Bucs hope former Rams OC will convince Baker Mayfield to stay

Liam Coen and Baker Mayfield were work friends on the L.A. Rams

Baker Mayfield said he won’t commit to staying with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers until the offensive coordinator situation is figured out, so the team immediately went out and hired his former play caller with the L.A. Rams. The Bucs are hiring Liam Coen to be the new offensive coordinator after Dave Canales took the head coaching job with the Carolina Panthers.

Coen and Mayfield worked together on the Rams in the back half of the 2022 season.

Mayfield, a pending free agent, said he wasn’t sure what his future would be until the Bucs hired an OC:

“It all just kind of depends,” Mayfield told NFL Network’s Cam Wolfe Thursday at the Pro Bowl Games when asked where he anticipates playing in 2024. “Obviously Tampa, we’re going though a little bit of a OC search right now. It’ll start there. They were the first ones that gave me a chance, and (I’m) thankful for them. We’ll see. Taking it one day at a time.”

The team immediately hired one of his former OCs, Coen, who switched back and forth between the Rams and the Kentucky Wildcats. Coen was on McVay’s staff, then became Kentucky’s OC in 2021, then replaced Kevin O’Connell in L.A. in 2022, then was essentially fired at the end of the season after the Rams went 5-12.

Coen is back in the NFL again and he will be working with Mayfield, assuming that Tampa locks him into a new deal, which is expected.

Mayfield bet on himself with a one-year, $4 million contract to compete with Kyle Trask as the starter. He easily won that job and led the Bucs to the playoffs with a round one win over the Philadelphia Eagles. It is unlikely that the Bucs will even let Mayfield test free agency as they could use the franchise tag, if necessary.