Rob Gronkowski and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ foundation are coming to the aid of a Florida high school that lost football equipment in a shed fire.
The tight end announced Tuesday, via Twitter, his Gronk Nation Youth Foundation and the Bucs Foundation will combine to help out Blake High School.
“To the Blake High School Yellow Jackets, you’re getting a brand new storage unit and new football equipment to replace everything that was lost,” Gronkowski said.
The fire in May destroyed almost all of the Tampa school’s football equipment, from game day necessities to practice dummies and more.
“I was kind of in shock when I heard,” head football coach Duane Thomas told Tampa Bay.com. “We were talking about (possibly) July 15 to start practicing again. That equipment is essential.”
The school’s game-day equipment, field markers, pylons, chains, practice equipment, pop-up dummies, pads and all daily workout gear are presumed lost, said junior varsity head coach Michael Castellana. Some of the equipment was bought personally by coaches.
“It all could have cost more than $15,000 easily,” said Castellana. “The budgets are so tight. The money won’t be there (in the yearly budget) to replace everything, let alone 25 percent of it.”
An irreplaceable item was a donation from the booster club: a homemade stencil that was made specifically for Blake to re-create the school’s yellow jacket logo in the center of the field for game days.
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