Buccaneers Send Message to Next QB

Getty The next Buccaneers quarterback will have a daunting task in coming after Tom Brady.

Replacing former Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady could feel like jumping off a high dive — or getting fed to the bears if it doesn’t go right.

New offensive coordinator Dave Canales used such imagery in describing his plans at quarterback with void of Brady retired and only having Kyle Trask on the roster. Canales praised Trask’s success in college at Florida and added that Trask can be like a point guard for a Bucs offense that still has talented skill players.

“I really liked him coming out [of college]. If you look at some of the skill position players that he had there: Kyle Pitts, Kadarius Toney — he had the big return in the Super Bowl — and then you have Dameon Pierce [who] was another guy, right? Well, he was able to distribute. The thing that we’re going to help Kyle continue to build on here is to just be a point guard,” Canales told reporters on Wednesday, February 22.

Trask, the Bucs’ second-round pick in 2021, will have Pro Bowl-caliber receivers in Mike Evans and Chris Godwin to work with. Fellow receiver Russell Gage and running backs Leonard Fournette and Rachaad White could also help Trask succeed amid his inexperience.

“Point guards don’t have to be the one to score all the points — you just distribute,” Canales said. Play on time, get the ball out of your hands, life is better that way when you do that. You’ve got these bears chasing you, and if you don’t like bears chasing you, get rid of the ham — and that’s the football, right? So just teaching him those principles, allowing him to be a distributor.”

That doesn’t mean the Bucs will go with Trask with free agency around the corner. However, Canales will commit to developing Trask for the time being. A long time Seattle Seahawks assistant under head coach Pete Carroll, Canales came on board with the Bucs in mid February.

“The way that I’ve been trained is, ‘They’re ours until they’re not.’ So, right now, I’ve got one Buccaneers quarterback – it’s Kyle Trask,” Canales said.

No ‘High Dive’ in Canales’ Coaching Philosophy

Canales doesn’t believe in an offense always riding or dying with the quarterback, and he backed it up with an opinion of one of the NFL’s biggest coaching names.

“I heard Sean Payton say this the other day and I thought it was brilliant. He said, ‘You’ve got to take the quarterback off the high dive.’ I thought that was a brilliant way to put it because you can’t be leaning on him to make every single play all of the time,” Canales said.

Now the Denver Broncos head coach, Payton formerly coached the New Orleans Saints and gave the Bucs trouble for years. While Payton didn’t find a lot of success after quarterback Drew Brees‘ retirement, Canales helped the Seahawks hardly miss a beat when quarterback Russell Wilson left for Denver.

Seahawks quarterback Geno Smith, who didn’t have a prior track record of success as a starter, led the team to the playoffs with a 9-8 record. Smith threw for 4,282 yards and 30 touchdowns versus 11 interceptions.

Canales got credited for Smith’s success as the team’s quarterbacks coach.

Trask Fits Canales’ System?

Canales wants to install a quarterback-friendly offense that thrives on playmakers, and he sees Trask fitting right in.

“I would say, really right now, the system is the system. It handles any real type of quarterback,” Canales said. “So, it’s not so much that we’re going to build it through Kyle, it’s just that as I get to know him and study him, the things we’ll do will be in his wheelhouse.  And it’s going to be about our tight ends, it’s going to be about our backs. It’s going to be about Mike and Chris, Russell. It’s really the whole thing.”

“When I say system, it’s not so much the plays that are run but it’s the marriage of the run and pass and it’s the attacking style that we’re going to be in and out of tempos and multiple,” Canales added. “So that part, really, you plug and play your talent. The plays become the plays but it’s the system that is flexible.”