Terra Pinckley was six the last time the Tampa Bay Buccaneers made the Super Bowl. She remembers sitting with her parents – both longtime Bucs supporters – cheering the team to victory, then joining them at the championship parade, where she high-fived then-star fullback Mike Alstott, and shook All-Pro linebacker John Lynch’s hand. It was a moment that cemented her fandom forever.
In a perfect world, the St Petersburg native would watch this Sunday’s Super Bowl among hordes of fellow Bucs fans, preferably at a sports bar. But the pandemic has muddled those plans. Her Super Bowl Sunday will take place from the comfort of her own couch.
“I’m just still not comfortable with bars and restaurants, especially in that kind of crowd,” Pinckley, 24, said. “Not that like football fans aren’t safe, but it’s just the emotions of the moment. I don’t trust that too much.”
Pinckley’s dilemma will be familiar to thousands of people across the Tampa area, from fans to hospitality workers to politicians: how exactly do you host – and cheer on – the biggest sporting event in America during a pandemic?
This year’s Super Bowl is the first time a team will play for the championship in its home stadium (the venue for each Super Bowl is decided years in advance.) Buccaneers fans planning on watching the game outside of their homes will have different Super Bowl experiences than in years past. On Thursday, Tampa mayor Jane Castor issued an executive order mandating masks be worn outdoors at most of the city’s most popular spots, including anywhere Super Bowl festivities occur, in addition to a previous order mandating face coverings indoors. Bars and restaurants in the city can seat up to 50% capacity indoors, but patrons must still wear masks (since publication venues can now operate at 100% capacity provided customers are seated).
The mask ordinance, Castor said, will help ensure events surrounding the game are held as safely as possible. Volunteers will hand out masks all week, reminding people of the rules. And the city will work with local businesses to ensure that they are enforced.
“What we’re looking towards is education and encouragement,” Castor, a Democrat, told the Guardian in a phone interview. “And we will communicate the requirement to wear masks outdoors.”
As for those who break those rules?
“On the Riverwalk, we’re going to push them all in the river,” Castor joked, before saying violators who don’t comply will receive a citation. “People quite often look at government and private organizations to carry all of the responsibility. Something as simple as wearing a mask can prevent the transmission and contracting of Covid-19.”
Despite the reduced number of spectators allowed in the stadium (Sunday’s game will seat 24,700 in person out of a typical capacity closer to 75,000 for big games) and the fact that the Bucs are playing in their own backyard, Castor is expecting a large number of Kansas City Chiefs fans, as well as those without an allegiance to either squad, to travel to the area.
NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy said that while hosting a Super Bowl during a pandemic brings challenges not common in other years, the league believes its protocols – such as mandatory face coverings, physical distancing in common areas, and temperature checks and PPE for all staff working the game – should be enough to keep fans safe.
“We took a critical look at all of our functions to ensure a safe and responsible gameday experience for fans,” McCarthy said. “And that begins with the parking lots where fans may get there four or five hours prior to [the game] … We spent a lot of time with local, county, state, and federal officials, medical experts, and public health experts to go over our plans, and they provided feedback.”
Still, those precautions aren’t enough for some fans to feel comfortable venturing to Raymond James Stadium. Kenneth Stewart, the chairman of a local security firm and pastor at Tabernacle of Hope in Tampa, says he’ll most likely watch the game with a handful of his congregation, though he would have absolutely purchased tickets if it not for the pandemic.
“I’m excited for the first time in history for the host city to have their team playing a Super Bowl,” Stewart said. “But you want it to be a Super Bowl and not a super spreader. I think people deserve some good news. But you see them celebrating without social distancing, and no mask. It’s kind of concerning.”
John Currier, the general manager at Ferg’s – a popular sports bar in St Pete – said that after “mobs of people” came by to celebrate Tampa’s NFC championship victory last month, his staff implemented different rules for the Super Bowl. For starters, anyone hoping to watch the game from the bar will need to put down a deposit for a reservation. If someone isn’t wearing a mask indoors or on the back patio – they won’t be served, and hired security will make sure Covid safety protocol is enforced.
“This whole past season has been challenging to spread people out and make sure people have masks on and are following the rules. It’s very frustrating,” Currier said. “There’s just people looking to celebrate, and I understand it, but we still are in the midst of a pandemic.”
A similar plan has been put in place across the Bay, at Hattricks Tavern. David Mangione, a partner at the bar who has served patrons during the area’s two World Series, three Stanley Cup finals, and now two Bucs Super Bowls over the past 19 years, says that the energy people bring when they come to watch a game is electric. He hopes that will carry over on Sunday, when fans who have reserved tables in advance will be able to watch the Bucs.
“We have taken the opportunity to do the right thing,” Mangione said. “We make sure that we’re sanitizing, we are wearing masks, we’re doing everything that we can, and that we are supposed to be doing based on the city’s protocols”
After hosting fans for the area’s previous playoff runs, Mangione has been able to adapt Ferg’s plans based on what he’s seen. As Castor puts it, no city in America has as much experience hosting large scale events during a pandemic as Tampa. Last fall, both the Rays and Lightning reached the championship rounds of their respective sports, with the Lightning emerging victorious in the Stanley Cup finals. And while neither event was held in the Tampa Bay area (the World Series was played in Arlington, Texas while the Stanley Cup was held in Edmonton, Canada), the Lightning drew massive home crowds for a championship parade.
Castor celebrated with fans during the Lightning’s boat parade through the Bay and down the Hillsborough River, standing in the front of a police boat with her partner and one of her sons, unmasked. Though she says her chance of contracting the virus in such an environment was slim, she made a promise that if the Bucs win on Sunday things will be different at the next parade.
“This time, Castor said, “I’ll wear a mask from sun up to sun down.”
