The Bucs have gotten some of the NFL’s best quarterback play in the last half-decade. Yes, a lot of that came from the greatest quarterback to ever play the game in Tom Brady, who was the man under center for three seasons from 2020-2022.

Now, it is Baker Mayfield’s turn to put up numbers and lead Tampa Bay on a deeper postseason run. Through his first two seasons in town, it’s hard to argue it has not been the best-case scenario for Mayfield and the team. He has not only revived his career but has become an above-average signal caller bordering on elite status.

Speaking at the NFL Annual Meeting in West Palm Beach, Florida earlier this week, head coach Todd Bowles shared just how much he loves the way Mayfield plays and carries himself.

Bucs Want Baker Mayfield To Be Himself – Even If That Comes With Mistakes

Baker Mayfield took his game to the next level in 2024.

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

After having a career year under former offensive coordinator Dave Canales in 2023, Mayfield was even better last season playing under offensive coordinator Liam Coen, who has now moved on to be the head coach of the Jaguars.

Running Coen’s offense, Mayfield put up a career-high 4,500 passing yards and 41 passing touchdowns while competing 71.4% of his passes, looking like a modern-day gunslinger in the process. Relying on quick game to get the ball out efficiently to his weapons, he was in command and avoid the several dud performances he had during his first year in Tampa Bay.

Still, it was not all perfect.

One aspect that the veteran quarterback will look to improve upon is throwing interceptions. He tied for the league lead by throwing 16 of them, which was up from the 10 he threw the year before. While Todd Bowles wants to take care of the football and see the interceptions be cleaned up, he also recognizes letting the leader of the offense do what it takes to win. If that means throwing three touchdowns and two interceptions but securing the win, Bowles will not be complaining.

“That’s number one,” Bowles said about the priority of playing mistake-free football as it relates to Mayfield’s interceptions. “We’ve always got to take care of the football – that’s number one. When you play like Baker plays, you’re going to have a mistake here or there. We’d like to cut that down some if we can, but we’re not going to hinder his play. We love the way he plays, we love what he does for us…And for the turnovers that he gave, we’d never be in playoff position if it wasn’t for him in the first place. We’re fine there, we’ve just got to clean up some things and he knows that.”

Baker Mayfield Was “The Perfect Guy” For Tampa Bay After Tom Brady

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

When Tom Brady retired following the 2022 season, there were a lot of doubts about how the Bucs would move forward. Would they regress into the team they were before his arrival, and into another dark era that followed after Tampa Bay’s 2002 Super Bowl win?

That was avoided thanks to the work of the front office ushering in another wave of young talent and the coaching staff coaching up the young players brought in. While that was crucial, so was finding a long-term answer at quarterback.

Baker Mayfield picked up where Brady left off and is the latest signal-caller to experience a career resurgence after things did not work out with the team that drafted him.

“The first thing is we allowed him to be himself, number one,” Bowles said. “You’ve got to go to the team that has the right system that kind of fits you. Sometimes, you play on teams where the system doesn’t fit you. Baker found the right place at the right time. We tweaked the system at the right time after Tom [Brady] left because they were completely different systems.

“To come in and have a system that fits you [where] you can still be yourself and [it] allows you to grow and process and blossom, I think is important. Baker brought as much to us as we brought to him as far as bringing leadership and personality in our building…Him understanding the game and us have the system that fits him and a place that fits him, I think it was a good marriage.”

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

With a cast of players around Mayfield that has formed one of the league’s youngest rosters, the team needed a leader who could relate and ingratiate himself into the locker room.

Whether it’s the bond he shares with the offensive line, the chemistry he has formed with his wide receivers, or his fiery playstyle that gets all of the guys motivated to play hard, one cannot question the relationships he has built within the building and his fit with the organization.

Todd Bowles had the chance to meet him before the 2018 NFL Draft when he was the head coach of the Jets. Although Mayfield went first overall and New York pivoted to select Sam Darnold with the third pick, he enjoyed getting to know him then and felt like he was the right guy at the right time to lead the team to where it is now.

“Having a prior relationship with him helps, obviously, getting to know him, so I already knew him from that standpoint,” Bowles said. “Jason [Licht] had a good feel for him as well, so we thought he was the perfect guy for what we needed at the time.”