“I Know The Vision And I’ve Seen The Success” – JoeBucsFan.com – Tampa Bay Bucs Blog, Buccaneers News

Not everyone sees Todd Bowles as Dead Coach Walking. Some see a beast of a leader whose methods succeeded on the grandest stage.

The Bucs’ defensive performance in the Super Bowl two years ago will no doubt go down as one of the greatest in history.

But after the Cooper Kupp playoff dagger 13 months ago, a lot of Bucs fans were perplexed by Bowles’ decision to blitz on the critical last-second play, and subsequently lost some respect for Bowles the defensive guru. Even love-filled Father Dungy took to Twitter in stunned disbelief.

(Joe always understood the all-out-blitz call, but damn did it prove to be ill-timed. Joe almost thinks some players were so surprised — and gassed — and weren’t ready to execute.)

Still, that was one play. And Bowles’ defensive players have intense respect for him. That was evidenced by veteran defensive tackle Will Gholston’s profound chatter on WDAE Radio last week.

“Coach Bowles is one of the coaches that I would run through the wall for knowing that the wall won’t fall down. And if he said, ‘Do it again.’ I would do it again,” Gholston said. “Because you can see in his preparation and detail, especially being a defensive coordinator, like you see his work ethic. Like I know his work ethic and it only drives me to work as hard or harder as a player because I know the vision and I’ve seen the success.”

Joe thinks Gholston voiced a key point. Those defensive players have seen Bowles work magic year after year on that side of the ball and they believe in him wholeheartedly.

One minor example would be the Bucs ranking seventh in the NFL in sacks last season with Shaq Barrett out with an injury before midseason. A better example would be the Bucs’ run of historically great run defense in 2019 and 2020, among others, in addition to exemplary development of several defensive backs.

Now Bowles just needs everyone on the same page as Gholston. Overall, the Bucs weren’t a physical team last season and didn’t look to have the “run-through-the-wall” mentality Gholston speaks of.