* Warren Sapp was a great player for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Without him, arguably, there would have been no Tampa Bay Super Bowl win in 2003. He was deservedly inducted into the NFL Hall of Fame on Saturday in Canton, Ohio.
What I found telling were the complimentary comments of, among others, Bucs’ co-chairman Joel Glazer. “It was not only his play on the field, but the way he did it,” explained Glazer. “He had an attitude. He had swagger. … He was not only a great player, but he danced, he entertained on the field for the fans.”
Would that he hadn’t.
Part of Sapp’s legacy is that he helped fast-forward the NFL from the ultimate football arena to another show business stage. Sapp wasn’t content to let his ferocious playing speak for him. He had to taunt, yell and dance. He was part premier player, part cheap lounge act. The game, Glazer and other enablers notwithstanding, is not better for boorish, look-at-me antics now institutionalized for compliant network cameras.
Too bad the Bucs’ mold was broken with the late Lee Roy Selmon, a Hall of Fame player and person.
* As amazing as the last month has been for Tampa Bay Rays’ wins, no less notable was the combined crowd of 66,000 that watched the Rays at the Trop for the final two games of the San Francisco series. Moreover, only one of those games–last Saturday–included any kind of giveaway, although it was the uber popular Joe Maddon gnome. Sunday’s sell-out had no inducements other than a home team playing the best baseball in the major leagues.
* Look for the Tampa Bay Lightning to be well represented in this winter’s Olympics in Sochi, Russia. But don’t look for any Bolts to be representing the U.S. As many as 10 members of the Lightning organization–led by Canadians Marty St. Louis and Steven Stamkos–could be suiting up and playing for Canada, Finland, Sweden, Slovenia, Czech Republic and Latvia.