Nickelback had the year’s top song, and the
Tampa Bay Buccaneers were the champs of the NFL.
It was the team’s first season with fiery head coach
Jon Gruden, and the Bucs had visions of multiple Lombardi trophies lining the cabinets. Long-suffering fans were ecstatic and ready to keep the pirate ship at Raymond James Stadium well-stocked with cannon fodder to celebrate their team’s triumphs.
However, the past 18 seasons in Tampa have gone over about as well as news of a Nickelback world tour.
It’s been a long drought of irrelevance coupled with bad coaching—the Bucs hadn’t even sniffed the playoffs since 2007. Until this season’s arrival of a certain quarterback with more rings than one hand can hold.