A lot of things are new for Tristan Wirfs this season. He is making the much-anticipated move over to the blindside from right tackle, where he has blossomed into an All-Pro level player since being drafted in 2020.

As well as a position change, it will also be a completely new offensive system for him to learn under Dave Canales. This means adjusting not only in terms of hand placement and body movement but also different schemes and assignments. For Wirfs, it is all about taking it in stride.

Tristan Wirfs Is Making Adjustments At LT And “Starting To Get Better”

A new season brings with it a fresh start. As the rainy season starts in Florida, it is symbolic of how it washes away the old and brings in the new. That is the theme for Tristan Wirfs in his hopes to improve and quickly learn the intricacies of being the stalwart at left tackle. It’s not easy.

Bucs OL Robert Hainsey and LT Tristan Wirfs – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

“Everything’s backward, getting control with my left hand instead of my right, and not throwing up my right and opening it up,” Wirfs said on his toughest adjustments. “My weight distribution – I always used to keep my weight in my left leg, but now I keep it in my right. It’s all different; it’s so similar, you’re doing the same stuff, but it’s all just flipped.

“Just getting as many reps as I can with [offensive line] Coach Joe [Gilbert] just to keep building. I had thousands of reps on the right side, and now going in as a newborn baby on the left.”

While he set a high precedent for his work at right tackle, it is not his first rodeo being the left tackle. While playing at Iowa, he made four starts at the position. Now he is starting to get his muscle memory back down.

“Yeah, it’s slowly coming back,” Wirfs said. “My set – at first, it felt so weird, then I’m like, okay, it’s starting to get better. Now it’s like one thing at a time is getting better. My set was good; now I got to work on my vertical set, getting that back. I think the biggest thing is going to be my hands because my right hand was like my bread and butter. This one didn’t really do – it just kind of sat here,” Wirfs said, holding up his left hand. “Now I got to wake it up; I got to get it to do something now.”

Bucs LT Tristan Wirfs Discusses New Offense

As well as educating himself on how to be a great left tackle, Tristan Wirfs is also getting down the schematics and blueprint of a zone offense. Although it has only been a couple of weeks of OTAs, he is a fan of how it is designed and tailored around being a player-friendly system.

Bucs OC Dave Canales – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

“I think what’s been really cool is the mid-zone aspect of it,” Wirfs said on the new-look offense. “Just what they’re wanting to do and how that’s going to benefit us as an offensive line – from all the visuals we’ve put in, I like all of them a lot. It’s a different style of offense, and learning it has been a new challenge because I’m used to – college too – it was all numbers.

“This set of numbers means this, this set of numbers means this – now it’s just all like, a word will tell you everything. That’s been kind of fun, learning something new, and figuring out how to get it down.”

Getting more into detail, he gave an example of how it affects him on a play-to-play basis.

“It’s very offensive line-friendly,” Wirfs said. “For a tackle, if the defensive end is outside, the aiming point is coming off your inside leg. So they’re like: ‘Don’t get blown up; just keep him outside, and you’ll be good. The back is going to make his cut off you and stay in line with the center.’

“It’s not a lot – you don’t have to see a bunch of stuff, and it’s not too complex or anything. For a tackle, just like [Andrew] Whitworth, that’s why he played so long. It’s a very player-friendly offense.”

Tristan Wirfs Does Not Want To Let Anybody Down

Bucs T Tristan Wirfs -Photo by: Matt Matera/PR

While there is no doubt Tristan Wirfs is one of the best tackles in the NFL, he still has to tell himself that he will be the same player on the left side.

“I have very high expectations of myself,” Wirfs said. “I don’t want to let anybody else down, so it’s just doing my best to keep those thoughts positive and to kind of take every day as an opportunity to get better. I think about that all day, every day.”

It may sound silly to think of Tristan Wirfs as being someone to let anybody down. He already sounds ready to be a leader on a Bucs’ offensive line that will look completely different from just a season ago.

But in keeping up his elite level of play, a fear of failure pushes him to become as great on one side of the offensive line as he was on the other. This desire has gotten him to this point in the NFL and is one that he sees as a chance to continue to grow and learn from, one day at a time.