TAMPA, Fla. — After decades of being a joke in the NFL world, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers rose to relevance in the 1990s and eventually won a Super Bowl championship on the backs of legends like Derrick Brooks, John Lynch, Ronde Barber, and Warren Sapp.
John Gruden’s championship celebration became immortalized in NFL Films fashion and later as a statue for generations of fans to visit and revisit the franchise’s greatest moment.
Until 2020, it was the peak for the franchise. But, soon after the 2002-2003 season, the Buccaneers franchise returned to its laughing-stock status, doomed to not win another playoff game for nearly 20 years.
In 2020, the team not only made it back to the playoffs for the first time since the 2007 season, they won more postseason games than the franchise had played in since that one title was won.
All of it was capped off by a historic Super Bowl win in Raymond James Stadium, the first team to win one in their own house.
The opening game of the year for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers is supposed to be a celebration, starting off the new season in the same place they finished the last, as the team’s social media coordinator Jill Beckman pointed out.
Following this up with a historic offseason from Jason Licht and the Bucs’ front office, the greatest quarterback of all time will again lead his men in pewter on the field as they seek out the franchise’s third Lombardi Trophy.
So, who will challenge the defending champions? Who gets the first shot at dethroning Brady, Bruce Arians, and the Todd Bowles defense which so convincingly stopped Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs dead in their dynasty-driven tracks?
Why, the Dallas Cowboys, of course. The same Cowboys who finished 6-10 in 2020 and sat at home while the NFL’s playoff field, including an additional team for the first time, competed for a championship.
The Cowboys were the second-place team from easily the least accomplished division from last season. This is the team the NFL’s schedule makers deemed worthy of being part of the ribbon cutting contest to the 2021 campaign.
In the eyes of history, the Dallas Cowboys are more accomplished than the Buccaneers. Understandable.
Dallas’ five Super Bowl titles obviously overshadows Tampa Bay’s two. However, since the Bucs first entered the club of Lombardi Trophy owners, the Dallas Cowboys have just three postseason wins total. That’s one shy of the amount the Bucs earned just this past postseason.
Yet, the NFL decided this was the best way to open up the season. The biggest snub, at least in my eyes, coming at the expense of the Buffalo Bills.
Losing out to the AFC Champion Kansas City Chiefs in the 2020 NFL Playoffs, Buffalo has high hopes for the coming season, and for good reason. They’re led by a young quarterback with tons of potential who, in just his third season of play, notched his first two playoff wins and reached four playoff games played.
Not only is the matchup between Buffalo and Tampa Bay not kicking off the season, it’s not even in primetime. Instead, it’ll be played in the afternoon on Dec. 12 on CBS.
So, instead of facing a quarterback coming off of two postseason wins just shy of a Super Bowl trip, the Buccaneers will face Dak Prescott and his one playoff win in the same three years who had quarterbacked his team to a 1-3 start before being lost for the year last season.
It’s not about a lack of empathy for Prescott. I felt for him just like everyone else did when he suffered his terrible injury. I’m looking forward to seeing him step on the field again and seeing what he can do to try and lead his team back to relevance.
No, it’s not a slight towards Prescott or the Cowboys. It’s about competition and holding the chance to kick off the season as something to be earned, not given.
It’s about the opportunity missed by the league to put title fight contenders in the ring to launch the season properly. Instead, they’ve decided to continue their love affair with a star shaped logo that hasn’t truly gotten close to being at the top of the league - or their conference for that matter - since Tom Brady was an 18-year old backup quarterback for the Michigan Wolverines.
For more on this story and for more on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, check out the Locked On Bucs Podcast.
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