Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady refused to downplay head coach Bruce Arians’ strong language in reaction to the team’s 29-19 loss at Washington on Sunday, November 14.
Arians called the Bucs a “dumb football team” during his postgame press conference. Brady alluded to hoping the team heard it loud and clear during his podcast, “Let’s Go!,” on Monday.
“Hopefully, we’re all very receptive to it because that’s what being a player is and that’s what being a great teammate is,” Brady told podcast cohost Jim Gray.
Brady admitted there’s no hiding from Arians’ media comments or other media reaction to the Bucs debacle in Washington. Media personalities and fans sounded off left and right about Brady losing to Washington quarterback Taylor Heinicke in particular.
“It’s very natural because we’re all surrounded by family members, and agents, and people from our schools that want to protect us when things don’t go well,” Brady told Gray about the media noise.
Many things didn’t go well in the Bucs’ second-straight loss from Brady’s two interceptions to the defense giving up a 19-play fourth quarter scoring drive. Arians lamented it all — especially the lack of energy and the six penalties.
“What you really need is the truth,” Brady told Gray. “And the truth is when you walk in that building the next day and you look at all the guys on the roster, and you look at each other and say, ‘We are the problem. We win as one, we lose as one.'”
“There’s no point in pointing fingers at anyone or anything. It does no good. We’re all in it together,” Brady added. “If we want to make it better, we need to fix our problems.”
Brady Says Bucs ‘Problems’ This Year Are ‘Different’
Tampa Bay stumbled around midseason last year, too, before turning things around in December after a late bye week.
That Bucs team had trouble with deep throws, turnovers and stopping potent passing attacks. Some of those things have crept up again, but penalties and a lack of focus have been alarming, too. Injuries mounted much more this season than last as well — the latest being Richard Sherman and Vita Vea.
GettyVita Vea gets carted off after sustaining a leg injury at Washington.
“The problems we have this year are different than the problems we’ve had in the past,” Brady told Gray. “So we have to take a different approach to fix them.”
As Arians pointed out the Bucs can quickly and easily fix themselves in the effort department. Brady alluded to it, too.
“We’re going to have to dig deep. We’re going to have to show a lot of resiliency, we’re going to have to show a lot of mental toughness,” Brady told Gray. “We’re going to have to work harder than what we’ve worked.”
Bucs Still the Hunted
Brady knows better than any member of the Bucs that the road to repeating as champions is “very difficult” and that each team is gunning for Tampa Bay. In his career, Brady has been a defending Super Bowl champion six times already and repeated only once.
“Everyone would think, ‘Oh, you guys won last year, why don’t you just win again this year?’ Well, as we know in the NFL, that is very, very difficult to do,” Brady told Gray. “It’s very difficult to repeat success, and a lot of teams are out there gauging where they’re at based on their game against you.”
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Tom Brady Responds to Head Coach Bruce Arians Calling the Bucs ‘Dumb’