A sampling of features appearing on Buccaneers.com/news...
The Best Guys I Know
Trust
The Buccaneers may boast the only staff in NFL history with all minority coordinators, but that wasn’t much more than an afterthought for the man who assembled it.
“Those are the four best dudes I know.”
Bucs Head Coach Bruce Arians, never one to mince words, was said man/magnet that attracted coaches from all different backgrounds and experiences to form his ideal staff in Tampa. The four best dudes? Those are his three coordinators and assistant head coach; Todd Bowles, Byron Leftwich, Keith Armstrong and Harold Goodwin.
Their resumes speak for themselves. Resumes that have nothing to do with the color of their skin, the year they were born or even how long they’ve been with Arians. Separately, their bodies of work are impressive, together on one staff, they are downright astounding.
“Those are the four best dudes I know.”
Bruce Arians
What ties this group together is predictably, the first pillar of Arians’ coaching philosophy: trust. It precedes ‘loyalty’ and ‘respect’ because if you have trust, the other two most likely follow. Arians may have a diverse staff of black, white, male, female, former players, career coaches, young, old, but it all works because they all trust each other. And how they came to that common trust varies as greatly as they do.
Loyalty
“From the standpoint of we come in this building every day, or Arizona, or Indianapolis, it’s a comfort level knowing that everybody at the table has your back,” said Assistant Head Coach and Run-Game Coordinator Harold Goodwin. “It’s a comfort level knowing that every person is going to get their job done. It’s a comfort level that [Arians] as a head coach or coordinator at those previous stops, doesn’t have to micromanage everything.
“I think that’s a beautiful thing.”
Goodwin, or “Goodie” as he’s known around the office, has been with Arians for years. Following a football career that took him to the University of Michigan as a player, Goodwin first entered the league as an assistant offensive line coach with the Chicago Bears for three seasons. He was then brought in by Steelers Head Coach Mike Tomlin, who he knew from collegiate camps while Tomlin was in the college coaching ranks. The transition to Pittsburgh provided an introduction to Arians, then the Steelers’ offensive coordinator.
“[Arians is] a guy that if he likes the way you work and he can trust you, you’re always going to be good with him.”
Harold Goodwin
Goodie was not only assisting the offensive line, but also playing the role of offensive quality control – and putting in the hours to match. That earned Arians’ trust. Loyalty followed as BA took him to Indianapolis, then Arizona too. And the respect? Well, Goodie has Assistant Head Coach in his title here in Tampa, doesn’t he? Soon, both Arians and Goodwin hope, he’ll drop the ‘assistant.’
“[Arians is] a guy that if he likes the way you work and he can trust you, you’re always going to be good with him,” said Goodie.
Offensive Coordinator Byron Leftwich also met BA in Pittsburgh, in the middle of his nine-year NFL playing career. He had been brought in from Jacksonville to back up quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, then in his fifth season. The trust between Leftwich and Arians happened quickly. As in, the first 48 hours of ever meeting each other, quickly.
Leftwich had just signed with Pittsburgh the day before a Steelers’ preseason game in 2008. Right before a two-minute drill, Roethlisberger tweaked something and limped off the field. Their other backup quarterback wasn’t available. So, Arians looked at Leftwich and said, “You’re going in.”
Leftwich didn’t know the names of the plays. He didn’t know the hand signals. He hardly knew his teammates at that point. But he knew the concepts from his prior four years’ experience in the league, at least. BA showed him an 8 ½ x 11 sheet of paper with a list of 10 plays on it, all numbered. Leftwich studied the numbered calls for a few seconds before throwing his helmet on and trotting out onto the field.
“I just told him, tell me the number,” recalls Leftwich. “He’d tell me ‘two, two, two’ and I’d just picture the play that was in two.”
Leftwich had committed them to memory by number. He says the drive went for about 80 yards and the Steelers scored. He came back to the sidelines to an incredulous BA, shaking his head, “I don’t know how in the hell you did that kid, but that was pretty good.”
“I bet he doesn’t even remember that,” chuckles Leftwich.
Either way, trust was born that day. Leftwich gained perspective in Pittsburgh, working for the first time as he says with a truly different and gifted quarterback in Roethlisberger. He soaked it all in and learned to speak Arians’ language, too. Arians saw so much promise in Leftwich that he bugged him for the better part of two years after Leftwich retired to become a coach. His coach. Finally, Leftwich conceded.
“I always say the joke I was struggling on the golf course, but it wasn’t that,” laughed Leftwich. “It was more about who [Arians] was. I knew that if I were to get into coaching, there were very few people that could lead me to it because I didn’t have a perspective of what it was. Even though when I was a backup in Pittsburgh, I did a lot of things that a coach would do, I never saw myself as a coach.
“He called me, and it was more matter of fact. He would always say hey man, you’d be a hell of a coach. You should think about it. This time, it was something different. And maybe I was just ready.”
There weren’t contract talks. BA and Leftwich never settled on a timeline in Arizona. Leftwich can’t even remember what he made that first year working for the Cardinals. He just kept showing up; through OTAs, through Training Camp and then finally, the season. He’d stay for two seasons in Arizona. And now, it’s led him to Tampa, to work side by side with coaches that have even more perspectives – something he sees as a tremendous asset.
“This time, it was something different. And maybe I was just ready.”
Byron Leftwich
“Just speaking about staff, I remember Todd, I was a D.C. kid,” said Leftwich. “I grew up rooting for Todd Bowles. [The Washington Redskins] were my team. I used to hear how smart he was as a player back then. You see why he’s coaching. I can imagine how smart of a football player he was and then I get here and get an opportunity to meet him. Now, that’s someone I learn from every day. This is a former head coach in this league.
“I’ve got people I can lean on from a coordinator standpoint that have been through the things I’ve been through that can help me become a better coach. Todd makes me a better coach every day.”
Bowles played eight years in the NFL for both Washington and the San Francisco 49ers as a safety. From very early on in his career, he was tasked with calling the defense from the field. He became that player that everyone relied on; a maestro conducting his orchestra, like he still does as the Bucs’ defensive coordinator now.
“I grew up rooting for Todd Bowles. [The Washington Redskins] were my team. I used to hear how smart he was as a player back then. You see why he’s coaching.”
Byron Leftwich
He’s the only other man on staff besides Arians that has held an NFL head coaching title. Bowles served as head coach of the New York Jets from 2015-2018, climbing to one of the 32 most coveted spots in the league because of those aforementioned smarts, his experience both as a coach and as a player and his ability to translate all of that to those that play for him.
“It helped me see the entire game probably sooner than I wanted to or would have learned it if I wasn’t calling the signals because you were responsible for seeing so many things other than your job,” Bowles recalls about being thrust into a prominent role early in his playing career. “It helped me get into coaching without even knowing I was getting into coaching.”
“It helped me get into coaching without even knowing I was getting into coaching.”
Todd Bowles
And he’d been doing it since college, though the scheme wasn’t as complex, when he met a fiery young first-time head coach in Arians in 1983. Their initial interaction was mostly limited to that of a typical redshirt sophomore and his new head coach, even if the twang and reputation BA came with was anything but typical of Temple at the time.
“Well they came from Alabama and we were all city kids, so it was a little bit different early on,” Bowles laughs. “BA was very vocal back then, even more so than now. He had a lot of cuss words and there wasn’t much room for error back then. He commanded maximum effort and maximum trust back then. Those who could hang stuck with him and those who couldn’t got off the boat.
“He backed up everything he said,” Bowles continued. “It’s ok for a coach to be honest and say whether it’s the player’s fault or his fault and come out and say that. He knew what buttons to push with the team. It’s very easy to trust somebody like that.”
That trust carried them through Bowles’ playing years, as they kept up with each other and then into the early stages of Bowles’ coaching career, where they met back up – this time as coworkers – in Cleveland in 2001. Bowles was hired as the secondary coach. Arians was the offensive coordinator.
“We had fun going up against each other in practice every day,” Bowles smiles, almost deviously.
The first chance Arians had to create his own staff, he hired Bowles as his defensive coordinator.
That was in Arizona in 2013, when Arians was finally given the opportunity to become an NFL head coach. And it all stemmed from something that started decades earlier clear across the country in north Philly.
Also around for those Temple days was Bucs Special Teams Coordinator Keith Armstrong. Back then, Armstrong was a ‘grinder’ as he puts it, playing defensive back for the Owls. Whatever the team needed, he did. He stayed focused on the field and out of trouble off it. That left an impression on Arians.
“You look at the whole picture and you say ok, why did you hire me? Because we’re qualified coaches.”
Keith Armstrong
“It was how I played,” Armstrong said. “I was always in the weight room, always practicing hard. I think [Arians] sees people’s character over the long haul. He sees that even when situations change, you stay the same. And I think he just saw the work ethic.”
Temple was actually the last time Armstrong and Arians even worked together, after Arians insisted Armstrong become a Graduate Assistant at Temple when he was done playing instead of taking a teaching job. That was in 1987. Not for lack of trying, but after stints in college and over 25 years in the NFL, the two were finally reunited in Tampa in 2019. This time, Armstrong brought with him a wealth of knowledge and experience, serving most recently as the Falcons’ Special Teams Coordinator for 11 seasons.
Quite the resumes, huh? And that’s what led them all here. That’s what got their current head coach, and all the others along the way, to trust them. That’s what makes them the best guys BA knows.
“Look at the body of work,” Armstrong said. “You say he’s a minority coach, ok, but he’s been one of the best and been doing it for a long time. You look at Todd, it’s the same thing. And sure, Byron is young coach, but he did a hell of a job this year. You look at the whole picture and you say ok, why did you hire me? Because we’re qualified coaches.”
Respect
Tom Brady’s Super Bowl Legacy… Thus Far
Just how good has Tom Brady been in the Super Bowl? Enough to warrant an entirely separate article and his own stats subsection on pro-football-reference.com.
After signing with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in a blockbuster free agency move, quarterback Tom Brady and the Bucs will now immediately have the opportunity to do something no other player has ever done before: play in a Super Bowl as the home team.
Of course, Brady spent the last 20 years of his career in New England, playing in a stadium that hasn’t ever hosted a Super Bowl game. Now, it comes to Tampa for the fifth time – and the first since Super Bowl XLIII following the 2008 season.
And while Foxboro may be an unfamiliar host, Brady is no stranger to the championship game. He’s been to a whopping nine Super Bowls in his career and won six of them, recording a feature-length film’s worth of highlight reels. His last victory came just two seasons ago in 2018 over the L.A. Rams.
That game saw him throw a modest 262 yards on 21 completions. The year before? He threw for a whopping 505 yards and three touchdowns against zero interceptions despite the Pats loss to the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl LII. Those are the most yards EVER thrown in the big game. In all, Brady has gone 256-of-392 on pass attempts for 2,868 yards and 118 touchdowns in Super Bowls alone. His nine quests for the Lombardi Trophy and six wins are the most of any active player. He has 30 playoff wins in all.
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Perhaps one of his most memorable Super Bowls, and certainly the one Bucs fans probably remember most of his, came after the 2016 season. The Patriots faced off against the Atlanta Falcons and found themselves in a 25-point hole, down 28-3 in Super Bowl LI. If it were any other quarterback, the Patriots themselves may not have even thought they stood a chance. No team had ever come back from such a deficit. But Brady willed it and New England ended up taking the Falcons into overtime – the first time NFL fans ever got bonus football in a Super Bowl. Sure enough, the Pats scored a touchdown and won the game to give Brady his fifth championship.
Two years before that was another victory, this time over the Seattle Seahawks and the infamous, ‘He should have ran it’ play where instead of handing the ball off to running back Marshawn Lynch at the goal line with time expiring needing a touchdown, the Seahawks instead elected to throw it and New England safety Malcolm Butler picked off Wilson to seal the game for the Pats, instead. It capped off perhaps Brady’s best Super Bowl performance, where he completed 37 of 50 pass attempts for 328 yards and four touchdowns.
Before that epic win were back-to-back Super Bowl losses to the New York Giants after the 2011 and 2007 seasons. Those were the lost years that Brady undoubtedly would like to forget. Only, the way those losses stung provide a sense of motivation for the veteran signal caller to this day, according to his Tom vs. Time documentary.
Between 2001 and 2004, New England was in the Super Bowl three times with Brady at the helm. They won all three, first against the ‘Greatest Show on Turf’ St. Louis Rams in 2001, the Carolina Panthers in 2003 and the Philadelphia Eagles in 2004. Brady threw six touchdowns in total during those games – against just one interception.
Over his Super Bowl tenure, Brady has taken home four Super Bowl MVP trophies along with the Lombardi Trophy. Those came in 2001 (his very first), 2003, 2014 and 2016.
But now let’s briefly revisit Super Bowl XLIII in 2009. No, Brady wasn’t a part of it. But you want to know who won that game inside Raymond James Stadium? The Pittsburgh Steelers – with an offensive coordinator named Bruce Arians, an offensive quality control coach named Harold Goodwin, a backup quarterback named Byron Leftwich and a linebacker named Larry Foote. They are all now coaches for the Buccaneers and can return to the Super Bowl in the same stadium, this time with Brady in tow.
He already has more rings than fit on his throwing hand – all with the same franchise. That’s pretty epic. But Brady and all of those aforementioned guys winning it in their home stadium for the first time in NFL history – in their first season together? Now that would be a Hollywood ending.
Their Day in Court: Bucs Players Get Firsthand Look into Local Judicial System Through Social Justice Initiative
A woman taps her foot anxiously as she sits on one of two wooden benches in a small, stale, white-washed room – the only decoration being a piece of printer paper taped to the wall that reads: NO TALKING IN COURT AUDIENCE. There’s a window in front of her but the view isn’t of the outside. Instead, it’s of another room where a prosecutor, a judge and various court personnel sit. It’s almost museum-like, with the court as the exhibit. Above that window is a video monitor showing live-looks inside two correctional facilities. Public defenders read off names and offenses in rapid succession from the screen, getting maybe a sentence or two in before the judge through the window decides just how much it’s going to cost to get these offenders out on bond and therefore, out of a jail they’ve already been in for multiple days. This is despite the fact that not a single person has been formally charged with anything yet. And it’s without actually ever stepping foot in front of a judge in-person, as offenders are just displayed as figures on the screen.
The monitor shows a young woman in a customary orange jumpsuit stand up as her name is called. The woman back on the bench in the stale room suddenly stops her foot tapping and stares intently at the screen. The public defender indicates to the judge there is someone present in the ‘audience’ for this particular offender before reading off multiple charges, including theft, and recommendations on bond to be set.
“Is that your daughter?”
It’s a question not from the judge through the window, nor anyone in the offsite correctional facilities on-screen, but instead from next to the woman on the bench. There sits Buccaneers cornerback Mazzi Wilkins. The mother nods briefly to the young player before the judge motions for her to come speak with him directly. Multiple Buccaneers players occupying the rest of the bench space in the room watch through the window as the mother enters the courtroom to answer to the judge deciding her daughter’s fate. The players are here as part of the Bucs’ Social Justice Initiative, and along with Walter Payton Man of the Year winner Anquan Boldin and the Players Coalition, are at the Hillsborough County Courthouse to get a firsthand look at bail and probation hearings. These kinds of things are open to the public, by the way. The woman among them in the audience serves as a sobering example of the reality of this experience. Turns out, her daughter is just 18 years old. She gets good grades. She’s on the basketball team at school. She fell in with the wrong crowd, her mother concedes, now face-to-face with the judge.
“I don’t want my daughter to become a statistic.”
The statistics of incarceration in the United States are staggering. The U.S. has the largest prison population in the world, along with the highest per-capita incarceration rate with 698 people per 100,000 in prison. The statistics of jailed persons are even more pronounced. Over 450,000 people are held nightly without conviction in this country. Right here in Florida, 65% of those in the Hillsborough County Jail are pending trial. They’re in jail because they can’t post their bail – a number almost arbitrarily set despite there being no evidence bail improves public safety (most of these are non-violent crimes) or that it increases the likelihood an offender will show up in court, per research presented by Jessica Brand, a lawyer from the Justice Collaborative, which works with the Players Coalition. In fact, some states have done away with monetary bail entirely given its questionable effectiveness.
In a voice that sounds more parental than judicial, the judge then rules to leave the girl’s bond at the standard $2,000 for the first charge of theft but then ROR’s or “Releases on One’s Own Recognizance” for the rest of the charges, meaning no additional money will be required to release her. Her parents can pay the bond, so she won’t be part of the jailed statistic any longer, provided she shows up for her court date. Many others the players see that morning, however, aren’t so fortunate.
“You can see it’s a real systemic problem,” running back Dare Ogunbowale said. “I would say to an extent, it’s almost not fair. Based on your income level, that’s your ability to be free or not.”
Down the hall in a much bigger courtroom, that’s decorated for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, sit wide receivers Mike Evans and Chris Godwin with many more of their teammates. This is the more traditional setup you expect to see when you watch courtroom TV shows. And like those TV shows, judges have absolute power over their courtrooms in real life, too. The players are sitting in on probation hearings, where there is a little more context, but a whole lot more arguing, as the judge rules whether to send violators to jail or reinstate their probation. It’s quick, too. And it may be a client’s first time ever being face-to-face with the overworked public defender that is attempting to shield them from the judge’s autonomy. Some have waited weeks in jail for their hearing – any progress they’ve made in getting their life on track while on probation surely wiped out; A father, who now works two jobs to support his wife and three kids, pleading to be reinstated after missing a meeting with his probation officer due to transportation issues. He was unemployed when he committed the offense he was on probation for but has since secured stable housing for his family and gained employment. If he goes to jail, what will they do without him? Or a woman that violated her probation after only two months who is now opting to wear an ankle bracelet for two years rather than serve 30 days in county jail, which would thereby satisfy her entire probation sentence. All because she can’t leave her kids. Odds are after not making it two months, she won’t make it two years without a violation. And a violation, no matter how trivial, would mean prison time. Upstate. Not cushy county jail.
“It’s tough,” Ogunbowale said. “First, you’re going to empathize with the person. Obviously, they’ve committed a crime and you can’t ignore that but at the same time, some of the punishments, you don’t feel that they’re properly being punished. That’s kind of the frustrating thing about it. That’s why a bunch of the guys that were here today will make sure we do things to hopefully change things like that in the future.”
Change is slow and difficult, but Boldin and the Players Coalition have already been able to effect changes across the country. Boldin has had conversations with political officials in multiple states. A Pahokee-native, he’s currently working on an effort to change bail policies in Orlando and has helped multiple communities in Florida. As one of the founders, Boldin started the Players Coalition with the mission to make an impact on social justice and racial equality at the federal, state and local levels through advocacy, awareness, education and allocation of resources. That mission starts with a platform not unlike the one Bucs players have.
“You’re not just an ordinary Joe,” Boldin told the players in a conversation session following their time in the courtroom. “When y’all speak, people listen. And when you voice your concerns and your opinions about things that aren’t right – that’s when things begin to change. It’s amazing to me to see the response we get as athletes from people in positions of power, even the community.”
“We do have a platform and we need to use that platform in whatever capacity that’s going to be,” Ogunbowale agrees. “Being in Tampa, guys going back to their respective cities too, we know that we have a platform that we can use our voices to try to change the system. Kind of just start small and work our way up from there. We definitely plan to use our voices.”
The Buccaneers’ Social Justice Initiative is a player-led effort to make a meaningful difference in the Tampa Bay community and support the larger, league-wide effort to address social justice issues. It’s in place to help facilitate exactly what Ogunbowale said: helping players use their voices.
“It makes us feel good knowing that we have the backing of an organization that wants to see us do good in the community,” he said.
Beau Allen’s Support of Waterboys for My Cause, My Cleats Has ‘Higher’ Meaning
Over 30 different causes will be represented on players’ cleats Sunday as part of the NFL’s Fourth Annual My Cause, My Cleats Initiative. Some players chose which to support based on family or loved ones that have been impacted by certain diseases. Others have their own foundations they proudly back. But for defensive lineman Beau Allen, his chosen cause has a little bit of a ‘higher’ meaning.
Back when Allen was with the Philadelphia Eagles, then-teammate Chris Long got him involved with Waterboys, which puts professional athletes and sports fans on the same team in pursuit of one goal: bringing life-sustaining drinking water to communities in need. Allen championed the cause proudly for a couple of years – but this past offseason, decided that wasn’t quite enough. Waterboys leads an expedition into Africa and up Mount Kilimanjaro each year, with both NFL players and military veterans, as a means to raise money for the organization and bring the two groups together.
The dormant volcano is the tallest mountain in Africa, and the highest single free-standing mountain in the world, rising 19,341 into the air. To summit its peak is no small feat – especially for a big man like the 327-pound Allen, who along with Long, Eagles’ center Jason Kelce and former Seahawk Haloti Ngata, joined by military veterans, accomplished just that. In the process, the two groups figured out they weren’t so different – especially when they had the same mission.
“When you get up there, the same sort of fellowship I’ve seen in Afghanistan or Iraq – you don’t want to let your buddy down,” said Fred Dummar, a retired Army Green Beret who made the climb with Allen. “If you’re buddy stumbles, you want to be there pushing him, giving him a little shove in the back, steadying him. Everybody wants to make it. You don’t want to let the team down.”
“The thing I remember talking to Fred about is there are a lot of similarities between combat veterans and athletes when they get done playing,” Allen continued. “They kind of lose a sense of purpose and they miss that brotherhood and it’s kind of different when you don’t have people telling you what to do and where to go and line up and stuff like that. We kind of bonded over that and it was one of the reasons it was fun to be around those guys.”
Dummar was brought in by Nate Boyer, who was under Dummar during his own time as a Green Beret. Boyer also played for the Seattle Seahawks and therefore bridges the gap between the two groups for causes like these. It’s the cause within the cause, helping retired veterans feel a sense of belonging and purpose again, which so many struggle with after retirement.
To regain that sense of purpose though, the group first visited the well sites. In Allen’s case, they went to five different sites around the densely populated Arusha, Tanzania to see firsthand the impact the organization was making. One particular site, which was at a school in the middle of the city, Allen won’t ever forget.
“You go and you look and you see where they were getting their water before, and it was this really small creek, not that deep, and it was filled with garbage,” Allen recalled. “Not sanitary. And you’re like, wow this is where they get their drinking water. This is not ideal at all. Then you see the well and you see how much of an impact it has and you really feel it.”
“The first couple days, everybody is hanging out, you start seeing the wells and realizing how important it is so I think that kind of served to galvanize the group,”‘ Dummar added. “All the little kids at the school running around and playing, seeing the joy they have and how appreciative they are over something that we take for granted is really kind of a life-changing, life-impacting moment.”
Fast forward a few months and Allen stares at a Smartwater bottle in his locker at AdventHealth Training Center on ‘Unboxing Day’ this past week for My Cause, My Cleats. His blue cleats bear the Waterboys logo that he’ll don on Sunday. He reflects on what it’s all for, knowing from experience the change he’s effecting.
“It’s a pretty humbling thing,” Allen said. “It makes you feel like you’re doing something important – and you are.”
And as for Dummar and the rest of the group that hiked up Kilimanjaro, he says they all have a pretty ‘epic’ group text that continues to this day. It’s a bond that lasts long beyond the climb, just like the wells that provide water long after the team is gone.
To find out more about Waterboys and how you can help, visit https://waterboys.org/ and to see the rest of the cleats and causes that will be represented Sunday, visit https://www.buccaneers.com/mycausemycleats.
Teammates Show Up for Team Godwin Foundation Launch
You’d be hard-pressed to find a better teammate than Bucs wide receiver Chris Godwin. He and wide receiver Mike Evans are the best receiving duo in the league this season and Godwin’s 60 catches this year are the most of any of the Bucs receivers this season. Godwin shows up for his teammates, and in turn, his teammates showed up for him as he and girlfriend Mariah DelPercio launched the Team Godwin Foundation on Monday night.
“It means the world to me seeing how many of my teammates came out here on a Monday, one of their days off,” Godwin said. “They did not have to be here, especially as long as they have been. It just shows the support they have for me and the respect that they have for me and that they have my back. It means the world to me.”
The Team Godwin Foundation aims to make a difference for pets in need through advocacy and financial assistance to local shelter and rescue groups. Through programs like the Second Chance Fund, animals in need of live-saving treatments are able to get the financial support they need.
In fact, this season Godwin started his “Receptions for Rescue” campaign, which invites fans to make a donation for every catch he makes this season. With each catch, a dog’s life is saved and Godwin’s overall goal for the season is $10,000.
The Foundation also aspires to make a difference for animals facing adversity by educating the public on the importance of adopting – something the couple themselves knows firsthand.
“For me and Mariah, this was something that was close to our heart,” Godwin said. “We have two dogs at home. We just adopted our second dog in March. Seeing our relationship with her and how much she’s brought to our eyes, it’s really very special. We just want to go out there and spread the word and educate people that may not know.”
The event was held at Eddie V’s Prime Steak and Seafood restaurant and was co-hosted by former Tampa Bay Ray Jonny Damon. The whole evening flowed like a cocktail hour with roving food and entertainment. There was a magician that made defensive tackle Beau Allen sufficiently uncomfortable. This was after both he and quarterback Ryan Griffin got a caricature portrait done of themselves by the on-site artist and before inside linebacker Lavonte David took down a sizable plate of truffle mac ‘n cheese.Carmen Vitali✔@CarmieV
At the Team Godwin Foundation launch and Jameis is looking like a proud dad… I’m crying y’all. I’m also taking full credit for setting this up 
@Beau_Allen @Griffin_11 @Jaboowins
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In all, 12 of Godwin’s teammates were there, including Jameis Winston, Ryan Griffin, Mike Evans, Breshad Perriman, Justin Watson, Scotty Miller, Cam Brate, Tanner Hudson, Bryant Mitchell, Beau Allen, Lavonte David and Anthony Nelson along with Captain Fear and the Buccaneers Cheerleaders. Donations from those teammates poured in, as well as from the Buccaneers themselves, who were one of the sponsors on the event.
It’s safe to say Godwin’s well established with his teammates and it’s important to him to establish himself and his foundation in the Tampa area, too.
“I’m still in the process of establishing myself on the field and I think this gives people a chance locally to get to know me and who I am off the field,” he said. “People are starting to support me a little bit more so it’s very important to me to plant some roots. I love Tampa, I love being here and so starting it here is very important.”
Carmen M. Vitali 