Byron Leftwich is entering his second season as Tampa Bay’s offensive coordinator, and this will be his first time working with Tom Brady.
Leftwich, 40, was a first-round draft pick by Jacksonville in 2003 and is similar in age to Brady, who is 43 and was drafted in 2000. The two can relate to each other based on beginning their NFL careers around the same time, which they regard as a different era of football.
According to what he told ESPN’s Jenna Laine for an article, Leftwich plans to collaborate with Brady to work towards the future Hall of Famer’s strengths and preferences when it comes to designing the Buccaneers’ offense.
“My philosophy — and which I believe (Bruce Arians’) philosophy is also — is that every quarterback I’ve ever been around has a role in the offense. I don’t just call plays; I don’t just come up with plays – I come with plays always with the quarterback in mind,” Leftwich said, via ESPN. “So there’ll be some things that’s different here and there; obviously we want to know everything that Tom knows. Any time you’ve got a guy like this leading your team at the quarterback position, you want to know and put him in the best position possible all the time.”
Leftwich says they aim to find out what plays likes/executes best and run with those. They will likely run similar packages to what Brady used in New England and utilize running backs and tight ends in the passing game. The whole article is worth a read.
Arians is not known for utilizing tight ends in most of the offenses he has coached, but he has said the team plans to use multiple tight end formations, which plays to Brady’s strength. Now that Tampa Bay has added Rob Gronkowski to a group that already includes Cameron Brate and OJ Howard, such an approach makes sense.
Brady meanwhile is working hard to develop relationships with his new teammates and reportedly is already being embraced as a team leader.
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