Baker Mayfield And Fewer Downfield Shots
November 13th, 2025
Wants shots downfield.
All offseason and through training camp, Bucs offensive coordinator Josh Grizzard said he wanted to add more long throws to the offense.
Of late, that hasn’t been the case. It’s been very much like former-Bucs offensive coordinator Liam Coen’s offense. Coen didn’t like to take long shots very often, if at all.
Yesterday, Bucs coach Todd Bowles was asked if the decrease in long passes was due to Baker Mayfield being banged up.
No, Bowles said, Mayfield can throw the longer passes. Bowles believes the decrease has more to do with who is available at receiver than health.
“I don’t think it affects his throwing,” Bowles said when asked if Mayfield’s bumps and bruises limited his throwing. “Obviously, the linemen getting shuffled around and receivers getting shuffled in and out kind of hurts a lot of things we want to do.
“Obviously, as good as Emeka [Egbuka] is, [defenses] start paying more attention to him and you start breaking things down. We’ve just got to find different ways to get big plays down the field.
“So, we’ve just got to continue to work at it and make sure the guys are playing [and] doing what they’re supposed to do to make them effective in the ball game.”
Are the Bucs going to open up the offense? Bowles believes the team is going to try. But things can’t be forced because that’s when a quarterback gets into trouble.
Joe just hopes Grizzard starts having receivers run routes past the sticks on third down. They don’t have to be running deep routes or go-routes, ust enough so when a receiver catches a ball, he already has a first down.
That should not be too difficult a task to craft.
November 13th, 2025 at 7:09 am
Tez on the go route at least once a game they need to try it
November 13th, 2025 at 7:16 am
If you can’t block up front, then you can’t throw deep….Baker doesn’t have time or trust in his line.
November 13th, 2025 at 7:19 am
bookend TEs Todd. it’s your only chance. TE driven offense.
November 13th, 2025 at 7:34 am
“bookend TEs Todd. it’s your only chance. TE driven offense.”
Agreed, more 12 personnel and less 11 personnel. We’re using 11 personnel at about 67% of the time even WITH the injuries at WR.
we need to reduce that and use more 12 Personnel which makes more sense with 3 rostered, healthy TEs. We could still mix it up and shift outta of that and into 11 personnel with a TE in the slot to try to get matchups, especially on early downs.
Grizzards’ play sheet erases when he shakes it like an etch-a-sketch.
November 13th, 2025 at 7:47 am
Warren, please excuse my lack of understanding. What do you mean by “12 Personnel”?
I figure we all know they can put no more than 11 players on the field at once, so I’m thinking you mean something different…but I don’t know what you mean.
November 13th, 2025 at 7:51 am
How about using the TE to catch a few? Ya had 88 open, WIDE open and threw into a crowd to #2. Play SMART!!
November 13th, 2025 at 7:51 am
I like Bowles as HC thus far, but he’s established that he is willing to lie to us (QB comp), so forgive me if I don’t take his word that Mayfield isn’t effected by his health.
Yes, I think Mayfield can throw deep. But that doesn’t mean he’s not sore and it isn’t affecting his accuracy.
November 13th, 2025 at 7:51 am
“Obviously, the linemen getting shuffled around and receivers getting shuffled in and out kind of hurts alot of things we want to do”. It’s rocket science I’m telling you.
November 13th, 2025 at 7:55 am
12 personal is a two tight end set Buccaneer Bonzai.
November 13th, 2025 at 7:59 am
WBL probably right about that and yes we can motion and slot that TE. Plus, the etch-a-sketch line was pretty good.
November 13th, 2025 at 8:02 am
“Obviously” your defense can’t give up four 50+ yard gains in a game. “Obviously” your defense backs shouldn’t play 13 yards off of a receiver on 3rd and 5. “Obviously” your linebackers should be able to cover and tackle. “Obviously” you OLB’s should be able to sack the QB. “Obviously” you shouldn’t have your star play makers be put in a position to get injured in the preseason and garbage time of games already lost…etc.
November 13th, 2025 at 8:05 am
“Warren, please excuse my lack of understanding. What do you mean by “12 Personnel”?”
12 personnel is a personnel package that consists of:
-QB
-1 RB
-2 WRs
-2 TEs
and your 5 OLmen.
You can run almost every thing we run out of 11 personnel(where there are 3 WRs, 1 TE, & 1 RB) which we use > two-thirds of the time, but in 12 you swap a TE for that 3rd WR.
Great for drawing defenders into the box, but also allow for those 2 TEs to either act as blockers OR WRs and creates mismatches with them and ILBs & safeties.
I say use THAT more, because it’ll take those same ILBs we have trouble picking up blitzes from on 3rd downs to have to respect the threat of our TEs in the pass game.
More blockers on the LOS, can also make those outside run plays more pop with the TEs we’ve already been spamming as blockers anyway, to be the anchors on the outside and help get our backs into space.
It’s our second most used personnel package, we just dont use it enough in my opinion, at least not situations it’d benefit us more like to start games. Just another knock I have against Grizz, because we could rotate Payne & Otton, and try to use Culp on the other side as a mismatch magnet.
Culp has only had 18 snaps on offense this season, even with the attrition we’ve had in the WR room.
Last season he caught 5 passes, for 88 yards and 4 first downs. The fact we haven’t even tried using him in the pass game, disgusts me.
November 13th, 2025 at 8:14 am
And a shot of Ozempic.
November 13th, 2025 at 8:22 am
Baker’s oblique effected his passing, his knee stopped his scramble drills, and the injuries to the o-line caused those injuries.
But while this was going on, we ran into to teams that exploit the o-line, and the remaining wide receivers – and we had no answers left.
Getting Baker healthier, getting Goedeke back, possibly getting Bucky back, may allow us to start charging that up a bit.
If Bucky plays, I think we have a chance against Buffalo.
Now, about that run defense…
November 13th, 2025 at 8:27 am
The time to take a shot is on 2nd & short. Yes there are times when the Bucs have decent run on 1st down resulting in 2 or 3 years to go. And what to they do? RUN it to get a 1st down. If only they would take a shot down field then. If the pass is not complete, they can then run it to keep the drive alive. Not rocket science.
November 13th, 2025 at 8:33 am
21 PERSONNEL!!!!!
2RBs 1TE 2WRs
CHECK THE FILM!!!!!
1st quarter, 7:42 mark: RW & Tucker both lined up in the backfield next to baker….RW motioned to the left and baker handed the ball off to Tuck who ran behind the C & RG…….12 YARDS!!!!
GRIZZ never ran that play or formation again….
21 personnel GRIZZ!!!!!
GO BUCS!!!!
November 13th, 2025 at 8:41 am
“GRIZZ never ran that play or formation again…”
Must’ve been during the spot rain shower, that erased the chalk off his of play tablet 😂😭
November 13th, 2025 at 8:57 am
MORE CONCERNED about Josh Allen and the downfield shots!…
everyone knows Bowels defense is vulnerable to the deep throws and Allen specializes in the area….
Bucs offense has to show up big time in this game to account for the weak defense if they want top leave with a WIN….
November 13th, 2025 at 9:01 am
Must’ve been during the spot rain shower, that erased the chalk off his of play tablet 😂😭
LOL!!!!!…damn i needed that laugh lol
GO BUCS!!!!
November 13th, 2025 at 9:13 am
Does baker ever change plays at line of scrimmage thanks
November 13th, 2025 at 10:08 am
Hey 813….get a little bit of imagination. You’ve used the same “7:42” comment at least 4 times.
November 13th, 2025 at 10:45 am
Joe g – yes, he does.
Hard to take downfield shots while running for your life. This has been the story of the last 3 games. Feeney clearly isn’t cutting it – hopefully Luke H is back soon, or give Klein a shot. Our guard play sucks.
November 13th, 2025 at 12:22 pm
Coen was a dink and dunk game caller who had one of the better run games in the league and dialed up 40 TD passes last year.
Shouldn’t that be the ideal? Ball control ending in touchdowns.
November 13th, 2025 at 12:28 pm
“Shouldn’t that be the ideal? Ball control ending in touchdowns.”
Hard to do this averaging the 5th most punts per game tied with Cincy at 4.2 punts per game
last year we finshed with an average of 2.9 punts per game.
If I had to guess, our struggles on 1st & 2nd are tied directly to the nosedive we’re seeing with our difference in 3rd efficiency last year and right now.
November 13th, 2025 at 3:03 pm
They don’t need to throw deep – they need to just go back and watch video from last year, and see what was working. It was two back sets, it was misdirection, it was not being completely predictable. It’s not hard. This is allegedly the same offense with the same playbook – so use the plays that were working instead of using the part of the playbook that Coen never used. Seriously, use AI, have it go through every play called in every situation, come up with a probability chart, and work from that, you’ll get dramatically better results, instantly, with no other changes.
This is the dumb crap we hear during the offseason, why I started calling Grizz, ‘Wiz Kid’ – because everyone talked about how they were going to go deep and improve on what Coen did. I said it at the time, Baker is not good throwing deep, it’s why when Coen stopped doing it, went to a short passing game offense, things took off. Doesn’t mean Baker can’t throw deep but it shouldn’t be the focus – do what worked all last year. Also bring back more motion, more pulling with the line, all the stuff that was working so incredibly well last year – compared to this offense which looks much more like a Canales/Leftwich hybrid – which is an insult.
November 13th, 2025 at 4:07 pm
NNNNNNNN