Baker Mayfield Brings “Juice”
April 2nd, 2023
Todd Bowles explains.
Anyone remember the NFL Films clip of Chucky lecturing his Bucs from early in his Tampa Bay coaching days?
The clip was Chucky talking during a break in practice. Maybe it was right before practice started. He explained not only did he want each player to bring juice to practice, but it was necessary to better one’s self on the football field.
Juice was the very foundation of building an NFL player, he said.
So Joe was reminded of that clip going through notes of Todd Bowles speaking at the NFL gathering in Arizona last week formerly known as the “NFL Owners Meetings.”
Bowles was asked about new Bucs quarterback competing Baker Mayfield. Bowles sounded like Chucky.
Bowles talked about how Mayfield brought “competitive juice to go along with Trask. … Baker’s won in college, he’s been to the playoffs as a pro, and he brings us a lot of leadership.
“I think this style of offense will fit him really well.”
Joe sure likes to hear that and Joe would guess the new offense under first-year coordinator Dave Canales will take advantage of one of Mayfield’s best traits: mobility.
Canales told Joe at the Combine in February how he would likes to get his quarterback outside the tackles occasionally on designed pocket movement. That seems to be right up Mayfield’s alley.
Now here is the catch with Canales and Mayfield: If Canales is able to resurrect Mayfield’s career and the Bucs make the playoffs. This season could be Canales’ first and last with the Bucs.
Teams like to fill head coaching jobs with offensive coordinators. And if a guy can demonstrate he can build a successful offense while turning around the career of a former No. 1 pick of a quarterback, imagine what he could do for a rookie quarterback or another veteran whose career has fallen on hard times.
You know, like Canales also did with Geno Smith?
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:39 am
Whoa Joe! You’re getting way ahead of yourself there. Let’s just hope either Mayfield or Trask does well enough to get the Bucs into the playoffs. Then we’ll worry about next year. A whole new system. an o-line still in transition, and a new QB under center. Lot of unknowns. Let’s just see how this season plays out. Should be interesting, at least to us Bucs fans.
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:40 am
Trask wasn’t a Bowles pick similar to the OC situation he had last yr. It’s pretty obvious in how much he raves about Mayfield vs what little he says about Trask, that he’s mentally hitching his wagon to Mayfield. For marketing purposes Mayfield is easier to sell to fans…..maybe that’s part of it but Bowles engages way more in conversations about mayfield.
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:45 am
Just hoping Mayfield can get his interceptions straightened out and hope he can play like a middle QBR QB game manager. We don’t need another Jameis trying to eat wins, that’s not bringing the juice.
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:49 am
• Little Confidence
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:51 am
Ok Joe, slow down man.
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:56 am
Why don’t you guys Whoa on the Whoas and “slow down”, he said “IF” you know the biggest word in the dictionary, simmer down drama queens.
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:57 am
Someone needs to bring juice, Todd doesn’t
How many times have we watched a Bowles team sleepwalk through quarters, halves, and entire games?
Does he realize he had the best juice ever to walk the planet last year and he promptly put handcuffs on him?
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:57 am
Trask is not mobile should be traded period why they drafted him is anyones guess.
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:10 pm
Chucky brought juice. Bowles brings sleep-walking.
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:13 pm
Baker brings the juice – just like a waitress at your local breakfast diner.
Tampa has a good selection of Cuban establishments with those machines stocked with oranges.
I’ll have the freshly squeezed please to go with my eggs, bacon and heavily buttered Cuban bread.
Baker saunters over with his trademark eye black you know to show he’s a real gamer, because he’s cocky and all, and serves the eggs hot and juice cold.
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:14 pm
This is going to be a miserable season. Bring on the creamsickle unis. They handing out paper bags as you enter the stadium? What an embarrassment.
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:15 pm
Joe deleted my comment about Baker being a breakfast diner server. Hahaha
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:17 pm
PSL Bob LOL PLAYOFFS!!
Vegas has the Bucs at 6.5 games.
Bet the under.
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:23 pm
I think Canales would have to perform miracles with the QBs on this roster and score a ton of points to move up to a HC position after only one year as coordinator. If those things happened, I think I’d want to elevate Canales in Tampa and let Bowles go. Of course, if Canales succeeds in a big way, the Bucs are probably back in the playoffs and Bowles keeps his job.
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:26 pm
Bucs dropped from 25th to 29th in power rankings last week and we haven’t even played yet the Rodney Dangerfield of the NFL.
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:38 pm
Didn’t 8 wins win the division last year?
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:52 pm
Why is it Joe’s always afraid of losing coaches years down the road? How many stories were posted or comments made on Leftwich moving on? Let’s just hope Mayfield is an actual decent starting qb with Bucs.
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:58 pm
Yeah, loser juice. Mayfly is 33-39 for his career. A good OC can make him look a little better for a little while, but the true nature of a QB always shines through.
Mayfly also has 102 TDs and 64 INTs for his career, where’s the beef?
April 2nd, 2023 at 12:59 pm
One of Mayfield’s best traits is his mobility? This guy is slower than a lot of defensive lineman and he is one of the most un-athletic QBs in the league. There is a very good reason why he has been a colossal failure in his first 5 years. The Steelers figured out all you have to do is make sure he stays in the pocket which is a relatively easy task and he struggles to find throwing lanes because of his lack of height
April 2nd, 2023 at 1:12 pm
Baker is mobile when he has to be. And IF..Canales can cut his interceptions by half? We just might have something here.
April 2nd, 2023 at 1:19 pm
Dooosh you can’t expect 8 wins to get you the division in multiple years.
This year is going to be one of those organizational reset years where hard lessons are learned – or at least should be learned.
HC with a losing record. QB with a losing record (or one who has never started a game). OC who has never called games. No running game to speak of. No pass rush. Lost starters and depth in the secondary. Star LB is 33. Star DE/OLB has a blown out achilles – he’s 30. Shedding salary.
Vegas was generous with 6.5 u/o.
The only hope this team has is if they have a high scoring offense – but they brought in a guy who loves running the ball and the short passing game on a team that’s strength is in the WR core. They also are going to likely not start the QB who could run a high scoring offense if given the opportunity.
I don’t know what to say man. Just embrace the suck and hope for an upward trend in 2024 with new coaching.
April 2nd, 2023 at 1:24 pm
The h””l with juice can be play good football consistently!
April 2nd, 2023 at 1:36 pm
Never been a fan of baker. I think Bowles is confusing juice with noise. He certainly brings that. God forbid this actually turns into a QB controversy. Bowles will try to channel his inner Bill Walsh and fail miserably. Baker signed here because he knows he’ll be the guy. This is his last best chance to start in the league. I doubt he would’ve signed here otherwise.
April 2nd, 2023 at 2:15 pm
Agree with Bobby. Bowles is a fan boy of mayfield. Seems to have a crush on him. I personally don’t think this is a competition anymore. Baker is the starter n not because of trask not able to beat him out. Only way trask sees the field is if baker gets hurt ,preseason or garbage time. Sorry trask. I hope you get a legit shot somewhere else.
April 2nd, 2023 at 2:55 pm
OC won’t be leaving next year.
April 2nd, 2023 at 3:22 pm
He might very well be an OC for one year, and then a HC.
He might even replace Bloweszo in a repeat of the Lovie – to – Koetter transition.
April 2nd, 2023 at 3:27 pm
Says the sideline manniken.
April 2nd, 2023 at 3:39 pm
Jameis had juice
Bowles doesn’t have juice
So what???
Train wreck
April 2nd, 2023 at 3:41 pm
I would say the bigger “catch” with all this is that historically, Mayfield has not been great outsider of the pocket. At least now when it’s because the pocket breaks down / on scramble drills. Maybe it will be different on designed roll outs and such.
April 2nd, 2023 at 3:46 pm
Harder to hit a QB when he’s breaking contain with the intent to pass. Of course that’s totally dependent on the defensive call and whether or not there are extra bodies coming playside, but a lot of counter play action, boots, waggles, have an element of misdirection to freeze the front 7 or coverage even for that split second, because it can be the difference between a highly executed play or a “bad call”.
April 2nd, 2023 at 4:00 pm
Everybody has juice in April. Let’s see what he brings in December.
April 2nd, 2023 at 4:07 pm
What VOTS said…too bad Bowels’ juice got stale last year and will continue this year till he gets canned.
April 2nd, 2023 at 4:08 pm
History might tell a story about a Heisman winning, #1 overall pick, not great athletic ability, not a cannon for an arm, doesn’t run well, traded to a helpless team then dumped for league minimum trade value, 2 Superbowl victories with a talented bunch put Jim Plunkett in the HOF. This could be more interesting than most think, if ya don’t dig the bravado, chip on my shoulder, has to play with his hair on fire type QB, don’t support him, but a younger QB spark might be the ticket!
April 2nd, 2023 at 4:23 pm
Leeman Bennett had better credentials coming to the Bucs , it’s going to be just that kind of year!
It’ll be a good year to go on UFR
Uninterested Fan Reserve
Hopefully there will be a lot of 1 o’clock starts to get to pain over with.
April 2nd, 2023 at 4:45 pm
I haven’t seen so much hate for a head coach since lovie smith!
April 2nd, 2023 at 5:25 pm
You guys better bring some juice to practice now! And if you don’t have juice! You fake it! 😀😃😄😁😆😅
April 2nd, 2023 at 7:03 pm
Great article! Juice really is important. It’s emotion, that competitive fire that champions bring to the game. The Bucs were missing that juice for most of the 2022 season. Part of it was TB and his troubled personal life (and maybe his age), but part of it, and maybe most of it, most of the missing juice, goes right back to the guy who brought it up, who’s talking about it in relation to Baker. That guy is Todd Bowles himself! It’s been said over and over, and over again, that a team assumes the personality of its head coach. That’s not good for the Bucs and Bowles. Let’s start a new stadium chant: Bring Back Bruce! Bring Back Bruce! …
April 2nd, 2023 at 9:03 pm
The hard sell on Baker is to sell tickets. I don’t see the sales numbers, but I don’t think its going to work. The Glazers should not try to get desperate, expect the worst hope for the best kind of approach. They have to know football business. Maybe they think 2023 is a wash and they’re just going to let Bowles do his thing. I wouldn’t be surprised.
Tim – the Plunkett comparison is pretty good well except for one thing – Plunkett isn’t in the hall nor will he ever be. You ever look at Plunkett’s numbers? More INTs than games played – that’s 15 seasons. In arguably his best year -1983 – he threw 18 INTs to 20 TDs. They won in spite of him.
In 1983 Allen and Christensen were the entire offense – but that’s all they needed with that defense.
April 2nd, 2023 at 9:08 pm
Big Storm Brimosa brings the juice! Jon Gruden and Bruce Arians both have a coaching style to get into the players faces to get them pumped up. Tony Dungy and Todd Bowles not so much. Dungy had Monte Kiffen and Rod Marinelli to get on the players and hold them accountable. Todd Bowles needs some assistant coaches to step up. Hope they can do it.
April 2nd, 2023 at 9:11 pm
Brazen Zebra … ‘a team assumes the personality of its head coach.’
Would you also say that’s true of a defense assuming the personality of its DC? Bucs have had a pretty decent defense under Bowles, in case you haven’t noticed.
I and many others consider Tom Landry to be one of the greatest coaches of all time. Head coach of the Cowboys for 29 years. Won 270 games (including playoffs) and 2 Super Bowls. Incredibly creative when it came to defenses; father of the 4-3 among other things. Most who played for him considered him to be very inspirational, yet most ‘outsiders’ considered him to be quite reserved, and not at all demonstrative.
None of us ‘outsiders’ REALLY KNOW how this Bucs’ team feels about Tom Bowles. We SPECULATE on blogs quite a bit, but none of us REALLY KNOW.
April 2nd, 2023 at 9:21 pm
With every rah-rah blogpost Joe makes about our lord and savior Baker Mayfield I just get more and more convinced this team is headed for a historically bad season.
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:02 pm
Why does anyone think baker brings the juice, he has failed at multiple stops and on top of that acted like an ass who can’t handle any media criticism. But yeah he will be the after Tom brady savior for the Bucs….
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:13 pm
Mike S — you must have some stats and data on the upcoming season, eh?
April 2nd, 2023 at 11:54 pm
I predict the Bucs will make playoff, and im rarely wrong, anywhos, I dont watch nfl football but i might check out buc games just so i can put another notch on belt, so go buc’s
April 4th, 2023 at 9:52 am
I think we still have a chance to at least compete and be in the run to clinch the NFC south division. Some of our strengths will be in our run-pass game with Edmonds and White. Those are two very explosive backs with lots of speed. I think Baker will start the season but if he starts to drop the ball we will run with Trask and he will bring the offense back to life. People are talking about how Mayfield isn’t mobile but Tom Brady was the furthest thing from mobile too. That doesn’t matter, IQ does. Whoever is the better decision maker SHOULD win the job. People disregard we still have a lot of talent on the defensive end. We still have lots of depth at the WR position. We are rebuilding our O-line and if we snag to high rated lineman in the draft we can certainly compete. The most questionable position right now is QB and we have to get that figured out by September.