TAMPA, Fla. — Tom Brady looked a lot more comfortable running the Bucs’ offense last season following a 7-5 start and a bye week to work out some of the kinks.
But offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich insists there wasn’t much different about Bruce Arians’ “no risk it, no biscuit” attack during the eight-game win streak that culminated in a 31-9 win over Kansas City in Super Bowl 55.
“We’re doing the same stuff,” Leftwich said Tuesday. “I know there’s this big talk about everything. The offense is based on the quarterback. That’s what I believe in in coaching. It’s always been that way. I told you guys it took us time. We didn’t have an opportunity to practice (during the pandemic shutdown) so we were trying to figure things out on Sunday.
“But we’re not doing all this motion stuff, I don’t know where you get all that from. We put our quarterback in the best position to have success all the time and that’s how we’ve always looked at it. Week 1 last year. Did we do a better job? We may have as we learned each other, me and Tom ... I did a better job of putting him in position. But we didn’t go and start doing all this different stuff.”
Although Leftwich bristles a bit at the notion that there was more pre-snap shifts and play-action passes during the Bucs’ run, it’s somewhat undeniable that’s what transpired. The Bucs were more balanced the second half of the season, although Leftwich suggests they were more efficient running the ball, which opened up some of the deep shots.
“We really honed in on what we were as a team after the bye and we tried to do that thing,” Leftwich said. “But it’s the same concept, the same plays we’d been calling.”
However they got there, Brady responded in his first year under Leftwich by passing for 4,633 yards, 40 touchdowns and 12 interceptions before adding more than 1,000 yards passing and 10 touchdowns in the postseason.
How much better will Brady be in his second season with the Bucs? “We’re probably going to look like we looked at the end of the year,” Leftwich said.
