Raymond James Stadium

Infobox_Stadium
stadium_name = Raymond James Stadium
nickname = Ray Jay, The New Sombrero, The CITS


location = 4201 N. Dale Mabry Highway
Tampa, Florida 33607
broke_ground = Fall 1996
opened = September 20, 1998
closed =
demolished =
owner = Tampa Sports Authority
operator = Tampa Sports Authority
surface = Natural grass, Tifway 419 Bermuda
construction_cost = $168.5 million
architect = HOK Sport
tenants = Tampa Bay Buccaneers (NFL) (1998–present)
Tampa Bay Mutiny (MLS) (1999–2001)
USF Bulls (NCAA) (1998–present)
Outback Bowl (NCAA) (1999–present)
ACC Championship (NCAA) (2008–09)
seating_capacity = 65,857 (expandable to 75,000)

Raymond James Stadium is a multi-purpose football stadium located in Tampa, Florida. It is home to the NFL's Tampa Bay Buccaneers as well as the NCAA's South Florida Bulls. The stadium seats just over 66,000, and it is expandable to 75,000 for special events. The stadium also hosts the annual Outback Bowl on New Year's Day, and the Super Bowl of Motorsports monster truck event in mid–January. Super Bowl XXXV was held there on January 28, 2001 between the Baltimore Ravens and New York Giants. It will host Super Bowl XLIII in 2009.

History

Raymond James Stadium was built primarily to replace the aging Houlihan's Stadium, formerly located adjacent to the property. It is located on the former site of the now–demolished Al Lopez Field. The stadium officially opened September 20, 1998, when the Tampa Bay Buccaneers defeated the Chicago Bears, 27–15. The final cost of the stadium was $168.5 million, publicly financed. It was known as Tampa Community Stadium during construction, but the naming rights were bought for $32.5 million for a thirteen–year deal by St. Petersburg-based Raymond James Financial in June 1998. [http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/1998/06/27/archive/main12734.shtml?source=search_story] On April 27, 2006 an extension was signed to maintain naming rights through 2015.

The stadium was selected to host the ACC Championship Game in 2008 and 2009.

The first–ever public event to be held at the newly built Raymond James Stadium was Career Super Bowl, a large job fair in the club suites area produced by FloridaJobLink.com and Aim Direct Media.

Features

One of the most recognizable features of the stadium is a convert|103|ft|m|sing=on, 43–ton steel-and-concrete replica pirate ship, which fires soft-rubber footballs and confetti each time that the Bucs score points. The cannons fire six times for a touchdown, once for an extra point, twice for a safety or two point conversion, and three times for a field goal. In addition, when the Buccaneers enter their opponent's red zone, stadium hosts hoist team flags around the perimeter of the upper deck. During various times throughout the game, the song "Yo Ho (A Pirate's Life for Me)" is played on the stadium public address system (taken from Pirates of the Caribbean), which signals patrons onboard the ship to throw beads, t–shirts, and other free prizes to the people below.

During Super Bowl XXXV on CBS, the pre–game, halftime, and post–game desk reporting took place from aboard the pirate ship.

When it opened, Raymond James Stadium was dubbed the "crown jewel" of the NFL. "Buc Vision", a pair of convert|92|ft|m|sing=on wide video screens, are among the largest in the league. "Buccaneer Cove" features a weathered, two–story fishing village facade, housing stadium concessions and restrooms. All areas of the stadium are ADA compliant.

Temporary bleachers were erected in the endzones for Super Bowl XXXV, and the attendance was a stadium record 71,921.

In 2003, the corner billboards in the stadium were replaced with rotating trilon billboards.

Raymond James boasts the best turf in the NFL, according to a 2004 biannual players' survey.

Timeline

*Immediately upon purchasing the Bucs in 1995, new owner Malcolm Glazer declared Tampa Stadium inadequate and began lobbying local government for a replacement. [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4207/is_19950117/ai_n10181431] After discovering that the Glazers were exploring moving the team to another location, the city of Tampa and Hillsborough County came up with a plan to fund a new stadium as part of a "Community Investment Tax", which was put up for a referendum.
*As part of the campaign to pass the referendum, Glazer promised to pay half the cost of the new stadium if fans put down 50,000 deposits on 10–year season commitments. The drive fell 17,000 deposits short, the offer was withdrawn, and the Bucs did not pay any of the stadium's construction cost. [Harry, Chris. "Fantastic Voyage for Bucs". Orlando Sentinel. July 24, 2005]
*On September 3, 1996, the voters of Hillsborough County, Florida approved, by 53% to 47% margin, a thirty–year, half–cent sales tax to build new schools, improve public safety and infrastructure, and provide the Buccaneers with a new stadium. Voting precincts reported record turnout. The team signed a stadium lease in which the local government must pay for almost all of the stadium expenses while the franchise keeps almost all of the proceeds. [http://www.forbes.com/business/2007/09/12/biz_07nfl_all_slide_13.html]
*On October 31, 1996, the NFL owners met in New Orleans to select the host site for Super Bowl XXXIII and Super Bowl XXXIV. Pro Player Stadium in the Miami area was selected to host Super Bowl XXXIII. Atlanta, Tempe and Tampa were candidates for Super Bowl XXXIV, with Tampa the favorite, following the successful tax referendum. The Georgia Dome in Atlanta, however, was awarded the game. As a compromise, Tampa was awarded Super Bowl XXXV, which the NFL had not originally planned to select that day.
*In April 2003, the Tampa Sports Authority proposed passing ownership of the stadium to Hillsborough County to avoid having to pay millions of dollars in property taxes (The Bucs' lease agreement dictated that they not have to pay property taxes). However, Bucs had a right of refusal and refused to sign off on the plan unless the local government paid more of the cost for game–day security and increased the amount of (county-purchased) insurance coverage for the stadium. [http://www.sptimes.com/2003/04/18/TampaBay/Tax_bill_swells_as_Bu.shtml] The dispute continued for months until December 2003, when the county legally declared the stadium a condominium and took ownership. As part of the change, the Bucs were given ownership of portions of the structure. To win the Bucs' approval, the county agreed to refund the team's resultant property tax payments annually. [http://www.sptimes.com/2003/03/06/Hillsborough/Hillsborough_votes_ye.shtml] [http://www.sptimes.com/2003/12/18/Hillsborough/County_act_ends_tax_o.shtml]
*On May 25, 2005, NFL owners met in Washington, D.C. to select the host site for Super Bowl XLIII. During the balloting, Raymond James Stadium defeated the Georgia Dome (Atlanta), Reliant Stadium (Houston), and Dolphin Stadium (Miami Gardens).
*After a nearly two–-year legal battle, the Tampa Sports Authority came to a settlement with popular sports-seating and telescopic platform/bleacher company Hussey Seating of North Berwick, Maine. Following the stadium’s opening in 1998, roughly 50,000 Hussey-manufactured seats at Raymond James Stadium began to fade from their original color – a bright, vibrant shade of red – to a shade of washed-out pink. Spotting this obvious defect, the Buccaneers organization pleaded to the TSA to sue the seating manufacturing company for the cost to replace the affected chairs in 2003. Initially, in May 2004, after testing samples of the seats, Hussey Seating did not find any cause for the fading, and thus, found no reason to replace the seats at the company’s cost under the current 10–year warranty. After the TSA cited a portion of the warranty which did, in fact, state that Hussey would replace seats if any fading were to occur, Hussey president Tim Hussey admitted an error in the research and eventually would come to a $1.5–million agreement with the TSA to replace the problem seats. Reportedly, the seat-fading occurred due to a manufacturing error by Hussey, as a UV inhibitor – a sunscreen-like component for the plastic – was forgotten in the mixture used to create the seats. All of the problem seats were replaced by new, non–pink seats in the spring of 2006.
*Although there are no official nicknames, the stadium is sometimes referred to as "Ray Jay", "The New Sombrero" (a spinoff of the former Bucs' home, as coined by Chris Berman of ESPN), or humorously by local residents as "the CITS", which stands for the Community Investment Tax Stadium. The name "CITS" was coined by long time Tampa sportscaster and sports talk radio host, Chris Thomas and was taken from the tax referendum that was created to fund its construction. On occasions during radio broadcasts of games, Buccaneers' radio play-by-play man Gene Deckerhoff refers to the stadium as Jesse James Stadium.

References

Gallery

Notable football games

Super Bowls
*Super Bowl XXXV: January 28, 2001 (Baltimore Ravens 34, New York Giants 7 – all-time stadium record attendance 71,921)
*Super Bowl XLIII: February 1, 2009

NFL Playoff Games
*NFC Divisional Playoff: January 15, 2000 (Tampa Bay Buccaneers 14, Washington Redskins 13 – Buccaneers record attendance 65,835)
*NFC Divisional Playoff: January 12, 2003 (Tampa Bay Buccaneers 31, San Francisco 49ers 6)
*NFC Wild Card Playoff: January 7, 2006 (Washington Redskins 17, Tampa Bay Buccaneers 10)
*NFC Wild Card Playoff: January 6, 2008 (New York Giants 24 vs. Tampa Bay Buccaneers 14)

College Football Games
*#14 South Carolina 31, vs. #22 Ohio State 28: January 1, 2002 (Outback Bowl stadium record attendance – 66,249)
*#18 USF 21, vs. #5 West Virginia 13: September 28, 2007 (largest non–Super Bowl crowd in stadium history – 67,018)

succession box
title = Home of the
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
years = 1998 – present
before = Tampa Stadium/Houlihan's Stadium
after = currentsuccession box
title = Home of the
South Florida Bulls football
years = 1998 – present
before = Houlihan's Stadium
after = currentsuccession box
title = Home of the
Tampa Bay Mutiny
years = 1999 – 2001
before = Tampa Stadium/Houlihan's Stadium
after = last stadiumsuccession box
title = Home of the
Outback Bowl
years = 1998 – 2009
before = Tampa Stadium
after = currentsuccession box
title = Home of the
ACC Championship Game
years = 2008 – 2009
before = Jacksonville Municipal Stadium
after = Bank of America Stadiumsuccession box
title = Host of the Super Bowl
years = XXXV 2001
XLIII 2009
before = Georgia Dome
University of Phoenix Stadium
after = Louisiana Superdome
Dolphin Stadium