Twenty-seven years ago, in 1999, Blink-182 came out with a song titled, “All The Small Things.” That song was and still is a pop culture phenomenon, and it can be heard belted out by thousands of fans in unison at any given sporting event across the country. “All The Small Things” gave Blink-182 its biggest crossover hit; “All The Small Things,” or as Todd Bowles said after the Bucs’ 26-19 overtime defeat to the Steelers in Week 6 Sunday, “all the little things,” are holding Tampa Bay back from being a serious operation.

There’s a common theme with all of the best teams in the NFL, and it’s that they don’t beat themselves, nor do they allow the little things throughout the course of a game to become big things. Well, the Bucs are not in that group of teams, and the little things are a big reason why they blew a 16-3 second half lead against Pittsburgh.

Steelers DB Jaylen Ramsey and Bucs QB Jalon Daniels – Photo by: IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Yes, the Bucs had a 13-3 lead at the half and a 16-3 lead at one point in the third quarter, but it should have been so much more. Tampa Bay took a 13-0 lead with 4:08 remaining in the second quarter on the right leg of Chase McLaughlin, who drilled a 47-yard field goal. But it should have been seven had the Bucs executed the play before.

Facing third-and-11 from the Pittsburgh 29-yard line, wide receiver Emeka Egbuka sprinted past safety Jaquan Brisker and was wide open down the right sideline for a score. Quarterback Jalon Daniels, making his third consecutive start in place of the injured Baker Mayfield, didn’t put enough loft on the ball and it went off the right hand of Egbuka, who was forced into attempting a one-handed catch for the touchdown.

Now, perhaps Egbuka could have made a better play on the football, but it should have been an easy completion to give the Bucs a commanding 17-0 lead. Instead, Tampa Bay had to settle for three, further keeping Pittsburgh in the game.

Then we move to the end of the half, where the Steelers took over from 23-yard line after the Bucs offense went three-and-out. With 1:28 remaining and no timeouts, the Steelers, who had zero points on the board at the time, promptly marched to the Tampa Bay 34-yard line to attempt a 52-field goal, which Chris Boswell connected on.

Once again, Todd Bowles’ defense allowed free points at the end of the half instead of locking it down and going into the final two quarters of play pitching a shutout.

It only got worse coming out of the half. On the Steelers’ second offensive play of the third quarter, quarterback Aaron Rodgers threw a swing pass intended for running back Jaylen Warren right into the hands of linebacker Josiah Trotter. The only problem there was that the rookie dropped it. Had he made that play, he would have been off and running the other way for six.

Let’s mark that as two potential touchdowns off the board for the Bucs. If both plays were made, the Bucs could have had as much as a three-score lead.

By the time the fourth quarter came around, the Bucs letting the Steelers hang around started to bite them. Pittsburgh found its flow as an offense, leaning on the quick passing game of Rodgers and beginning to attack the middle of the field in certain moments. The Steelers would get points on all five of their fourth quarter and overtime possessions. They capped it off with a game-winning, 12-play, 70-yard scoring drive that took 6:45 off the clock in overtime.

The Bucs Keep Finding Ways To Lose Close Games Under Todd Bowles

The Bucs offense, meanwhile, wilted down the stretch. They had just two yards of offense across three drives in the fourth quarter before their final drive, in which they successfully picked up 30 yards to give McLaughlin a 53-yard field attempt to tie the game and send it into overtime, which he drilled.

When they got ball back in overtime, needing to go 75 yards in 3:15, offensive coordinator Zac Robinson opened up the drive with a run up the middle to Irving that went for just one yard. Tampa Bay showed little urgency, moving away from tempo and even having to burn a timeout because a play came in late.

Bucs QB Jalon Daniels and OC Zac Robinson – Photo by: IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

It’s nothing but more of the same for the Bucs, whom continuously find multiple ways to lose close games. In fact, the Bucs have now lost 10-of-13 one-score games dating back to Week 10 of the 2025 season. Over the course of Bowles’ tenure as Tampa Bay’s head coach, this team is 19-26 in one-possession games. Take out a 6-4 record in 2022, Tom Brady’s final season, and the Bucs are 13-22 in such games over the last three-plus seasons.

“We gotta learn to finish ball games. We had a chance to finish the ball game, we didn’t finish it at the end. You play that hard and grab a lead, you gotta keep it and it’s all the little things in between,” Bowles said. “We practice two-minute for a reason on both sides of the ball, and we gotta finish the ball game. They understand that and as a team, we have no more margin for error.”

In year five of the Bowles era, it shouldn’t be like this. But when you consistently fail to execute the small things, this is what it looks like: 1-5, barrelling aimlessly to the most unsuccessful season of Bucs football in the 2020s.