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Tampa Bay Proves Its Winning Way

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 31, 2009

When Barbara Casey, spokeswoman for the Tampa Sports Authority, answers the telephone these busy times at Raymond James Stadium and declares, "Home of Super Bowl 43, Tampa," she no longer must add, "Florida."

She says, "They used to ask 'Tampa where?' But no more. Now they know the Bucs won a Super Bowl, the Lightning won a Stanley Cup and an American League championship was played here, and all the other sports achievements have done it, I guess.

"Yes, all's well. No real crises. Just get ready and get it done, our fourth Super Bowl."

She was in a command position at RJS, as good a facility all around as any in the National Football League, as good a location - Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater - as there is. Teams and the media have said it. The NFL has said it. And oh, yes, it will be sold out, difficult as the economic times are, Casey says, and Paul Catoe emphasizes.

Catoe runs Tampa Bay & Co., the busy boosters of the area's sports, tourist attractions and convention facilities.

He adds, "Don't have to tell you, but the Super Bowl is back because Tampa Bay has done a fine job the three previous times it has been played here, once in the harsh condition of the Gulf War start when we had the best game."

The final score that night was the New York Giants 20, Buffalo Bills 19. That game in 1991 is remembered for the tight security, the planes and choppers flying overhead and armed troops stationed strategically, and for the moving pregame national anthem by Whitney Houston with The Florida Orchestra in accompaniment.

A special memory for me and others in the press box was when a well-dressed young man tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Mr. McEwen. I faked this badge after photographing the genuine, and here I am. I am with Pitney Bowes. I am not in the media. I will not get in your way." He didn't, and I didn't squeal. I admired his guile.

The other two games were just dandy events, but lousy games - Ravens 34-7 over the Giants in '01 and Oakland 38-9 over Washington in '84.

'We'll Get Another Bowl'

We have been passed over, until this game, because of new stadiums being built as well as more competition from places like Houston. Catoe said the absenteeism is over. Tampa needs to star this time, as "Tampa has. We'll get another bowl; '12 is a possibility, but perhaps '13 is better."

The chairman of this current successful bid is good citizen Dick Beard, owner of R.A. Beard, a real estate investment firm. J. Leonard Levy, who had a hand in all of the bids and the pursuit of the franchise that became the Bucs, remains active, as are members of the Tampa Sports Authority and other public officials.

This sports growth, in facilities, franchises and events, was magically created. It and the Super Bowl came to us because we went after most of them.

We have always been a baseball place, in the spring primarily, until the Rays emerged as part of a groundswell. College football has been around since the days of the University of Tampa Spartans. The University of Tampa's so-so football years were followed by the great ones of Fran Curci, Earl Bruce and Dennis Fryzel, of Billy Turner, Fred Solomon, Leon McQuay, Paul Orndorff and that crowd of winners.

The Buccaneers had seen this place grow, with 12 preseason NFL games played at Tampa Stadium before the NFL decided to expand to Tampa.

Tampa fans who supported the Spartans and the NFL preseason games were rewarded. I was there, in New York's Drake Hotel on April 24, 1974, when NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle walked into the room and announced: "The National Football League today voted to expand to Tampa, Florida, and one other city to be chosen later this year. The teams are to be ready for 1976. The franchises will cost $16 million each."

Jacksonville tax lawyer Hugh Culverhouse would be selected to win the team, after a first turndown. In time, his son and widow would sell the Bucs to Malcolm Glazer's family for $192 million. The original plan was to move the team to Baltimore, but Tampa support prevailed. The Bucs remain a charter big league franchise in the Tampa Bay area.

On the heels of the Bucs, George Strawbridge created the gritty Tampa Bay Rowdies soccer team and proved the base for the growth of sports here: the National Hockey League Lightning, the Tampa Bandits of the "other" football league started by Bandit owner John Bassett, and, in time, the Rays of Major League Baseball in St. Petersburg. Add to that the University of South Florida and the big sports deals here, along with an improved Art and Polly Pepin Stadium at UT and what it offers.

Meanwhile, with George Steinbrenner living here and through deals with city and county governments, he moved his high-profile New York Yankees to the Legends Field facilities he built at the northwest corner of Dale Mabry Highway opposite old Tampa Stadium. It is a model spring training facility and home to a minor league team.

A Promoter Is Born

Not much of this may have happened had not a young Junior Chamber of Commerce president named Bill Marcum taken notice. He and I eyed the nearly full stadium for a poor preseason matchup between Atlanta and Washington. I whispered to him, "My goodness, what have we got here?"

Marcum turned promoter, and with help from wealthy lawyer Ed Rood set out on the road to put Tampa on the map, with plenty of help.

Commissioner Rozelle and his wife, Carrie, were around often socially and on business - the social including fishing for bass to the north and heading south to Boca Grande to catch tarpon. It was established that there was more to Tampa than a dandy football stadium.

The University of South Florida has become a major university in size, purpose and achievement. Raymond James Stadium is home to a growing big-time football program, as it is to the Outback Bowl on New Year's morning. It thrives under the umbrella of the Outback Steak House operation, a major sports benefactor that also sponsors a major seniors golf tournament.

It was the success of the Buccaneer franchise adventure and the grand experience of Super Bowl XVIII in 1984, plus the passion of boosterism in the Tampa Bay area, that caused the Catoe-Levy crowd to realize their future was good in the biggest of the bowl business. They probably did not believe they were favorites for this one. But, over the years, Tampa Bay has never gotten overconfident and knew it needed to support its team and owners, and have the owners reciprocate.

"We are just a typical American city with a lot going on, with an acceptance of sports, the places to compete and the weather in which to stage events outside or inside," Catoe said. "We have a supportive government and we have a busy, active, involved media who like this place and their work here. Tampa Bay is not overloaded with egos."

Tom McEwen is a former sports editor of The Tampa Tribune.

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