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Feels responsible for rookies.
As Todd Bowles said earlier this week, he doesn’t like to “sugarcoat” things for rookies in underwear football.
Bowles wasn’t trying to suggest underwear football is unimportant for veterans. But Bowles did note that underwear football is sort of a crash course for the rookies so they are ready to rock when training camp kicks off next month.
> “It’s important because they have to learn the scheme and they have to pick everything up and see how we run things,” Bowles said. “For the young guys coming in, OTAs and minicamps are for them to get caught up with the vets.”
Bowles’ goal for the rookies is, that by the end of minicamp next week, the rookies are “on level ground” with the vets next month.
> “We don’t lose sight of that and we make sure they get the reps they need and the extra meetings and the extra walk-throughs so that by the time training camp comes, they have a chance to compete,” Bowles said.
Bowles feels it is his responsibility to do this both for the rookies themselves and for the team as a whole.
That’s one reason Joe doesn’t believe Bowles loses a wink of sleep with Mike Evans working out away some days from OTAs. That allowed Emeka Egbuka to get valuable snaps with Baker Mayfield. Same with Tez Johnson.
Evans doesn’t need the reps. Egbuka does. In a twisted way, Evans working out away from some OTAs might actually be beneficial to the Bucs.
Joe’s not sure he can say the same about hide-and-seek Haason Reddick.