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Going From Bucs To Bucks Is Taxing

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By STEVE OTTO

The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 1, 2008

Even on a day when the financial world was collapsing, he looked every bit the part of the successful financier as he stood before the crowd of Tampa business men and women.

He had the dark suit, expensive tie and monogrammed shirt of his trade as a Big Whoopee at Merrill Lynch and he spoke with the ease and confidence of someone who knows what's going on.

Of course it was still early on a Monday afternoon. Congress had yet to abandon sanity in deference to politics and create a new sense of fear at almost every financial and political institution standing.

All poor Sean Farrell had agreed to do was show up in front of the weekly meeting of the Exchange Club in a Harbour Island room that looked out toward a city about to be shaken as our entire credit system ground to a slow crawl.

"That's not the Sean Farrell I remember," I whispered to Bob Bishop, the guy who had put together the program.

Of course the Sean Farrell I remembered usually had on a helmet, although even with that there had been no hiding the long black hair and beard.

Most of you remember Lee Roy Selmon, the Hall of Famer in the orange Creamsicle-colored uniform with the number 63 on it. Well, No. 62 belonged to another Buccaneer number-one pick, Sean Farrell, even if the Bucs selected him by mistake.

They Kept Him Anyway

It was back in 1982 that the Bucs, looking for someone to help Selmon on the line, decided to draft Booker Reese out of Bethune-Cookman. As the draft progressed, the Bucs' man in New York was asked to fill in Farrell's name as a backup choice down the line.

But when it was the Bucs' turn, a garbled phone call sounded like "Farrell" to the guy in New York and by mistake went for the Penn State grad. Ironically, they made some trades and did manage to get Reese. Reese bombed and Farrell went on to be one of the anchors of the Bucs' line.

Early on it was a shaky marriage. Farrell described some of those years, "If you wanted a drink, you had to use the vending machine and if you happened to get a game ball for doing something spectacular, the cost would be deducted from your paycheck." He said when he first showed up he discovered he had more equipment in his garage than they had in the weight room.

Speaking at a booster party around Christmas and asked what he wanted most of all, he answered "to get out of Tampa Bay."

He Didn't Fit The Stereotype

But that was a long time ago, and Farrell was hardly your stereotypical jock. He had looked at colleges that focused as much on academics as sports. As a player he realized that if he didn't take responsibility for his money nobody else would and he began studying finance. After retirement he went to work for a financial institution.

Farrell admitted that pro football had taken its toll on his body although "I think I still have one good play left in me," but it was nothing compared with the world of stress in the world of finance.

I'll tell you what. Farrell is now back, not because of a draft. He has a home he built "just at the wrong time" he laughs, on Davis Islands and a desire to be a part of this town that suggests he is going to be a real winner, even without that Creamsicle uniform.

Keyword, Otto Graphs, to read and comment on Steve Otto's blog.

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