Tristan Wirfs Compelled To Act Like A Senior Pro

Tampa Bay Buccaneers left tackle Tristan Wirfs intends to fill some of the leadership void left by Tom Brady’s retirement.

Tristan Wirfs is still only 24, but has accomplished enough so far to be able to guide younger players. He was drafted 13th overall by the Bucs in 2020.

Since then, he’s been to the Pro Bowl twice, an All-Pro once as well as winning a Super Bowl. He started all 20 games of Tampa Bay’s Super Bowl winning run.

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“We had Tom,” Tristan Wirfs said. 

“Tom is an incredible leader. He’s an incredible person. You could put him up there with the best leaders of all time. He was very vocal. He’d bring the whole team up and give a little speech after practice. He’d bring the whole offense up.

“Obviously, I’m not even close to that level to do that now, but I want to say a couple things — how I’m feeling or what I’m thinking. Just how practice went — just little things. I’ve been trying to do that more. Trying to be somebody that the younger guys can kind of lean to or ask me questions about whatever. It is weird, I still feel young, but going into Year 4, I’ve been to the Super Bowl, been to the playoffs, been to the NFC Championship, I’ve done stuff.”

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“I’ve really been doing my best this offseason throughout all these OTAs and throughout this minicamp just to be a little bit more vocal,” said Wirfs.

“Because I feel like even through college, I’ve never been an extremely vocal leader. I’ve always been kind of a lead-by-example kind of guy – go almost under the radar. I feel like now it gets to a certain point where now I kinda got to take over.”