Bucs Nation
The Tampa Bay Bucs are in the midst of unprecedented franchise success, but how did it start?
Heading into 2025, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have high expectations. The team is coming off of a 10-win season. In the offseason, Jason Licht and co. made sure to keep all the key cogs in position to counteract any sort of drop off. Tampa Bay kept all 11 of their starting offensive players while adding new additions to their defense— Ensuring 2025 was prepped for a step forward, rather than a regression to the mean.
Tampa Bay’s ‘mean’ has been pretty porous. While success in recent years has been plentiful, the Buccaneers are still the same organization that boasts an all-time record of 318-457-1 (The worst win percentage of any NFL franchise). The Buccaneers haven’t been flawless as of late, but the team has more than turned themselves around. It was not that long ago when the narrative of the Buccaneers being hopeless losers engulfed the entire franchise from top to bottom. Now, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have more Super Bowl titles than the rest of the NFC South combined, they currently have tied New Orleans’ record for most consecutive NFC South championships, and they are one of just two teams with a five-year postseason streak, a Super Bowl championship, and four straight division titles. The other team in that category? The Kansas City Chiefs. Yes, Tampa has certainly come a long way.
There have been more than few faces responsible for this change, however, a few do stand out. In no particular order or ranking, the conversation’s most obvious figure— Tom Brady. Brady choosing the Bucs as his free agent destination will go down as the greatest free agent signing in league history and likely the most impactful singular moment the franchise has ever had. Brady did not single-handedly turn the Buccaneers into winners, but he has not taken a snap for the team since 2022 and his fingerprints are still littered all over organization. Brady’s ability to lead a young talented team in the right direction on the field with this play and off it through his experience was nothing short of miraculous.
Brady was not alone in his Florida conquest because there were multiple reasons the greatest quarterback of all-time would choose the Bucs. Coming from the New England Patriots and Bill Belichick, Brady was not going to leave the closing scenes of his football career in the hands of an inexperienced, unproven leader. At the time, Bruce Arians had not won a championship as a head coach, but he was a highly respected football mind, offensive play caller, and person inside football circles.
The Buccaneers had signed him, out of retirement, a year prior to try and fix their perennially up and down quarterback Jameis Winston. In Arians’ first season with the Buccaneers, Winston was as Winston as ever— Tossing 33 touchdowns and 30 interceptions. Following the season’s final game (which fittingly ended on a Jameis Winston pick-6), Arians...
