defining one for Todd Bowles' team.
When assessing the 2024 season as a whole, the Buccaneers were ravaged by injuries on both sides of the ball, but Bowles isn't using that as an excuse. Instead, he wants his team to put its foot on the opposition's throat when it is in a position to do so.
"I feel good that we know how to win," Bowles said. "I don't feel good about us finishing the season from a playoff aspect, and the middle of the season having a drought two years in a row, we got to be better from that standpoint. We got to do a lot more of that, and we got to play not even better football at the end, but we got to have killer instinct, and we got to try to blow people out and try to win a division instead of it going down to the last week."
So in a nutshell, Bowles wants his team to be more consistent in 2025, and it has the talent on both sides of the ball to make it happen.
Injuries played a big role in the Buccaneers' four-game losing streak from Week 7 to Week 10, but the bye allowed them to get healthy, and then the team rattled off six wins in their final seven games.
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So when healthy, the team's talent is clear, but Bowles wants to see more of a "killer" mindset from his players in 2025 and having gotten more plaudits for how they've played over the past 24 months, the Buccaneers now realize that it is time to stand up and be counted.
2025 looms as the season where the Buccaneers make good on their potential, with a "killer instinct" key to their success.
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This story was originally published April 1, 2025 at 6:59 PM.