Arians wasn’t ready in Arizona
Relax, Cardinals fans.
Bruce Arians wasn’t going to win a Super Bowl out here.
BA is great, and he deserves every accolade after leading the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to a dominating win over the football team from Kansas City.
But he’s a better coach today than he was back then; Bruce Arians has learned trust.
‘We can do any damn thing’
When he was with the Cardinals, BA had to do it all. He called plays and refused to change up his schemes.
His identity was rigidity. The mantra in those days was, “We do what we do.”
He was known for a mischievous streak that would prompt him to call a 50-yard pass play or an all-out blitz without reason, even if he had plenty of rhyme, “No risk it, no biscuit.”
But today, he lets offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich call the plays. BA’s Arizona offensive coordinator, Harold Goodwin, is the run-game coordinator.
The new identity is in flexibility. The new mantra is, “We can do any damn thing we want to do.”
Together, Leftwich and Goodwin came up with a game plan that was so old-school that it looked new. Tampa Bay had 145 rushing yards on 33 carries, about 4.4 yards per attempt. The Buccaneers threw for just 195 yards. They took Tom Brady, perhaps the greatest quarterback ever to play, and they made him a game-managing decoy! And it worked!
BA still has that rogue streak.
How else could you explain the way they used Leonard Fournette? They kept him throttled back all season, using Ronald Jones II as the primary ball carrier, and then unleashed a fresh, frustrated and fired up Fournette on a Kansas City defense that never saw it coming.
BA’s double-dog-dare-me side also shows in the make-up of his staff. The guy has more African American coaches than a Historically Black College or University.
Aside from Leftwich and Goodwin (associate head coach), Arian’s had Todd Bowles as defensive coordinator and Keith Armstrong as special teams coordinator. BA also had a Black woman, Jacqueline Davidson, as director of football research. And he had at least a half dozen other Black coaches on the sidelines.
In a league where Black coaches have a hard time getting hired, BA put together a staff full of them and won a Super Bowl.
They weren’t ready until now
It’s easy for Arizona fans to feel frustrated.
Arians got the Cardinals so close. They reached an NFC championship game and had the look of a team that could win it all. And he did it with much of the same supporting staff that earned the Vince Lombardi Trophy on Sunday.
But this group wasn’t ready to win it all until now.
Arians had to walk away from the game for a year to see how much it meant to him. He had to process a cancer scare that taught him to take better care of his health.
There’s no chance like a second chance, and Arians coached like a guy who wanted to make the most of his.
Bowles had to get over being unfairly dumped from his job coaching the Jets.
He’s coaching like he wants to get back in the big chair, and he just shut down one of the best offenses in the history of the sport.
Leftwich never had a chance in his first stint as offensive coordinator with the Cardinals under Steve Wilks (Leftwich had been a quarterback coach under Arians). Leftwich was working with a unit that had a rookie at quarterback and injuries all over the depth chart. Plus, Wilks, wanted a run-heavy attack, which he didn’t have the personnel for. Leftwich never complained. He just used that failure as a springboard to the success he’s having now.
And in Arizona under Arians, Goodwin was an offensive coordinator who was more like an offensive line coach. But now as associate head coach, he’s able to help keep Arians free to roam and motivate and do football stuff.
Every last one of these guys got better through their failures.
And Arians learned during his time away that he was going to have to learn how to trust them.
He didn’t know how to do that in Arizona. And he wasn’t ready to win it all.
At the same time, he couldn’t have won it all without having been in Arizona.
Cardinals fans didn’t miss out on a championship with Arians. They watched him get ready to win one later.
Now they know what it looks like so they can hold other coaches to the same standard.