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USATSI

Buccaneers coach Todd Bowles would like everyone to know that Tom Brady's decision to skip a team walk-through over the weekend had nothing to do with Tampa Bay's 20-18 loss to the Steelers on Sunday. The Buccaneers became the biggest upset victims of the 2022 season when they lost to the Steelers in a game where Tampa Bay was favored by 9.5 points. 

The day before every game, the Buccaneers hold a walk-through practice, but Brady didn't attend the session because he was in New York, where he was attending the surprise wedding of Patriots owner Robert Kraft, who tied the knot to Dr. Dana Blumberg on Friday night. Although Brady eventually met up with the Buccaneers on Saturday night, that was after missing the walk-through and several team meetings. 

Following the game, Bowles was asked if Brady's decision to skip out on Saturday's practice had any sort of negative impact on how the Buccaneers' offense played. 

"No, he didn't miss anything. He had a full week of practice," Bowles said, via MassLive.com. 

The Buccaneers offense looked out-of-sync for most of the day and one big reason for that was the play of Brady, who surprisingly struggled against a Steelers defense that hasn't really been able to stop anyone since losing T.J. Watt in Week 1. Brady completed 25 of 40 passes for just 243 yards and one touchdown. 

The Buccaneers were especially bad in the red zone, where they scored just one touchdown on four trips inside of Pittsburgh's 20. Bowles was asked if Brady's absence might have at least had a negative impact on Tampa Bay's red zone offense. 

"Absolutely not," Bowles said. 

Bowles seems convinced that Brady's absence had nothing to do with Tampa Bay's offensive struggles, but it's easy to see why some people might connect the two things. 

Brady was one of several former Patriots players in attendance for the wedding on Friday night, a list that included Drew Bledsoe, Randy Moss and Vince Wilfork. Of course, all of those players are retired, so they didn't have a game to worry about on Sunday. When it comes to active players, Devin McCourty, Matthew Slater and David Andrews were there to represent the Patriots, but one notable person who was NOT in attendance was Bill Belichick. 

The Patriots coach was invited to the wedding, but he decided to respectfully decline the invite due to the fact that he had a game to coach against the Browns on Sunday. 

"Sorry I missed it. I'm very happy for him," Belichick said Monday on WEEI, via the Boston Herald. 

Belichick was in Cleveland the entire weekend and his Patriots went on to beat the Browns 38-15. And based on that, we'll just go ahead and end things with this tweet.