Todd Bowles And Baker Mayfield
September 22nd, 2025
Baker Mayfield pulls away from Jets DL Micheal Clemons Sunday.
Joe still sees the following in the comments on this here website and just chuckles over it.
Some butthurt fans think former Bucs quarterback Kyle Trask, who to the best of Joe’s knowledge is unemployed, got the shaft and it was Trask, not Baker Mayfield, who should be the Bucs’ starter.
Meanwhile, Mayfield has morphed into probably the most clutch quarterback in the NFL, leading the Bucs to come-from-behind wins in the final minute in three straight games to open a season. That had never been done before.
Trask, huh?
Asked after the Bucs’ 29-27 win over the Jets yesterday about his confidence in his quarterback, Bowles said it is rock solid.
“One thousand percent [confidence in Baker Mayfield],” Bowles said. “It’s been like that since he got here.”
So let’s go back to the spring of 2023. Tom Brady had just called it quits. And as the Sage of Tampa Bay Sports, Ira Kaufman, said on his podcast, Team Glazer was now “peering into the abyss.” Team Glazer had a playoff team lose Brady and a glaring empty seat at quarterback.
But behind the scenes, Bowles was working. He apparently hounded Bucs AC/DC-loving general manager Jason Licht to sign Mayfield the way a little girl is relentless with her father about buying her a birthday pony.
Mayfield was on the cusp of his career imploding. No one else wanted him as a starter (the Rams and Crows wanted Mayfield as a backup).
Joe may one day look back on the Mayfield signing as the best Bucs free agent move aside from signing Brady himself. Mayfield is in serious contention for league MVP, everything the Bucs had hoped he would be, if not a lot more.
Few teams have the faith in their quarterback to pull off what Mayfield has this season. Forget his passing, Mayfield makes clutch runs to keep the chains moving.
Joe thinks because of Mayfield this Bucs season could be special, even with all the injuries.
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:12 am
And Todd deserves a ton of credit for the success of Baker. Believing in him and giving him whatever he wanted to be successful including asking him about different OCs.
A team full of injuries still finding ways to win.. thats coaching
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:13 am
Sure looks like an MVP season at this juncture.
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:14 am
If Wirfs returns I wonder if he’ll play RT and leave Barton at LT and the guy playing C there?
??????
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:18 am
@Joe….with being 3-0 and eberyone talking about this year being special…thoughts on making a trade or two. A pass rusher would be a fantastic addition. Not saying star player level but I think.adding a veteran pass rusher from one of these losing teams and maybe olineman would.be a great move.
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:18 am
It was great timing Mayfield needed one chance with his career on the line and Todd provided it with his career on the line. Good match and Bucs drafted around him with EE, Barton, Bucky, Cody, JMac,….Tez and Palmer you might could ad there with later rounds. At least they tried with Palmer. I just want to see this group healthy for once.
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:23 am
I wish I had put more than $30 on Baker for MVP at 32 to one.
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:25 am
Dubcity6 THANK YOU!!!! so many fans I see on here doing everything they can to bash Bowles. He’s not perfect as no coach is but he has consistently had this team in the playoffs and pushing for more. I was unsure of him when they first announced him as new hc but with each passing season of him at the helm I’ve gained more confidence and since hiring the game management specialist I feel like he’s improved a ton in that department. Most of all this team goes to war for him, they don’t quit. I think had Bowles got his man originally in baker back in new York they may still be there tearing it up together head coach and qb pairings determine the successful
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:27 am
“Born Again” Baker is now a Tampa Treasure. Let’s get a Lombardi and he will be cemented in as a true Tampa sports icon. Go Bucs!!
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:27 am
If Godwin plays like Chris Godwin., and I would certainly hope so given his contract – I like the trio of Evuka, Chris, and Shepard. Shepard btw is a really productive receiver, and was kind of a steal because he was a legit, productive starter with the giants. Should still avg 30 once (if) the offensive line stabilizes. Let’s face it, Evans was mad for a reason. He knew. I am not expecting anything but annoying/bad news following the MRI, so mind as well prepare for the inevitable
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:30 am
curses broken through week 3
Late game antics
Atlanta Falcons
Night games
Back up Qbs
Bucs are winning games they usually lose
That’s Todd and Baker
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:32 am
Sb~Levi was thinking similar. But if wirfs is back and you put bb and gb at their positions they played all of last year suddenly 3/5ths of your starting line is back in place and it would be the left side also so im sure they will try a few combos but wouldn’t be surprised to have their best o lineman play the most important spot in the line
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:38 am
Bucs – the new “Cardiac Kids”. No disrespect Brian Sipe.
September 22nd, 2025 at 7:40 am
Baker and Todd have the FIRE TODD CLUB cornered.
LFG!!!!!!
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:05 am
Todd Bowles is a great coach! Baker Mayfield is a great QB! Those 2 win games! How silly is that? Mike TD catch. Lavonte 11 tackles and a sack. Winfield knocks one loose! and Vea covers it up! Dean caught a football-stunning! Defensive stops on downs. Offensive line somehow fighting 60 minutes. Our kicker is back! Rookies Egbuka and Parrish are dawgs and I meant to capitalize that! Smith is as good a safety as Winfield and I don’t believe I’m saying that! Shep has a gusto for the game that flows through this team. I could name more(Bucky, Rachaad). This team (Baker and Todd especially) knows it’s all about how you finish. We’re not close to peaking in any regard. But our leaders know what to do. They have both been around the block. This is a good football team. It takes that. 50 isn’t enough, it takes 53 and then some. And we’ve got that. No excuses. 3 down, 14 to go, keep getting better and this might just become a great football team.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:06 am
After 50 years we FINALLY have a franchise QB.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:06 am
The only thing I didn’t like was Bowles took the foot off the gass he can’t do that and win games. But Baker came threw for us I hope Bowles don’t do that anymore.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:09 am
I’m happily eating crow. Do I think it was a fair competition? No. Am I glad everything worked out the way it did? Yes. I’m very happy for Mayfield and his family. I’m very happy for our Bucs. We keep winning and Baker is OUR guy.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:09 am
With the amount of injury related challenges, I think Baker is a front runner for league MVP and Coach Bowles is right now, coach of the year. Prove me wrong.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:16 am
Barton is a LOT better center than a tackle, he’s only mildly better than Heck. Criminal waste of his talent to play him at tackle is not absolutely necessary
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:23 am
Yea wait till Baker makes one mistake and half this board will be calling for Trask back and the other half For a Shadeur Sanders trade who is riding the Pine in Cleveland.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:24 am
props to Todd Bowles for having the vision to get Baker!!
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:27 am
You guys sure do talk about this Trask guy a whole lot for people who dubbed everyone else “Trask cult” LMAO.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:31 am
Lots of spooky coincidences yesterday. Not only did Todd Bowles want to draft Baker as Coach of the Jets but that following season Tyrod Taylor got injured and Baker stepped in against the Jets and got Cleveland’s first win in 600 plus days which included catching a halfback pass for a 2 point conversion. Then he handed out free beers to the Browns fans who deserve better than the sorry owner they have.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:38 am
Wondering when Joe would pull Trask out of the void. Been days. OK, I’ll bite.
If Bake was a better QB, he would not be in clutch situations. Trask would have scored 50 points – no need to clutch! 😁
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:43 am
Great win! But that late game soft defensive coverage is a loss waiting to happen. It made this game look closer than it really was.
September 22nd, 2025 at 8:56 am
Don’t usually turn on the TV until the evening but took the wife and her sister and best friend to the airport yesterday for a month long trip to Europe. Helsinki Finland and Copenhagen Denmark ain’t really my cup of tea, especially during football season. Thank goodness for the chickens and dogs. I love getting to “batch” it. So the TV is on and I’m watching these idiots on “Get Up” on ESPN. Jalen Hurts is getting way overrated by these guys. I watched every game Mayfield and Hurts played at OU. Baker is the better QB and it’s not bias. It’s true. And Bowles has the recipe to take Hurts out of his game. It’s in Hurts head. I’m sure of it. We’re beating Philly this week. I said it would take a miracle for the Jets to beat us and it almost happened. So I guess Philly could beat us. But in my mind it would take a miracle.
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:01 am
The obvious reason Trask isn’t on a team is because every GM in the NFL is a FSU fan. NEVER FORGET Trask almost beat Alabama once. 😂😂😂
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:05 am
Good thing the Bucs are not playing the Giants. With both NY teams 0-3 the Con-issioner is desperate to give the nations largest media market something to cheer. Refs doing Jets and Giants games all have new Rolls Royce s….i heard….
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:07 am
Joe …. To both of you ! Bowles has proven nothing yet but mid season slumps the last two seasons and poor post season results ! A poor clock management problem …. He dam near lost the game after twenty point lead late in third quarter …. This kind of winning is not quality football ! Hell yes I am rooting for the home team but let’s get this team in order ! Don’t cry injuries ! This is a big boy league !
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:10 am
Kyle who??
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:11 am
The Baker fans on this board was never about bias. We just saw the same thing Todd Bowles saw when scouting for the 2018 draft. Some saw it when Baker was in HS, or at Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Brown’s or Rams.
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:13 am
If Bowles really pounded the table for Baker as hard as it’s alluded to here, you can’t really overstate how important of a coach he is for the franchise.
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:14 am
“Trask would have scored 50 points – no need to clutch!”
@BucaneroJim
100% right Jim. Thats why Bengals, Browns, Viking and Jets all wanted to sign him …in Madden Rookie Level.
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:20 am
Mahomes, Lamar, Josh Allen and Hurts are the top four because they run so effectively, in addition to their passing. Mayfield is right there, too! Top five, in my book.
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:20 am
PAY HIM!!!!!!!!!!!!
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:37 am
How can anyone not tip their hat to Mayfield and smile for him and our Bucs? To see what he has been through since coming into the league is uniquely without compare to anything we’ve ever seen. Being drafted by the most dysfunctional team in the league and everything that unfolded there. Then being discarded like a used Kleenex to another dysfunctional team in Carolina, only to be dumped unceremoniously during his first season there to the Rams. With no preparation under McVay and Coen gets thrown into a Thursday Night game not even knowing their playbook and wins the game and finishes the season as their starter. The next off season nobody seemed to want him except for Bowles & Licht. Then he finds himself having to follow the Goat, Tom Brady’s Super Bowl winning tenure here and somehow win over the team, the fans, and the starting qb position. Having 2 career seasons never having the same offensive coordinator for consecutive years ever in his pro career! Think about that for a moment. And here we are now, his 3rd season with our Bucs, winning the first 3 games in a row, 2 on the road with last minute scoring drives that he willed his team to victory while his teammates run through a wall for him. A perfect marriage of a quarterback and a town. This is the stuff classic sports movies are made of. A one of a kind story. If anyone ever deserved a Super Bowl ring in his career, it would be Baker Mayfield. Man, it’s good to be a Buc fan!
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:43 am
I was one of the biggest Bowles critics and I still am at times, but he has earned respect. He has led the Bucs to 3 straight division championships, with 3 different OCs. Obviously this is a testament to the Jason Light, Mayfield, and the rest of the organization as well. If healthy, this team could be one of the best in the league and Todd Bowles has to get a ton of credit for that. I am still not sure he can play game time chess with the best coaches in the league, but he seems to be learning and getting better each year. Count me in on the Todd Bowles bandwagon.
September 22nd, 2025 at 9:44 am
Yeah, I think I have seen about TWO “Trask-Lovers” still left, over the past year or so! Most everyone else, believes that Trask WAS done dirty, throughout his career. And, any honest person can easily, make a pretty damn strong argument for it being the truth! 💯
September 22nd, 2025 at 10:00 am
We start getting our guys back – the JAG’s and re-positioning should be over – we will become better, fast, on the o-line, which will help the run game, which will help the pass game.
Not sure we’ll have Tristan & CG back in game shape enough to overtake the Eagles, but we’ll see – it “feels” like we’re getting healthier and can get our old-line big uglies back in there positions. Heck at RT may be ok for the run game.
Wouldn’t it be something if Bowles continues the cheat code in place against Philly’s offense, and our own o-line improves just enough to surprise the Eagles D…
Let’s Go!
September 22nd, 2025 at 10:07 am
I missed the first 9-minutes of it, but it is unbelievable to me that “Get Up” did not even mention the Jets-Bucs game EVEN ONCE. Not one time. And, nobody did all during the week last week, either. Hell, it’s GREENY’S TEAM, and Rex Ryan was the last COACH, that they’d had ANY success with… Plus, they’re IN NYC. I mean, usually, they would be LAUGHING AT THEM (at least, just to give Greeny a hard time). It’s just ‘mind-blowing’ to ME. And, there was just soooo much for them to actually talk about too, including the Bucs Injury Report. It makes ZERO sense, other than it just being BECAUSE IT IS THE BUCS.
September 22nd, 2025 at 10:10 am
I wasn’t a Baker fan but am now. Won me over! Bowles still has a ways to go but wins are wins! Keep it up fellas!
On another note, one of the worst games I’ve ever been to yesterday because of the officials. Houston was holding on every play last week. They didn’t call it. and yesterday they want to throw a flag on every flag. Hard to watch
September 22nd, 2025 at 10:16 am
I was at the game yesterday just before it started chit-chatting with a guy who had made his first trip to Tampa from Cleveland.
Lifelong Browns fan who came to watch Baker play and he had a Bucs 50th anniversary t-shirt on (they were giving them out for free) and a nice Bucs cap. We talked a little bit about Brown’s decisions with Baker and DeShaun Watson. I really felt bad for this guy, those fans are in pain. I don’t deserve who’s owning, running and coaching the Browns these days.
Nice guy who was really impressed with the stadium and the atmosphere. I didn’t talk to him after the game, never saw him again but I bet he really liked Baker’s performance. He picked a good game to come to… except for maybe the extreme heat. Man, it was a furnace out there!
September 22nd, 2025 at 10:20 am
With yesterday’s win, Todd Bowles is currently tied with Father Dungy for second-best winning pct in franchise history (.556), behind only Arians (.663).
September 22nd, 2025 at 10:23 am
KABucs
You should have told him about the cure for being a Browns fan . . .
September 22nd, 2025 at 11:54 am
Lots of love for Baker, well deserved.
Inquiring fans would like to turn up the heat on the Head Coach, and press him why he lets (tells) his Defensive Coordinator to take his foot off the gas with a lead in the 4th quarter and for first drive of games? “Drrrrrrrrr, we took our foot off the gas” is not an acceptable response. Why did you take your foot off the gas? It’s your foot!!! And who is accountable for that?
September 22nd, 2025 at 12:48 pm
Tom Brady is/was rightfully the GOAT over his long career. The few years he had us winning the SB. Then he aged out. I do know if even he would have beaten the Jets during yesterday’s injury ridden lineup. I say Baker is better than the Brady that worked briefly for the Bucs.
September 22nd, 2025 at 1:45 pm
No, Brady would not have won the game yesterday. Too many injuries and he was Methuselah by then. Plus, his teammates were in awe of him, even when he pulled childish stunts like throwing an iPad on the ground during a game. It’s different with Baker. He’s one of the teammates and they know it. The one difference is the number of BS ref calls. Would they have tried that with Brady? The GOAT beloved by the NFL?
September 22nd, 2025 at 3:18 pm
“Inquiring fans would like to turn up the heat on the Head Coach,”
Not the experts! Retired players and commentators are singing Bowles praises.
But what must be particularly galling to our troll is on GMFB this morning several of the guys went out of their way in their praise of the Bucs to single out…wait for it…TODD BOWLES DEFENSE! But what do expert know?
September 22nd, 2025 at 3:34 pm
Not sure it came up but what about the confidence in Baker on 4th and 1 at the 20 yard line up 6 points to finish off the game at 2 minutes to play?
No need to kick a field goal and give the ball back there
If you can’t make a first down, your defense has 2 minutes to stop a touchdown drive of 80 yards with no time outs for NYJ.
I don’t get that call at all