Saying Goodbye to Buccaneers Fans: I Will Always Appreciate You
This is and isn’t a goodbye, per se, because I’ll always have an eye on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, I still have several private messages with people who have long since walked away from covering the team yet still watch them closely and I feel a love for the organization and fan base that won’t ever fade.
So, as I write what are the last words I’ll likely ever have published on a site dedicated to covering the Buccaneers, I do so with some sadness but also with a treasure chest filled to the brim with appreciation.
And if you’ll bear with me one last time, I’d like to share that with you, because you’re likely one of the people I appreciate in this story.
I’ve been told by many people during the past 10 seasons that I’m living their dream. What those people don’t know is that this dream was born from a nightmare.
On April 26th, 2012, one of the best men I’ve ever known, Dick Alson Lee, was killed in Afghanistan. I’ll never forget where I was — on the rooftop of a restaurant in San Diego, California, celebrating my sister’s upcoming wedding.
That night, I walked around the city, eventually getting back to the house my family had rented for the week, and all the while, I had no idea what I was going to do. I had to do something, after all.
It took a while. But after a lot of tears, anger, and truthfully, a prolonged desire for revenge and a serious battle with survivor’s guilt, I realized fixating on what couldn’t be undone was going to get me nowhere and only hurt the people I still had around to love. So I turned to the thing Staff Sergeant Lee and I enjoyed discussing the most: football.
I sent a random tweet to nobody expressing an interest in getting into sports media, fully unaware of how many veins really existed in that arena these days.
I received a reply and an opportunity to write from a man named Jacob Hutcherson. Although I have never met him, I owe him a massive amount of thanks and at least one drink should our paths ever cross.
The position was unpaid except for what I would earn in exposure and experience (I know every photographer out there is cringing at that statement) and for a site just about nobody had ever heard of called Pro Football Spot.
With the blessing of my amazing wife, Amber, I accepted it and took the first step into a venture that has taken me further than I ever thought possible.
I still remember the feeling of learning that something I’d written had been read by 100 people. Today that would be considered a failure by some, but whenever I feel my ego getting too inflated, I take myself back there.
At Pro Football Spot, I met some really good people, many of whom are still in the business today. Knowing where we started makes us proud.
Mike Kiwak and Gabe Burns were the first two, and I still talk to each of them weekly, if not daily.
From there, FanSided approached me to write for their platform about the Bucs, and with zero guilt from the folks at PFS, I took the job. There, I met Alan Schechter, a great New York Jets fan and an even better human being who knew precious little about the Buccaneers but a ton about writing about an NFL franchise.
Alan came at the perfect time, and he brought with him a man by the name of James Yarcho, who became a brother and, to this day, is family.
Pewter Report’s Bailey Adams, AtoZ Sports’ Evan Winter and NoleGameday’s Dustin Lewis — now one of my bosses with GameDay Media — all came during that run in my life that included a jump from FanSided to SB Nation. Along with that jump came another opportunity to become a credentialed member of the media. And Tampa Bay was the franchise that approved me to come to training camp as long as Gil Arcia promised he’d make sure I wasn’t a troublemaker. He vouched for me, and I got to go to Tampa. It was the first time I’d ever stepped foot in the state of Florida.
I was stationed at Fort Meade, Maryland, at the time, and showed up in pretty typical military TDY clothing: Boots, khakis, and a heavy-ass polo shirt with a t-shirt underneath it. In Tampa. In July.
There’s a rookie moment for you if ever there was one.
I remember meeting Trevor Sikkema for the first time, and he was wearing a t-shirt and board shorts. You’d think I was an 8-year-old who just got caught trying to smoke a cigarette. I truly felt like just standing next to him I might get in trouble because where I came from, that was not appropriate ‘work attire.’ Talk about your culture shock. I’m proud to say that today I, too, wear shorts and t-shirts to training camp. Weird flex, I know.
I completed my degree with the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism from Arizona State University, but I had long before that learned that there’s an educational way of doing something and a real way. Because of that, people like Sikkema and Scott Reynolds once wrote that I was a future Buccaneers reporter in the making. I don’t know if he knew how much that meant to me, even though he was wrong about half of it. Mark Cook, Greg Auman, Jenna Laine, Rick Stroud, Scott Smith and Carmen Vitali became unknowing instructors of mine from there on out.
Anytime I had the chance, I’d put in for leave and go cover a training camp, a scouting combine, the Senior Bowl, or an NFL game — a Bucs game. While other Soldiers used their leave for vacations, I used mine to go to work. A sacrifice my family made for me that I’ll never forget.
I learned about a thing called ‘podcasts’ during that time as well and that Auman was hosting one called Locked On Bucs. It was sports talk radio, but on your phone. Okay, weird, but whatever. I gave it a shot. I downloaded and listened and I enjoyed it. So I put the screws to Yarcho to start one with me.
After some arm-bending and maybe some name-calling (probably some name-calling) he relinquished, and Walking the Plank was born. I still remember how it felt when we had one episode get 10 downloads, and whenever I feel my ego getting too inflated, I take myself back there.
I recorded episodes from a desk in my kitchen, which had such bad acoustics that my wife and kids weren’t allowed to have loud thoughts, or they would mess up the entire recording.
I remember James doing some of our shows from the floor in his master bedroom. We’ve come a long way, brother, assuming you’re even still reading this (and you better be).
When Auman left Locked On Bucs, I was sad for the show but excited for us. I reached out to David Locke, the creator of the Locked On Podcast Network, and asked him if he was in search of new hosts and, if so, if my co-host and I could apply.
We sent in a demo, and David ripped it to shreds and told us to re-record. We did, and we got the job. It took some time, but eventually, we got 100 downloads on one single episode, then 1,000, and so on.
Propelled by the leadership of Locke, Ross Jackson, and so many others involved, the Locked On Podcast Network has taken us to heights I never thought possible when I sent that tweet to nobody all those years ago. It has taken me to Virginia, to the Locked On Commanders podcast, and eventually to this point.
I don’t know why, but I hate using the word ‘journey.’ But I have to say, this is one of the top five saddest days I’ve had in my sports ‘journey.’ One of the others is the day James and I learned Alan Schechter had passed away. We were in the middle of recording an episode of Locked On Bucs when he read the news, and we kept recording. We cried on air. And we didn’t edit a damn second of it.
Alan had always been real with us, and at that moment, we wanted to be real about the impact he had on us. We didn’t care who might have criticized two grown men for crying into microphones when it happened. But we weren’t criticized.
Instead, Buccaneers fans mourned with us. It was amazingly therapeutic, and if you’re one of the ones who remember that, we’ll never be able to truly share with you how much your support meant in that moment.
Retiring during COVID wasn’t easy, and neither was finding work. So when I found a job training explosive detection canines — the same job I had in the Army — I had to take it and move my family to Virginia, an hour away from Commanders Park on Coach Gibbs Drive.
Locked On gave me the opportunity to host two podcasts in Locked On Bucs and Locked On Washington Football Team, and through my co-host Chris Russell, I was able to join the Sports Illustrated blog site writers and cover the team in person.
Since then, I’ve been covering one team and paying close attention to another so I could keep writing and talking about them for as long as possible. Eventually, I realized I was doing that for selfish reasons, and that’s not why I got into this.
So why am I leaving BucsGameday and closing the chapter of my life where I get to write, talk about, and/or cover the Buccaneers? Because it's time. Truthfully, it’s been time.
As I prepare to cover the Washington Commanders’ Divisional Round game against the Detroit Lions, I keep thinking back to the same round in the same stadium when I covered the final game of the Bucs’ 2023 season. That night, James and I recorded our last episode together as co-hosts of Locked On Bucs.
The more I got engrained with Washington sports, the more I felt the weight of this day coming. Being in Tampa when the Commanders ended the Bucs’ season brought this reality into complete focus. It just feels like the right time.
River Wells and the guys at BucsGameday are a great staff led by Logan Robinson, who is damn near 20 years younger than me, yet someone I’m proud to call my boss. My departure from this arena hurts me more than it should anyone reading this, and I know this is much longer than it needs to be for you, but I needed to say goodbye in my own, corny way.
Sometimes, I take walks around empty stadiums or stand on vacated fields just looking. I do that to remember where this all started. I thank SSG Lee for his inspiration and text my wife and kids to tell them I love them. My son just wants to see the jumbotrons, but I’m pretty sure he knows, on some level, why I send the texts — to express my appreciation.
I’ve been on the Commanders’ beat for three seasons now. I’ve met even more good people and have been embraced by another fan base despite my status as a relative outsider. I get to talk and write about football every day. Not just on vacation. And people named Chuck, Sean, Nathan, Courtney, Tiya, and Jason, who have always supported me, continue to do so today.
But make no mistake about it, none of it would have been possible without any of you. Because of you I got to cover Jameis Winston (admit it, those were some fun times, albeit frustrating as well), Tom Brady, and a Super Bowl run, from a safe distance. And I've got to meet some of the most passionate fans who will never get the credit they deserve, just like some of the best players on their favorite team.
So, if you’ve read all of this, just know that I appreciate you. I may be leaving, but the Buccaneers will always be the franchise that gave me my first shot at doing this. Bucs fans will always be the first ones to embrace and encourage me, and any chance I have to come to Tampa, it’ll always feel like a home I never got to actually live in.
You’ve given me another reason to hold the words ‘never forget’ in my heart, and I’ll never forget it. Thank you.
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