The day started early again as we got up at 7am, grabbed a quick breakfast at the hotel, and the headed out into the chilly, windy morning over to the University of Dayton Arena for rehearsal with the alumni band. Practice ended a few hours later after we rehearsed the pre-game and halftime shows with the student band on the football field Welcome Stadium.
football
Bucs finish strong, but miss out on the playoffs
After finishing with only 3 wins last year, my Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat the defending Super Bowl Champion New Orleans Saints 23-13 to close out the regular season with a 10-6 record. Unfortunately, with the Bears losing to the Packers and the Giants defeating the Redskins, there will be no playoff games for the Bucs (I blame the OT loss against the Lions two weeks ago … thanks for the apology but I’d prefer the 11-5 record and a trip to the post-season instead).
The turnaround from a 3-13 season to 10-6 is a franchise record. Too bad a lot of local folks didn’t get to see a lot of those victories. Unfortunately, the Bucs set another record this year: the only team to have every home game blacked out.
And my Cleveland Browns had another disappointing season, finishing 5-11 just like last year. 🙁
Time to switch to winter sports … the Tampa Bay Lightning are currently leading the Southeast Division and are #2 in the Eastern Conference. I’ll be heading to a game in Chicago in early April to see them play the Blackhawks, but next up is Spring Training … only 74 days until my annual trip.
Football split decision
I knew it was going to be a tough start to the 2010 NFL season because one of my two favorite teams was guaranteed to start with a loss. That’s because the Cleveland Browns were in town playing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the season opener. The last time these two teams played each other was in 2006 and this was the first time the teams had met in the opening game of the season.
In other firsts, this was the first time I had gone to a Bucs game in Raymond James Stadium and the first professional football game I took my daughter to. The last Bucs game I attended was back in 1995 when they lost to the Bears in the old Tampa Stadium. I didn’t even live in Florida at the time and the Bucs were still wearing the orange and white with the feather hat logo. In fact, that might have been the last NFL game I’d attended, which coincidentally was also the last year for the “old” Browns before Modell moved the franchise to Baltimore.
Going to the game was actually the only way to see it if you lived in the Tampa Bay area since it was blacked out locally (the first blacked out home game in 12 years). The stadium was pretty empty … I joked with my daughter that they should have let everyone move down into the better seats so the stadium would look m
ore full on TV. Americal Idol finalist (and St. Pete resident) Michael Lynche sang the National Anthem and the F-16 flyover was fantastic … now it was time for some football!
It was hot during the first quarter (heat index of 105), but right before halftime our typical afternoon Florida rainstorms blew through and cooled it off for the second half. I was wearing a Browns jersey, so I was happy for most of the game as the Browns led 14-10. With about 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter, my daughter and I decided to leave so we could beat the crowds and traffic and the more serious weather we could see approaching. As we were walking in the parking lot, I heard the crowd and the cannons announce a Tampa Bay touchdown. We listened to the rest of the game on the radio driving home … the Browns had a good chance to still pull out a victory, but it wasn’t to be and the Bucs won their home opener 17-14. So it was a split decision for me seeing the Bucs win at the expense of my Browns losing, but my daughter and I still had a great time at the game so it was win-win for us.
Sports depression
It’s early October, that wonderful time of year when temperatures (supposedly) get cooler and we have that wonderful confluence of the baseball, football, basketball, and hockey seasons. Well, it’s usually wonderful, except:
- even with the franchise’s second best season, the Rays missed out on the post-season
- the Indians’ season (and the Eric Wedge era) is mercifully over
- the Browns are 0-4
- the Buccaneers are also 0-4
I got a pair of free tickets to the Lightning home opener tonight so I took my daughter, hoping to get a lift from a hockey home ice win. The appearance Dwight Howard dropping the ceremonial puck was a not-so-nice reminder of how the Orlando Magic knocked the Cavs out of the playoffs last spring. 🙁
We left at 6 minutes to go in the third period with the Bolts holding the lead over the New Jersey Devils 3-2 (thanks to 2 goals in the first 5 minutes of the period). As we listened to the last minute of the game on the radio driving out of downtown Tampa, we couldn’t believe our ears as the Devils tied the game with 0.3 seconds to go! The Lightning ended up losing the shootout, which gives them a disappointing 0-1-2 start. sigh
Maybe Lebron and Shaq will give me something to believe in …
P.S. Props to my new sister-in-law for pointing me to waitingfornextyear.com!
It’s over, let’s get back to normal
Super Bowl XLIII didn’t end the way I wanted it to, but what a fantastic, down-to-the-wire game! Some random thoughts:
- Raymond James Stadium and the Tampa Bay area looked great in all the blimp shots (especially in HD).
- I was only half-watching the halftime show, but I did see Bruce Springsteen slide across the stage and hit the camera. Ouch!
- Sleestaks!
- I missed Miller’s 1 second ad.
- I loved the MacGruber Pepsi commercial, primarily because of RDA‘s cameo appearance.
- Not that this would ever happen, but I had to laugh at the Lebron plays for the Cleveland Browns spot. Go Cavs!
After all the sun, blue sky, and fluffy white clouds we had on Sunday, the weather turned cold and rainy today as if to say “ok, you had your fun, go home!” to all the Super Bowl visitors. It’s nice to have traffic around the stadium area back to normal.
If you missed any of the Super Bowl commercials, you can watch them here.
Super Bowl prep
I work just down the street from Raymond James Stadium, home of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and site of Super Bowl XLIII in just over a week.
As the big day approaches, it’s getting busier and busier in the general area. The logos and signage are all over the stadium and the surrounding fences, light posts, etc. There are concrete barriers everywhere, ready to direct the flow of automotive and pedestrian traffic. The newly constructed office building next to where I work has been turned into some sort of staging area for volunteers:
And an entire tent city has gone up in one of the parking lots, I presume to hold parties, dinners, and other related events:
It’s going to be a madhouse around here next week, I can just tell.
Good thing the game wasn’t this week … temps have dipped into the upper 30s here overnight the past few evenings and the days haven’t been much warmer. Steeler fans would have been wondering why they left Pennsylvania to come to Florida. 😉 Don’t worry, we’ll be back up in the 70s for this weekend and, hopefully, Super Sunday.
Disappointing sports weekend
Both the Bucs and the Browns lost yesterday on opening day of the NFL’s 2008-09 season.
The Rays have lost 5 out of 6 games in September, allowing the Red Sox to creep up to 1.5 games behind in the AL East … right before opening a three-game series with the Sox here in St. Pete tonight. If the Rays aren’t careful, they could see their magical turnaround season evaporate in the final three weeks. They’ve got six games left against Boston and three against the Yankees. One bad series and they could find themselves out of the playoffs!
The Indians are still 10.5 games behind the White Sox and even though they’ve been strong late in the season (Cliff Lee is doing amazing work), it’s too little too late for Cleveland’s playoff hopes in 2008.