Would Baker Mayfield Hold Out? Bucs Uniform Variants

Pewter Report’s Scott Reynolds answers your questions from the @PewterReport X account this week in the Bucs Mailbag. Submit your question to SR each week via X using the hashtag #PRMailbag. Here are the Bucs questions we chose to answer for this week’s edition.

QUESTION: It won’t happen because Baker Mayfield isn’t wired this way, but what do you think fan reaction towards Mayfield would be if he held out for an extension? Could anyone blame him if he did?

ANSWER: This is a great question, and to be clear, Bucs quarterback Baker Mayfield has not given any indication that he would hold out of training camp over contract extension talks. This is what Mayfield said initially about the contract negotiations back on June 5 at his youth football camp in Tampa.

“The contract stuff – it’s happening, it’s starting – talks and whatnot,” Mayfield began. “Not anywhere close to what we were thinking. Would love to be here long term, but as of right now that’s not exactly the case. But I’m under contract for 2026. The guys in that locker room and the staff know that I’m still going to be me. I’m still going to do everything I can to help this team win a Super Bowl. To me, that’s the priority. Everything else will take care of itself.”

Mayfield continued.

“Obviously, yes, I would love to have a long-term deal done, but they know my deadline,” Mayfield said. As soon as training camp starts, we’re not doing any contract stuff. It’s all ball. It’s not up to me when that gets done by. Hopefully before that, but if not – still going to have a good year.”

Mayfield can’t “have a good year” if he’s holding out and on the sidelines. So if he doesn’t have an extension in place I – and the team – expect him to suit up and play this year, doing so at a very high level due to his motivation for a big new contract. Plus, Mayfield said that he and the team are seeking some common ground in recent comments at his Oklahoma football camp, which is a good sign.

The Bucs have a precedent of making players over the age of 30 play out their contract years before signing them to an extension. That happened for years with former linebacker Lavonte David, and most recently twice with former wide receiver Mike Evans in 2023 at the age of 30 and again in 2025 at the age of 32.

The Bucs even made Pro Bowl safety Antoine Winfield Jr. play out his contract year and he balled out and had an All-Pro season in 2023. Mayfield saw the team make Winfield the highest-paid defensive back in the NFL for a minute, as well as seeing how fairly the organization treated Evans with two fair market deals in 2023 and a higher offer than the 49ers signed him for this offseason.

So if Mayfield has to play out his contract year I think he will do so knowing that the team will treat him very fairly when the two sides reconvene talks after the 2026 season and prior to free agency. But to answer your question, I think there would be some fan backlash if Mayfield held out – primarily due to the rising high expectations for the Bucs this season.

There is a small minority of Tampa Bay fans that aren’t quite sold on Mayfield yet – primarily due to his play last year and the fact that he is 1-2 in playoff games in red and pewter. So that segment of the fan base would be the first to get upset about a training camp holdout. If a possible holdout lingered into the season due to an impasse in negotiations that could certain derail the team’s chances for success in 2026, and I think more and more fans would turn on Mayfield in that instance. But again, I don’t see Mayfield holding out at all.

QUESTION: What does Baker Mayfield have to do to prove to this deranged fan base that he’s the greatest QB in franchise history?

ANSWER: Well, ultimately it’s win a Super Bowl. I think most Bucs fans would consider Mayfield to be the third-best quarterback in franchise history behind Tom Brady and Brad Johnson – both of whom won Super Bowls in Tampa Bay in 2020 and 2002, respectively. Although he was only here for three seasons from 2020-22, Brady became the first Bucs QB to be named a Super Bowl MVP in 2020 and he also helped lead Tampa Bay to a franchise-best 13 win season in 2021.

Brady also set the single season record for most touchdowns in a season with 43 during the 2021 campaign. He will likely be inducted into the Bucs Ring of Honor for those honors plus the distinction of being the most successful QB in team history in the playoffs with a 5-1 record.

Both Brady and Johnson made a Pro Bowl in Tampa Bay, but ironically, Mayfield is the only QB in franchise history to make two Pro Bowls in 2023 and 2024. So he’s got that going for him. And the more yardage and touchdowns that Mayfield throws for and the more wins he racks up in the process, the more it helps his cause in possibly passing Johnson for QB2 on the all-time list. Yet while Brady won 13 games in 2021 and 11 in 2020, and Johnson won 12 games in 2002, Mayfield’s win ceiling in Tampa Bay is currently at 10, so he’ll have to break through that, too.

Mayfield needs to be as successful as Brady and Johnson were in the postseason first, and ultimately deliver a Lombardi Trophy in the coming years. It’s not out of the question for Mayfield to finish his career as the best QB in Tampa Bay history if he wins a Super Bowl and continues to climb the record books with several more successful seasons under center. And of course if Mayfield wins two Super Bowls that would cement his place as the best to ever do it with the Bucs, too.

QUESTION: How would you feel about the Bucs amending their all pewter uniforms by adding red pants. Basically a reversal of their traditional ones.

ANSWER: I don’t have a great imagination when it comes to visualizing things. Like I can’t look at an empty room and really visualize where stuff would go without actually putting furniture in it and seeing how it all fits firsthand. So thankfully we have AI to help me manifest your suggestion of modifying the all-pewter uniforms by switching out the pewter pants for red pants.

This may not be exactly what you’re thinking in terms of the details of the uniform, but I took a picture of Chris Godwin from the 2021 season in the all-pewter uniform and I put it into Chat GPT and this was the outcome.

It’s not a bad variant, but I think I prefer the pewter helmet, pewter jersey and pewter pants combo better. What do you think?

I will say while the ugly uniforms that the Bucs wore from 2014-2019 with the alarm clock font were indeed hideous, I kind of liked the all-red color rush uniforms the team wore on occasion during that time. That look was actually better than their regular uniforms during the Lovie Smith and Dirk Koetter eras.

So I took the same Godwin picture and went with a red-on-red uniform in Chat GPT to see what that variant would look like. What do you think about this version, Bucs fans? I’m not sure I like it better than the all-pewter look, but it is kind of interesting.

QUESTION: Heard a lot of rumblings about Gene Deckerhoff going in to the Bucs Ring of Honor. Do you think that is possible? I may be alone in this thinking, but I feel the Bucs Ring of Honor should be for people who had a direct impact on the team that takes the field. Would it be a better honor to name the press box or something after Deckerhoff?

ANSWER: I understand your point and there is some validity to it. If the team does not induct legendary broadcaster Gene Deckerhoff into the Ring of Honor that will ultimately the reason why – because he did not have a direct effect on what happened on the field to create success for the team. Deceased owner Malcolm Glazer, former coaches John McKay, Tony Dungy, Jon Gruden and Bruce Arians and former defensive coordinator Monte Kiffin are the non-players who have been inducted into the Bucs Ring of Honor. Yet all directly had a hand in creating outcomes on the field.

If the Bucs do find Deckerhoff worthy of the Ring of Honor, they should not delay in inducting him and should do it this year since he retired after 37 years as the legendary play-by-play announcer on the Bucs Radio Network. Deckerhoff is 81, and the Bucs created a precedent for immediate induction with Arians after he retired in 2022 at the age of 70. The team inducted Kiffin into the Ring of Honor just in time in 2021 at the age of 81. Kiffin passed away three years later at the age of 84.

If the team doesn’t induct Deckerhoff, I can understand the reasoning why, and that syncs up with your viewpoint. As for the press box, it is currently named after Tom McEwen, the late great columnist of the defunct Tampa Tribune. McEwen died in 2011 at the age of 88 and is credited with helping the Tampa Bay area land the NFL franchise in the mid-1970s. That’s back when newspaper columnists had a lot of political influence and sway in society.

Would the Glazers rename the press box after Deckerhoff and remove McEwen? I’m not sure, but as time goes on more and more people won’t recognize the name McEwen and won’t have any memory of who he was or what he did. Ask anyone under the age of 40 and they probably don’t know who McEwen is because that generation didn’t read newspapers, so maybe it’s time to rename the press box after Deckerhoff.

Naming the radio booth at the stadium after Deckerhoff seems valid and should happen. But that just seems to be too small of a gesture for such a legendary broadcaster who served the team’s fan base for nearly four decades. It will be interesting to see what happens with Deckerhoff and how the team elects to honor his legacy.

QUESTION: As the current roster is constructed which player or players, in your opinion, are Bucs Ring of Honor locks? Here’s a follow-up question: who do you think gets in the ROH this season?

ANSWER: On the current Tampa Bay roster I think wide receiver Chris Godwin and left tackle Tristan Wirfs are absolute locks to get into the Bucs Ring of Honor. Godwin is the second-best receiver in team history behind Mike Evans, who is also a lock, in addition to newly retired linebacker Lavonte David. Wirfs, a five-time Pro Bowler and a three-time All-Pro, is the most decorated offensive lineman in franchise history.

So those four players, in addition to former QB Tom Brady, are certainties when it comes to their names being inducted into the walls at Raymond James Stadium within the next couple of years. The team typically inducts one player at a time, so that’s five years worth of Ring of Honor inductees right there.

I don’t know if there are any other Buccaneers players that would be locks for the Ring of Honor right now. I think Antoine Winfield Jr. needs a few more Pro Bowls to be considered, although him having a Super Bowl ring certainly helps. Former defensive tackle Gerald McCoy is a six-time Pro Bowler, but was never on a Tampa Bay playoff team, and there aren’t any Ring of Honor members who didn’t play in the postseason.

As for other possible members who might get some consideration, I wonder if Shaq Barrett or Ali Marpet would make the cut. Barrett was a two-time Pro Bowler who helped the Bucs win Super Bowl LV, and he set the franchise record for most sacks in a season with 19.5 in 2019. Marpet is considered to be the best guard in franchise history despite only making one Pro Bowl. It would be tough to justify putting him in while former center Tony Mayberry was the first offensive lineman in team history to make a Pro Bowl, and he was the most decorated Bucs O-lineman with three Pro Bowls before Wirfs came along.

As for this year, I’m hoping that former linebacker Hardy Nickerson, a five-time Pro Bowler, gets into the Ring of Honor. His induction is long overdue and he helped turn the franchise around as the leader of the Bucs defense in the Tony Dungy-Monte Kiffin era before Warren Sapp, John Lynch and Derrick Brooks developed into leaders.

If not Nickerson, then I could see the team induct either Brady, who was inducted into New England’s Ring of Honor last year, or radio play-by-play legend Gene Deckerhoff. At 81, if Deckerhoff, who retired after 37 seasons in the booth, is going to be inducted it should happen immediately given his age as a senior citizen.