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Daniel Ruth: Public money built Bucs' stadium, so let public sell tickets

 
Dirk Koetter, Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach, wants to do what it takes to ensure that those sitting in the lower bowl of Raymond James Stadium are wearing his team's colors. [LOREN ELLIOTT   |   Times]

Dirk Koetter, Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach, wants to do what it takes to ensure that those sitting in the lower bowl of Raymond James Stadium are wearing his team's colors. [LOREN ELLIOTT | Times]
Published Sept. 20, 2017

Who knew the Tampa Bay Bucs were actually the Daisies of Dale Mabry?

It seems head coach Dirk Koetter got his hoopskirt all in a wad simply because from time to time attendees at Bucs game out at Hellooooo Sucker Stadium prefer to root, root, root for the opposing team. This had made the head coach of those manly men populating the Bucs roster all pouty.

"A perfect day for me is going to be all Bucs jerseys in the lower bowl and the Bucs winning by one or more," the coach proclaimed.

Some people regard a perfect day as one of world peace, no more famine, or the good health of family and friends. Koetter is satisfied with color coordination, obviously a man who sets a pretty low bar of perfection.

It seems the Bucs and its brain trust, the spawn of the late team owner Malcolm Glazer, Three Card and Monte, are distressed that some season ticket holders occasionally sell their seats to other patrons who are fans of Bucs opponents.

And thus on any given Sunday, Wanna Buy A Duck Field may be populated with customers cheering on the Minnesota Vikings, or New York Giants, or the New England Patriots. I understand this. I only cheer on a Bucs opponent when the whiners of the gridiron play my favorite team, which just so happens to be whatever team the Bucs happen to be playing.

Apparently when disproportionate numbers of foreign football fans start applauding anyone not wearing a pewter and red uniform, it causes the Bucs players to have their feelings hurt.

And no, this is not a Dick Butkus, suck-it-up moment.

Or put another way, these alleged macho chaps get paid millions of dollars to turn their opponents into zombies and yet Bucs players get all mopey at the mere sight of a Green Bay Packer jersey in the stands?

It should be noted the Tampa Bay Rays often play to crowds filled with Yankee and Red Sox fans, but you don't hear anyone on the team complaining about it since the Rays are grateful anyone shows up at all to watch the boys of bummer take to the diamond.

At any rate, to assuage the tender sensibilities of Dirk Koetter and prevent the pansies of Himes Avenue from collapsing into a weepy fetal position should a Miami Dolphins logo be spotted in the stands out at Tea Pot Dome Arena, the Bucs have instituted a new policy to make it as difficult as possible for a season ticket owner to transfer his or her ducats to someone else unless they go through the NFL ticket exchange.

Or it appears the Bucs want to turn the crowds at games out at Grifter Park into something more closely resembling a Donald Trump political rally where everyone practically has to take a loyalty oath before getting in.

In fact, the Bucs refused to renew season ticket packages for patrons who had been customers for decades simply because some of them had not been able to attend every game and sold their tickets presumably to enemy football fans. Now there's some customer loyalty for you.

Memo to the Bucs front office and Malcolm Glazer's rug rats, Slap and Tickle: It's a cockamamie football game for crying out loud. And you folks are treating admission to P.T. Barnum Stadium as if it was the Skull and Bones Society meets the CIA.

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It should be noted Snake Oil Field was built with public money. It is, despite the Glazer family treating the citizenry as their own personal ATM machine, a public facility where quaint notions of free speech still apply even if it means: A) giving the Bucs the raspberry and B) publicly suggesting Dirk Koetter is a crybaby.

And so as the NFL season commences, when it comes to gleefully irritating the coach, "Go (fill in the blankety blank)!"