TAMPA, Fla. -- Tampa Bay Buccaneers left tackle Tristan Wirfs got a special surprise this week when he learned he'd been named Associated Press First Team All-Pro, becoming the first player in NFL history to win the honor at both the right tackle and left tackle position.
But it was how Wirfs learned of the honor that was truly memorable. While doing a sit-down interview with AP senior writer Rob Maadi at the team facility, Wirfs' girlfriend, Meredith Sutton, walked in holding their nine-month-old son, Julius, who was wearing a shirt that read, "My Daddy is an All-Pro."
"No way," Wirfs said in disbelief.
"What do you think, Bub?" he asked his baby boy. "That's awesome. ... That's crazy. You surprised me. I was just telling [Meredith] about it the other night, like last night, I was like, 'No one's ever done it before.' I was like, 'I'm trying!'"
Wirfs' tender moment with his son was even more special given how open he's been about some of the mental struggles he endured taking on the new position last season. Wirfs had been the Bucs' starting right tackle from 2020-2022. His success was the stuff of storybooks: A Super Bowl title in rookie season, AP First-Team All-Pro in 2021 and Second-Team All-Pro in 2022, with many -- including his own coaches -- calling him a future Pro Football Hall of Famer.
But he worried he wouldn't be able to replicate that same success when he was asked to move to the left side to replace Donovan Smith in 2023, something he had never done before. Even as a star for the Iowa Hawkeyes in college, he only started four games at left tackle.
He began experiencing debilitating anxiety over the move and sought the help of the team psychologist, Dr. Joseph Carella.
"It seems like so minuscule, like oh, you're just flipping sides, but I was like having breakdowns about it," Wirfs said in August of 2023. "I'm like, 'I can't sit here with these thoughts anymore, I'm just kind of setting myself up for failure.' I would just think about, 'I am going to suck' or like, 'I am not going to be able to do it' all day long.
"I was in a really rough spot mentally. I was really nervous," Wirfs said then. "I was playing out the season in my head over and over again like, 'Oh, what if it goes this way or what if it goes this way?' So, I was like, 'It is freaking May. You have to calm down.'"
Wirfs went on to have a Pro Bowl season in 2023 and it carried over into 2024, where he was also named a Pro Bowler for the fourth straight year. His 95.9% pass blocking win rate was the best in the league among left and right tackles this year, and he surrendered just two sacks all year.
"That's outstanding," coach Todd Bowles said Friday. "It says a lot about him -- his work ethic, his character, his pride, the way he goes about things," Bowles said. "He does it the right way. He plays hard. He did a heck of a job at right tackle [and] I know he was skeptical at left tackle, but he dove in with both feet and he got great at it, too."
