NFL world reacts to sudden retirement of Bruce Arians

After being one of the most successful head coaches in the NFL for the last decade, Bruce Arians, is ending his head coaching career.

Arians told Peter King of NBC Sports and Sam Farmer of the Los Angeles Times that he was retiring as head coach of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Arians will move to a front-office role in the organization while defensive coordinator Todd Bowles will become the new head coach.

The move was confirmed by the Buccaneers on Twitter, while ESPN’s Adam Schefter tweeted a statement from Arians.

Arians has won everywhere he’s gone. He served as head coach of the Arizona Cardinals from 2013-2017 and with the Buccaneers from 2019-2022. Arians reached the postseason twice in both places, won Super Bowl LV in Tampa and has had only two losing seasons. His official record is 80-48-1. If we include his 9-3 record as interim coach of the Indianapolis Colts in 2012 while Chuck Pagano received cancer treatment, it’s 89-59-1.

Many in the NFL world congratulated Arians on a great head coaching career.

The Bowles element of it can’t be ignored. Bowles is a long time assistant under Arians. He was the defensive coordinator for Arians in both Arizona and Tampa.

He has head coaching experience, serving as head coach of the New York Jets from 2015-2018. That run didn’t go well. The Jets went 24-40, which looks even worse when we remember that New York was 10-6 in his first year.

However, those years could also be described as peak Jets’ dysfunction. While Bowles’ record wasn’t good, he may not have had a fair chance. The Buccaneers are one year removed from a Super Bowl win and have reached the playoffs in consecutive seasons. So, Bowles will have a fair chance to succeed. Given the history between the two, that might have been appealing to Arians.

Of course, one other part of this sticks out like a sore thumb. Throughout the offseason, there have been rumblings of a rift between Arians and quarterback Tom Brady.

Arians dismissed the rumors recently. But this news got people wondering again if the reported rift might be real.

Anyone else feel like Arians actually hates Brady lol

— Benny (@SlippinBenny) March 31, 2022

Whether Brady and Arians were really at odds with each other remains to be seen. But chances are good that we’ll hear a lot more about this news in the coming weeks.

[Peter King, Adam Schefter, Tampa Bay Buccaneers]