Bucs Gameday

Buccaneers Plan To Use More Pre-Snap Motion In 2024

The Bucs could be looking to align with some of the league's best offenses next year.

River Wells

JC Allen/Bucs Gameday
In this story:

When a trend in the NFL hits, teams tend to pay attention. And the Tampa Bay Buccaneers could be doing just that when they get ready for the 2024 season.

The team has a new offensive coordinator in former Los Angeles Rams and Kentucky Wildcats coordinator Liam Coen, and while many have noted the similarities between his offense and that of former Bucs OC and current Carolina Panthers coach Dave Canales, there looks to be one key difference coming to Tampa Bay — motion, in all its forms.

READ MORE: Buccaneers HC Todd Bowles Reacts To Netflix's Tom Brady Roast

Offensive coaches spoke to media earlier in the week, and quarterbacks coach Thad Lewis, who was in Tampa Bay last year, noted that more motion is likely coming to the offense for the upcoming season.

"I would say the motions and the shifts and things like that," Lewis told media. "We didn't do much of it, we did some of it, but right now I would say you would see a lot of it — just trying to dictate the defense, getting man/zone intel, things like that."

Lewis, of course, was not lying. While it was a far cry away from Byron Leftwich days where motion of any kind was extremely rare, Tampa Bay still didn't use a lot of motion in conjunction with the rest of the league under offensive coordinator Dave Canales. According to a chart made by ESPN's Seth Walder, Tampa Bay ran motion on just 42.8% of their plays — a middling number compared to some of the best offenses in the league in the Miami Dolphins (82.8%) and the San Francisco 49ers (75.4%).

When looking at motion at the snap — a movement becoming increasingly popular among coaches from the Shanahan tree — the Bucs were even more dire. Under Dave Canales, Tampa Bay utilized at-snap motion just 12.8% of the time, good for 28th in the NFL. Liam Coen is like to change that, as Coen came from the Sean McVay coaching tree and the Rams placed second in at-snap motion last year at 44.1%.

READ MORE: Lavonte David Comments on Buccaneers Not Being Favorites to Win NFC South in 2024

Just how this affects the Bucs in 2024 remains to be seen, but mathematically, trends point in favor of the change Lewis mentioned. Obviously, there are a few exceptions, but a great number of the best offenses in the NFL use pre-snap and at-snap motion at a far higher rate than the Buccaneers did last year, and that change could kickstart a new-look Tampa Bay under Liam Coen and his team.

Stick with BucsGameday for more coverage of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers throughout the 2024 offseason.

Follow BucsGameday on Twitter and Facebook

Published
River Wells

RIVER WELLS

River Wells is a sports journalist from St. Petersburg, Florida, who has covered the Tampa Bay Buccaneers since 2023. He graduated with a journalism degree from the University of Florida in 2021. You can follow him on Twitter @riverhwells.