How Tristan Wirfs overcame self-doubt to become the left tackle the Bucs needed

TAMPA, Fla. — Tristan Wirfs was a right tackle and a darned good one, an All-Pro in 2021 and 2022. He liked being a right tackle. And he didn’t want to be anything else.

It was more than a position; it was an identity.

Tristan Wirfs, right tackle.

Then in late January, Wirfs sat across from Todd Bowles in the Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach’s office for his exit meeting. He was expecting the usual — “We appreciate your hard work this year; we need to keep working in the offseason; relax a little, but don’t get too out of shape.”

But Bowles dropped a bomb.

“We’re thinking of moving you to left tackle,” Bowles told him. “We just want you to try it out. If it doesn’t feel good, you can go back to right.”

Then Wirfs visited with offensive line coach Joe Gilbert, who was more definitive.

“You’re going to be a left tackle,” Gilbert told him.

And then it began.

The pit in the center of the chest.

Shortness of breath.

A flutter in the gut.

“I don’t want to let anybody down,” he told himself.

“Right tackle is safe. I’m confident there.”

“What if I go over there and I’m terrible? Then what?”

“I don’t want to do it.”

Many football players weaponize their insecurities. Wirfs isn’t one of them.

Soon, the Bucs released incumbent left tackle Donovan Smith. Wirfs would have to find a way to make being a left tackle work.

But how could he if he didn’t believe he could?

To understand why Bucs right tackle Luke Goedeke calls Wirfs “an alien,” go back to the trailer in Mount Vernon, Iowa, where Wirfs spent the first five years of his life as the son of a single mom. He climbed out of his crib at 9 months, then rode a bike without training wheels when he was 3.

As a kid in a small town surrounded by cornfields, Wirfs always was big, like, turn-your-head big. Usually, biggest is not the most coordinated. Wirfs was the exception.

Wirfs started swimming when he was 5 — he could do the butterfly like nobody’s business — and won first-place medals in seven years.“He was so big and strong, he could just muscle his way through the water,” his mother, Sarah Wirfs, says.

Baseball was his favorite for a long time. A first baseman/designated hitter/pitcher, he batted .406 as a freshman at Mount Vernon High School by his recollection. He blasted as many as 10 home runs in a high school season, according to his mom.

He eventually gave up baseball for track and field, for good reason. He won three state titles in discus and two in shot put. He threw the discus so far during practice that it sometimes ended up on tennis courts beyond the track. The tennis coach had to ask that he be held back from throwing until the tennis team wrapped up practice.

Tristan Wirfs was a three-time high school state champion in discus. (Courtesy of Sarah Wirfs)

He also won a state title in wrestling, with a record of 99-16, according to his mother. And in football, he was all-state and selected to play in the U.S. Army All-American Bowl.

The college he chose was close to home, about 660 acres away, and known as a farm for offensive linemen.

When he arrived at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Wirfs seemed like the last person who would ever doubt himself athletically. But as a freshman in training camp, he lined up frequently against Anthony Nelson, a junior on his way to the NFL.

“You come from high school where you’re the big dog,” Wirfs says. “But then Nellie was beating my ass.”

It was every day, and it was humbling, his most humbling experience in football. Wirfs didn’t have long to get over it. In the Hawkeyes’ sixth game, Wirfs became the starting right tackle. No freshman tackle had ever been a starter at Iowa. He questioned if he could do the job.

Wirfs recovered and played well enough in seven starts with steady progress. The next year, he was voted honorable mention All-Big Ten, and in 2019, he was voted All-America by numerous outlets, as well as Big Ten Offensive Lineman of the Year.

Wirfs, defensive end A.J. Epenesa and running back Ivory Kelly-Martin were relaxing at a swimming pool when Kelly-Martin brought up a video he saw of someone jumping out of a pool — a leap of three feet, six inches.

“I didn’t think any of us could do it, let alone me,” Wirfs says.

He did it, and after the video went viral on social media, his draft stock had a similar jump.

.@Buccaneers first-rounder Tristan Wirfs is not your ordinary lineman 😱 (via @TristanWirfs74, h/t @thecheckdown) pic.twitter.com/6lCuMMl282

— NFL (@NFL) July 12, 2020

Before Wirfs worked out at the combine, scouts asked him what he thought he would run in the 40-yard dash. He told them he wasn’t sure because he had never been timed but said he was hoping for a 5.1. Then, at 6-foot-5, 320 pounds, he ran a 4.85 — fastest among offensive linemen. In the vertical and broad jumps, Wirfs broke the combine records for offensive linemen with leaps of 36.5 inches and 10-1, respectively.

After that, no one could have doubts.

Except one person.

After being chosen by the Bucs with the 13th pick of the 2020 draft, Wirfs lined up in training camp with Shaq Barrett or Jason Pierre-Paul in front of him and Tom Brady behind him.

Barrett was coming off a 19 1/2-sack season. Pierre-Paul was a three-time Pro Bowler. Brady was the greatest football player in history.

“We have Tom Brady, and Shaq and JPP are just working me over,” Wirfs says. “I’d go home thinking, ‘I don’t know if I’m cut out for this.’”

His goal was to avoid being yelled at by Brady.

“I’m like, ‘This is Tom Brady,’” he says. “I’m standing next to Tom Brady. Are you kidding me?’”

Then one day Brady pulled him aside.

“Just don’t get beat fast and don’t get beat inside and we’ll be OK,” Brady told him.

That made Wirfs feel better. He repeated that directive often.

Just don’t get beat fast and don’t get beat inside. Just don’t get beat fast and don’t get beat inside. Just don’t get beat fast and don’t get beat inside.

Wirfs maintained an equilibrium for his first four games. But then he started to tighten up as he prepared to play the Chicago Bears and Khalil Mack. He tried to hype himself up and listened to “headbanging” music. Then, instead of blocking like he always did, Wirfs abandoned his technique and tried to handle Mack the way other tackles had.

He gave up a sack. Then came a chirp about it, and another and another that turned into a chorus of cicadas, louder, louder, louder.

It was then that Wirfs realized what he needed was white noise. Old scouts say some offensive linemen are unbeatable in a phone booth. Wirfs would be unbeatable in a sensory deprivation tank. He thrives in calm.

After the game against Mack, no more listening to agitating music before games. And no trying to be a blocker other than Tristan Wirfs.

He was composed the rest of the season, even in the Super Bowl, and Wirfs was voted to the NFL All-Rookie team.

Brady retired after the 2022 season, having never yelled at Wirfs.

After learning of the position switch, Wirfs’ first call was to Bucs center Robert Hainsey.

“I’m nervous,” Wirfs acknowledged.

“Don’t think of it like that,” Hainsey told him. “Look at it as an opportunity to crush, a challenge you can overcome. Don’t think of it as something to dread. You’re going to be great.”

Yeah, that’s right, Wirfs told himself, never believing a word of it.

His mother was next. She told him to talk his feelings out. Don’t try to ignore them, she said. As he often did, Tristan followed mom’s advice. He was open and honest about his fears.

He had some experience at left tackle, having played two years at the position in high school and two games at left tackle at Iowa. But that was a long time ago.

With time and practice, he hoped, the feelings of doubt would be quelled. Wirfs worked at the Bucs facility all offseason with Goedeke, trying to get used to a different stance by doing hundreds of pass sets against air.

Moving from right tackle to left tackle was a major challenge for Tristan Wirfs, but he has mastered it. (Kevin Sabitus / Getty Images)

It was difficult to break old habits. He found himself using his right hand to do what his left hand should be doing — punching across his body. And in pass protection, he kept putting too much weight on his left leg, as he did as a right tackle, instead of shifting it to his right.

He knew he needed to become more comfortable using his left, non-dominant side, so he ate with chopsticks in his left hand. It took a while to eat because he kept dropping the sticks. When he finally finished, he brushed his teeth as a left-hander.

Nothing came easily.

On Wirfs’ first rep against a teammate in an OTA practice, defensive end Joe Tryon lined up from the wide nine position, outside of Wirf’s left shoulder, on a third-and-long. “I was amped up in my head, getting all antsy,” Wirfs says.

And then the ball was snapped.

“I stepped under myself, crossed my right foot over my left and just turn and ran,” Wirfs says. “Even I was like, ‘What was that? What am I doing?’”

He looked back at offensive lineman Justin Skule.

“Calm down,” Skule told him. “You’re OK. It’s going to be all right. You know, it’s the first day of OTAs. Relax. You can do it.”

But the play was carbonation for his stress. It was only springtime, but Wirfs started playing out the season in his head, imagining struggles and failures.

One day, Wirfs sat at a table in the Advent Health Training Center cafeteria with teammates and Bucs employees, including team psychologist Joe Carella — “Dr. Joe,” as he is known. The people at that table were talking the way people at a cafeteria table do, and Wirfs nonchalantly said he was feeling nervous about the position change. His eyes must have said more.

“You have 15 minutes?” Dr. Joe said.

The two of them took their conversation to the offensive line meeting room, where they were alone.

“What’s up?” Dr. Joe said.

“Nothing really,” Wirfs responded.

“Something’s up,” Dr. Joe said.

So Wirfs told him what was up, and they began a regular dialogue that lasted into training camp. They met formally about 10 times.

“I think a lot of people thought I was laying on some couch, looking at colors or pictures,” Wirfs says. “That wasn’t it. It was just me talking to him, telling him this is stressing me out. He’s somebody you can just shoot the s— with.”

Dr. Joe encouraged him to visualize successful sets, effective blocks and personal wins. He told him to talk to himself differently.

“I was sitting there telling myself, ‘I suck,’ or, ‘I can’t take a set right,’” Wirfs says. “Those words stick with you. They stay in your head. He told me to have positive self-talk.”

Even when he was struggling to get his mind where he wanted it, Wirfs knew he could get his body in a better place. He had never been a disciplined eater before and he had repeated bouts of cramping.

Meeting with Bucs director of performance nutrition Jessica Pastuf changed that. She administered a test while he slept to see how many calories he burned at rest. Pastuf determined Wirfs wasn’t consuming nearly enough calories, so he increased his intake from about 3,000 a day to as many as 6,000. She also put him on a hydration schedule.

The result, he says, was losing nearly 10 pounds of fat and gaining 14 pounds of muscle. His body fat percentage decreased by 1 percent, and he now weighs a solid 360 pounds.

A fitter Wirfs should have been a more confident Wirfs. Training camp would be the time to show it.

Several times, he lined up in a right tackle stance at left tackle. He tried to focus on one issue at a time, consistently improve, and most importantly, not get frustrated.

“Every day, it was reassuring him, telling him his technique was getting better,” Gilbert says. “I told him I didn’t expect him to come out and be Joe Thomas right away. What helped is he’s a humble guy. He came out every day like he was starting from scratch.”

Tristan Wirfs had his sights set on the end zone 😭

📺: #TENvsTB on CBS
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus https://t.co/kECSNGbyLL pic.twitter.com/CCUJJF14mt

— NFL (@NFL) November 12, 2023

That’s part of what makes Wirfs special. He doesn’t think of himself as the guy throwing the discus all the way to the tennis court, the heavyweight pinning all comers, or the batter sending baseballs higher than birds fly. He acts as if he’s above nothing — not other offensive linemen, not autograph seekers, not coaching and most of all, not failure.

A couple of weeks into camp, the Bucs and Jets had joint practices. On Wirfs’ first rep, he lined up against Jets first-round pick Will McDonald, excited to try to prove himself against a real opponent. McDonald came off the line to Wirfs’ left, and Wirfs reverted to punching across his body with his right hand. McDonald put a spin move on him and beat him inside.

It was a setback, but there were more good reps than bad as camp went on, and in his only preseason snaps against the Ravens, he played well.

“That was huge for me,” he says. “You build it up, build it up and you go out and you’re like, ‘Oh, it’s just football.’”

The more he did it, the more confidence, the more comfort.

He still does things like a right tackle at times. But Wirfs has played well enough for Pro Football Focus to rank him as the second-best pass-blocking tackle in the NFL behind the Cowboys’ Tyron Smith (they rank him 11th overall among 70 tackles who have played at least 300 snaps). On the Trench Warfare podcast, offensive/defensive line analyst Brandon Thorn and former NFL left tackle Andrew Whitworth said Wirfs should be midseason All-Pro. In the Bucs’ grading system, Wirfs has similar grades to what he had last season, according to Gilbert.

Wirfs and Dr. Joe still chat now and then, but Wirfs isn’t uneasy anymore. In the mirror, he doesn’t see Tristan Wirfs, right tackle.

At a training camp media conference, Wirfs told the world his anxiety was eased by talking with Dr. Joe. He believes men in football need to be more comfortable and open about mental health.

“The sport we play is very masculine and people think it’s impossible to feel nervous or anxious, but doing something at the highest level possible is stressful,” he says. “I wanted to say that what helped me could help other players.”

With every block, Tristan Wirfs, left tackle, says it all.

(Top photo: David Berding / Getty Images)

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