Bruce Arians on Byron Leftwich: ‘He’s the star’ of Buccaneers offense, will be a head coach soon

Last month, Bruce Arians stepped away from coaching to take a job in the Tampa Bay Buccaneers front office. He was replaced as head coach by his former defensive coordinator, Todd Bowles, but Arians thinks it won’t be long before his lead assistant on the other side of the ball — offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich — gets a head-coaching job of his own. In fact, Arians thought it was going to happen this offseason. 

“I really thought he was going to be the head coach of the Jacksonville Jaguars this year,” Arians said in a radio interview with Arizona Sports 98.7 FM. “Got so, so close. Yeah, it’s on the horizon for him. He’s the star.”

It was heavily rumored earlier in the offseason that Leftwich was one of the top candidates for the job in Jacksonville, only for a potential deal to fall apart because he did not want to work with incumbent general manager Trent Baalke. (That was reportedly a sticking point for several candidates, not just Leftwich.) It would have been a great story, given Leftwich’s history in Jacksonville, as well as a great opportunity for him, given the presence of Trevor Lawrence on the roster. 

Of course, it didn’t work out, and Leftwich is still in Tampa, where he’ll coordinate the Tom Brady-led offense once again. For Arians, it’s not Brady who drives the offense, though. It’s Leftwich. 

“I get credit and Brady gets way too much credit for what Byron does with our offense,” Arians said. “One of the reasons I hope he gets all the credit he deserves this year is to get a coaching gig; you know, he had about four or five teams real interested last year. I would anticipate him to be a head coach real fast.”

This might be a little bit of exaggeration on Arians’ part, given the dramatic upgrade from Jameis Winston to Brady played a large role in the Bucs’ offense taking off over the past two seasons, but Leftwich has certainly distinguished himself as a schemer and play-caller, and if the Bucs find success again in 2022, will presumably be in the mix for head-coaching opportunities again next offseason.