Todd Bowles Didn’t Like How Practice Was Going
August 11th, 2025
Mid-practice scolding?
Roughly halfway through practice, Joe thought the Bucs called the practice way early. Joe noticed all the players, whether from the defensive sideline or the offensive gathering behind the quarterback, all came forward to the middle of the field.
Generally, that means practice is over. But it wasn’t. All the players gathered in a giant huddle and some coach (Joe couldn’t see who but guessed it was Bucs coach Todd Bowles) was doing the talking.
That’s never a good sign. Usually, when this happens in the middle of practice, the coach is doing some serious rear-end chewing.
When Joe saw the Bucs break the huddle, the players were very quiet. Bowles normally not just encourages players to be chatty on the field, he emphasizes it.
So when the players walked away from the huddle quietly, and lined up for the next play, quietly, Joe was pretty convinced the entire team got reamed for something.
And that’s just what happened. After practice, Bowles softly said he had a talking to with his players. He made it sound like he was Ward Cleaver having a friendly chat with the Beaver at the dinner table.
The huddle, Bowles said, was “just to emphasize the little things,” Bowles deadpanned. He noted how underwear football — there were no pads today — “[p]ractice is a little different than practicing in pads and we just have to understand that.”
Somehow, given how the players were all so sullen after the huddle, Joe has a hunch Bowles wasn’t just kindly reminding players to be mindful of details, and instead took a page from his old mentor Bill Parcells and blistered somebody.
Coaches generally do not call a team huddle in the middle of practice to remind players to tie their shoes and break the huddle crisply.