{"id":702364,"date":"2026-01-24T21:15:17","date_gmt":"2026-01-24T21:15:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/702364\/"},"modified":"2026-01-24T21:15:17","modified_gmt":"2026-01-24T21:15:17","slug":"did-close-games-save-todd-bowles-joebucsfan-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/702364\/","title":{"rendered":"Did Close Games Save Todd Bowles? – JoeBucsFan.com"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Joe\u2019s heard the one-score game narrative for years.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s usually framed as a reason to believe a losing NFL team is close to getting over the proverbial hump.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s almost foolish. Most NFL games are decided by one score. Losing one-score games is no reason for optimism. It\u2019s better than getting your doors blown off, but playing it close and losing makes you, well, a loser.<\/p>\n

Jorge Diaz, the former Bucs starting guard (1996-1999), thinks keeping games close is a big reason Todd Bowles is still the Bucs\u2019 head coach, so he told The Rock Riley Show on WDAE radio<\/a> today.<\/p>\n

Riley asked Diaz why he thinks the Bucs retained Bowles after firing several key assistant coaches.<\/p>\n

In addition to saying he thinks Team Glazer likes the team culture and the overall Bowles way, Diaz pointed to the tight games.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe team never stopped competing and if you look at the margin of loss, it wasn\u2019t like this team was getting blown out,\u201d Diaz said. \u201d \u2026 So it was really interesting when you look at the big picture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Diaz also thinks Bowles agreed with Team Glazer and the front office that significant coaching changes were needed, so their unified approach is intact.<\/p>\n

Did the 2025 Bucs morph into the Father Dungy Bucs of the late 1990s? Diaz went there. He noted the Bucs\u2019 approach late in the season became \u201ckeep it close and pull away late,\u201d except the Bucs did have enough offense for that strategy to succeed.<\/p>\n

Diaz said Bucs struggles were tied to the many offensive line injuries but he wouldn\u2019t give the team a pass. The O-line \u201cis a beautiful dance by five large me,\u201d Diaz said, \u201cand that is hard to do when you\u2019re mixing and matching every week. \u2026 but you can\u2019t make any excuses.\u201d<\/p>\n

Diaz also praised the \u201camazing job\u201d of Graham Barton at left tackle in place of Tristan Wirfs in Weeks 1 through 3, and he added that undisciplined play and Emeka Egbuka\u2019s dropoff were major factors in the second half of the season.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t just offense, Diaz said, noting the Bucs\u2019 defensive collapse in Buffalo and poor special teams play overall.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Joe\u2019s heard the one-score game narrative for years. It\u2019s usually framed as a reason to believe a losing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":584287,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2077],"tags":[211,2599,2598,7,6,704,250,2597,2596],"class_list":{"0":"post-702364","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tampa-bay-buccaneers","8":"tag-buccaneers","9":"tag-bucs-message-boards","10":"tag-bucs-news","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-nfl","13":"tag-tampa-bay","14":"tag-tampa-bay-buccaneers","15":"tag-tampabay","16":"tag-tampabaybuccaneers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115952152579481860","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=702364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702364\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/584287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=702364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=702364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=702364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}