Steve Wilks takes shot at Panthers for Christian McCaffrey trade in response to Baker Mayfield

After defeating the New York Jets in a wild Week 3 game, former Carolina Panthers and current Tampa Bay Buccaneers signal-caller Baker Mayfield revealed the game was personal for him.

That's because he blames former Panthers interim head coach Steve Wilks, who is the defensive coordinator for the Jets, for cutting him while Mayfield was with the Panthers.

"I loved it," Mayfield said, according to ESPN's Jenna Laine. "And also their D-coordinator (Wilks) was the one that cut me in Carolina. Lot of stuff was personal today."

Upon Mayfield saying that, many wondered about how much control Wilks actually had as the interim head coach.

As it turns out, he didn't have enough to make that kind of decision.

Wilks was asked about Mayfield's comment on Friday and said he didn't have "much say over personnel," and he backed himself up by using an example involving the trade of Christian McCaffrey that also amounted to a shot at Carolina.

“I don’t think an interim coach has much say over personnel. If that were the case, I wouldn’t have gotten rid of our best player, Christian McCaffrey," Wilks said, per ESPN's Rich Cimini.

Wilks was the Panthers' interim coach for the final 12 games of the 2022 season and was a solid 6-6 in that role.

Unfortunately for Wilks, he didn't have the services of McCaffrey, who was traded to San Francisco right after Wilks took over.

While Mayfield's stint in Carolina was disappointing, things have turned out just fine for him.

After a brief stint with the Los Angeles Rams, Mayfield latched on with the Bucs and managed to revive his career en route to becoming the team's highly-paid franchise quarterback.

Meanwhile, the Panthers are still searching for their guy. The hope is that Bryce Young will be it, but the jury is still out on the former No. 1 overall pick.