The Tampa Bay Buccaneers fired offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich after four seasons with the franchise, the team announced Thursday.
The move came in the most brutal way because Leftwich had just been celebrated.
Leftwich arrived at work Thursday to find that he, along with every other member of the Buccaneers staff, had a painted commemorative football that congratulated staff members for winning back-to-back NFC South titles for the first time in franchise history, according to Rick Stroud of the Tampa Bay Times.
About an hour later, he would find out that he was being dismissed. Five other coaches were also being fired, and three others decided to retire.
The news comes three days after the Buccaneers’ 31-14 loss to the Dallas Cowboys in the NFC wild-card round.
The Bucs averaged 18.4 points per game and went 8-9 in the regular season. Tampa Bay reportedly looked into firing Leftwich during the Buccaneers’ Week 11 bye but decided to keep him. The team did not get any better as they 3-4 in its final seven games and scored more than 20 points twice before barely winning the NFC South.
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The team could possibly lose so much more if Tom Brady either retires or goes to another team.
For Leftwich, this was a quick fall from grace as he was hot head coaching candidate as recently as this past offseason. He reportedly withdrew from consideration for the Jacksonville Jaguars job a year ago. There’s no telling where he ends up now, but he shouldn’t be out of a job for too long.
