Bucs Ignore 20th Anniversary Of Super Bowl Win – JoeBucsFan.com – Tampa Bay Bucs Blog, Buccaneers News

Team Glazer honoring Jon Gruden at his Buccaneers Ring of Honor ceremony in 2018.

UPDATED: 10:30 a.m – It was stunning that Team Glazer passed on a formal and significant honoring of their 2002 Super Bowl team this season at Raymond James Stadium. Today is the 20th anniversary of the franchise’s first Super Bowl win.

As of 9:30 a.m. this morning, there’s not even an acknowledgement on the Buccaneers’ Twitter account, Facebook page or the team website.

And rest assured, 2002 Buccaneers players spoke up and asked Tampa Bay management how they would be honored this season and if it would be similar to the 10th anniversary celebration at a late-season home game.

Joe is convinced there is only one reason the Bucs passed on honoring the 20th anniversary: Jon Gruden, their first Super Bowl head coach.

Team Glazer defrocked Gruden from the Buccaneers Ring of Honor last season, ripping his name from the stadium after old Gruden emails were discovered as part of the probe of the Washington franchise. Gruden effectively was canceled by the NFL for what the league considered sexist, racist, xenophobic and anti-gay emails sent by Gruden to then-Washington general manager Bruce Allen and others when he worked for ESPN.

The emails also included anti-Glazer commentary, which apparently is a crime worse than any indiscretion committed by Antonio Brown, Jameis Winston or Jerramy Stevens.

Gruden is suing the NFL for a “malicious and orchestrated campaign” to make him quit his Raiders head coaching job midway through the 2021 season by leaking his emails — and concealing hundreds of thousands of other emails tied to the NFL probe.

Joe knows former Bucs were not pleased by the team passing on honoring the 20th anniversary of the Super Bowl win. The Bucs’ company line, apparently, was that there would be a big deal made for the 25th anniversary.

For perspective, during the 2021 season, the Patriots had a year-long celebration of their 20th anniversary of Super Bowl glory. That included a podcast and a website portal dedicated to re-living that 2001 season, in addition to other public celebrations.

Across professional sports it’s commonplace for teams to celebrate the 20th anniversary of a championship.

In Tampa, well, Gruden.

Joe finds this very embarrassing for the Bucs. It was a small-minded decision.

UPDATED 10:30 a.m. – The Bucs added a video to their website of Ronde Barber breaking down film of the 2002 championship season. Also added to their Twitter account was a post, “Where were you 20 years ago today?”

Today is the 20th Anniversary of #SBXXXVII – Salute all my former @Buccaneers teammates who played in the last SB that didn’t have a bye week between AFC/NFC Championships & SB weekend 🙌🏿🎊 pic.twitter.com/Fiz74LZ2QK

— Roman Oben (@R_Oben) January 26, 2023