The boos rained down from Raymond James Stadium last Thursday night when Baker Mayfield and the Bucs lost to the Falcons, 29-28, and blew a 14-point fourth quarter lead. The lasting image in many Bucs fans’ minds are the fact that Tampa Bay’s defense had Atlanta backed up on third-and-28 and then a fourth-and-14, which they allowed and soon after gave up the game winning field goal.

When a team has a defensive head coach like the Bucs do with head coach Todd Bowles, the issue gets get expounded on 10 times more. Add that into losing five of their last six games with the defense being a big reason why their second half struggles have continued, and it has Bucs fans going nuclear. Several have called for Todd Bowles to be fired for weeks now. That’s not going to calm down if they Bucs continue to lose games down the stretch and fail to make the playoffs as a result.

Baker Mayfield Has Todd Bowles’ Back

There’s no denying that the Bucs should have gotten the stop on Atlanta’s game-winning field goal drive. But looking deeper into the game, Tampa Bay’s offense had a chance to close out the game twice in the fourth quarter.

Quarterback Baker Mayfield threw an interception in the fourth quarter that set the Falcons up to score a possible game-tying touchdown before the two-point conversion was stopped.

Falcons OLB James Pearce Jr. and Bucs QB Baker Mayfield – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Then up two points, Mayfield missed a throw to Emeka Egbuka that went incomplete and gave the ball back to Atlanta. Had Mayfield been on time with the throw and Egbuka caught it, that’s a first down for Tampa Bay and the game is over.

Because Mayfield played a role in Tampa Bay’s loss, he’s backing up his coach by pointing out that he’s been just as much a part of the problem in this all.

“That’s always a tricky slope,” Mayfield said about fans not listening to Todd Bowles. “You love them when the defense is getting all the sacks and the turnovers, and then a game like that… Like I said though [in] post-game, it comes down to the offense. You’re up two scores, you have a chance to put the game away and you don’t. The easy thing to do is point at the defense because in [those] situations, it’s the last thing you see in the game, but if you look at the whole game, you look at the way it played out, blame me, don’t blame Todd.”

Bucs HC Todd Bowles and QB Baker Mayfield – Photo by: USA Today

Bucs Are Not Playing The Blame Game

A lot of discussion about accountability and not playing the blame game has come about recently. There was plenty of shouting in the Bucs locker room following the loss. Tampa Bay has been credited with having a close knit group, and although the team has been in this situation before, the way it’s fallen this season has been more eye-opening could potentially have caused some cracks in the foundation of the locker room.

Bucs QB Baker Mayfield – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Baker Mayfield assured everyone that there’s no problem. They are just focused on winning and trying to make the postseason.

“The finger pointing [is] only happening if you have bad culture in the building. That’s not a problem we have to deal with. We met on Monday with the offense, and I told them what I said in the post-game press conference, I said it’s on me, it’s on this group, I expect us to be able to score more than 28 [points] in a situation like that and put the game out of reach. You just nip it in the bud in the beginning.”