Welcome to The Hook, my weekly column that hooks you into a different Tampa Bay Buccaneers topic each Thursday, as well as some of my thoughts on the Bucs and the NFL at the end in a section called Cannon Blast.

I invite you to offer me some feedback on The Hook below in the article comments section.

For Bucs fans, the voice is instantly recognizable.

“Touchdown Tampa Bay! Fire the cannons!”

Emerson Eugene Deckerhoff has been the voice of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers since 1989 and along the way has seen many of the highs and lows for this franchise over the last three decades. From a two-win season like the team had in 2014, to hoisting a Lombardi Trophy following the 2002 campaign, Deckerhoff has called over 600 regular and preseason games. And that doesn’t include his full-time job with Florida State University where he has been the voice of the Seminoles football program since 1979.

Gene Deckerhoff and Bryan Glazer – Photo courtesy of the Buccaneers

I caught up with Deckerhoff this week from his home office and studio in Tallahassee to talk about some of his best memories of Bucs football along with his thoughts on the upcoming season with new quarterback Tom Brady.

What is your excitement level for the 2020 season with the additions the Buccaneers have made?

“Well, I think all Bucs fans remember the excitement when you draft a quarterback No. 1 overall in Vinny Testaverde and Jameis Winston – all pumped up and hyped up. This is like the first player overall in the NFL Draft when you get a player like Tom Brady – except he has already proven himself. The Buccaneers front office went all in. Our chips are on the table now. You have the greatest quarterback of all time, and you get his favorite receiver in Rob Gronkowski to come play for the Buccaneers. I am excited. Tom Brady is the real deal. He is going to play in warmer weather and I think it is going to fit him and fit us, and the Bucs are going to win a lot of football games. And who knows? Super Bowl 55 is at Raymond James Stadium, and Mark I think my favorite football team is going to be there.”

How have you and the family handled the COVID-19 situation so far this year?

“My office is in my home. It’s a small studio that I have been operating out of since 1990. So as a result there isn’t a change to my day-to-day activity. And as a result my preparation for games hasn’t changed. After the COVID thing came out I stopped preparing depth charts and match-ups for the preseason – how smart was that? – but I have done New Orleans, which is the first regular season game. And I hope, that first game stays on schedule and is on 4:25 p.m. on September 13. But we don’t know right now. I have done all my depth charts and all for the NFC South division rivals. And I am ready for those and I honestly think we will play a full 16-game schedule. I don’t know that we start on September 13, but I am hoping and crossing my fingers that we do. Otherwise you are playing into mid-January and February for the Super Bowl. But let’s cross our fingers and see if we play a full schedule. I think we will. The college game is really up in the air. We aren’t sure if the college game is going to start on time. I think what we are all going to do is watch Major League Baseball this weekend and the NBA and see how those professional leagues fare in handling the protocols of the COVID-19 virus situation. We have lost too many people here in the United States and you can’t be too cautious when you are fighting an invisible enemy. And we haven’t announced yet what our ticket situation is going to be. Jacksonville announced they will have 25 percent capacity. So have the Baltimore Ravens. Then how how about this? The Jets and the Giants that both play in MetLife Stadium, and the governor has already announced there will be no fans in at MetLife Stadium this year. So we won’t know until all the teams are the announcement, but I think that is coming soon.”

Gene Deckerhoff – Photo courtesy of the Buccaneer

You started doing Bucs games in 1989. How did the job come about for you?

“For three years I did the Tampa Bay Bandits with Steve Spurrier as our coach, John Reaves was our quarterback, Eric Truvillion was our top receiver and a kid by the name of Jimmy Jordan was our No. 2 quarterback. The Tampa Bay Bandits – I have a lot of fond memories. ‘All The Fun The Law Allows’ (team slogan) and I think that is the reason that when (former Bucs play-by-play announcer) Mark Champion left to go to Detroit that I received a phone call from WRBQ. They asked me if I would be interested in broadcasting Buccaneers football. I thought it was sort of a joke at first. You know they had the Q-Morning Zoo going on at the time. Then I read a newspaper article the next day that Mark was taking the job in Detroit. Then I got a call the next day and it was the same folks. So I flew down to Tampa and met with Ralph Beaver, who was the (WRBQ) general manager at the time and I was offered the job. But I had to get my bosses at Seminole Boosters to sign off on it, and I had to get Coach (Bobby) Bowden to sign off on it. He said, ‘Gene, why do you have to ask me?’ And I said, ‘Coach, we may have to do your television show at 2:00 a.m. or 3:00 a.m. in the morning so I can catch a plane to fly to a Buccaneers game.’ And he said, ‘Well Gene, I think it’s great. You wake me up after the commercials and we will do the TV show whenever you want to.’ There is not a coach at any level – high, school college or pro – who would have agreed to have his radio guy do a TV show in the wee hours of the morning. I owe that to Bobby and every time I talk to Coach Bowden I remind him of that.”

Jesse Ventura – Photo by: Gett Images

You have had some truly colorful characters as your color analysts over the years. Talk about your partners you shared the booth with.

“It doesn’t get any bigger than the tandem that WRBQ put together in 1989 and 1990, it was Gene Deckerhoff doing play-by-play, Al Keck as color analyst and Jesse ‘The Body’ Ventura. For two years that was the team. In 1990 Jesse ran for political office and got into politics and eventually became the governor of the state of Minnesota. Then Dave Logan – when WQYK became the flagship station – they wanted a former player to be the color analyst, so Dave Logan and I worked together from 1991 until he passed away after the 1998 season. Then Scot Brantley and Tom “Scoop” Korun and myself. It was the three of us. Then it was just Scotty and me, and then Hardy Nickerson came in and did one year and then got into coaching. Since then, Dave Moore retired as a player and became the color analyst on the same day. I’ll never forget Bruce Allen calling me and saying, ‘Hey Gene, we are having a press conference announcing Dave Moore retiring but also announcing he is going to be your color analyst.’ And Dave and I have had some great times over the years. I learn something new about football every time I do a broadcast with Dave. He is tremendous analyst. I am a little shocked he isn’t doing television. And of course T.J. Rives does a tremendous job as our sideline analyst.”

Other than the Super Bowl, what has been some of your best memories calling Bucs games over the years?

“Anyone at all is a rival. Remember, we played the New Orleans Saints a lot before 2002 when they realigned the league and put New Orleans, Atlanta, Carolina, a new team by the way, into the NFC South. So we had a natural rivalry I think with New Orleans and Atlanta because we played Atlanta an awful lot. Any wins over those rival teams were big. I remember not necessarily games, but plays. You know that 62-yard field goal by Matt Bryant is right up there in the top four or five of my favorite plays. I’ve had the opportunity, and it’s just the right place and the right time, of being fortunate to be the radio voice of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I had the distinct privilege, we finally got off the schnide with our first punt return touchdown, Vernon Turner, I believe that was against the Detroit Lions at Raymond James Stadium. I’m making the call, ‘he takes it from the 50 to the 45, we’re seeing history from the 35 to the 15 to the touchdown Tampa Bay,’ and we won that ball game. And then, the last team in the NFL at the time, this was before expansion I believe, to score a kickoff return touchdown. It was run by Micheal Spurlock against the Atlanta Falcons, so those are things I remember more than individual games. The rivalry – it was the same thing in the college games. I remember wins over Florida and wins over Miami. They’re right up there at the very top of my memory list because those are rivalry games, and obviously NCAA and FBS championship wins over Nebraska in 1993 and Virginia Tech in 1999 and Auburn in 2013. I remember those games. I’ve called 620 Tampa Bay Buccaneer games including preseason, so it’s tough to pick out one, two and three wins. We’ve had some great wins on Monday night, we’ve had some bad games, and we’ve had some great wins. I’ll tell you, maybe one that I’ll never forget my very first regular season broadcast was the Bucs at Green Bay and Vinny Testaverde had maybe his best day, I think we converted all but one third down and we won. That was my very first broadcast with Jesse and Al, and wins at Lambeau Field are very, very rare. Maybe the win in San Diego, the first ever win in San Diego in 1996. I remember John Lynch, the whole family had bought a suite, they got banners hanging from the suite. And Coach [Tony] Dungy – I remembered Coach saying we went out there and beat San Diego, and that may end up being the turning point of this franchise going in the right direction and from then on we were a tough out. Playoffs, playoffs, Super Bowl. Another one, we played Minnesota and Tony was our head coach, I think that was coach Dungy’s first win as the head coach of the Buccaneers in 1996 and we beat Minnesota, his former team by the way. Remember Tony was the defensive coordinator when he was hired by the Buccaneers, and we beat Minnesota and that was their only loss of the regular season and then they stubbed their toe and missed a field goal and lost in overtime to Atlanta in the NFC Championship Game. Those games – I bet you if I sat here for a half hour I could start rattling off some more – were some that standout. Again, Micheal Spurlock, Vernon Turner, Derrick Brooks’ interception in the Super Bowl and I say ‘The Bucs are going to win the Super Bowl’ and it’s only the third quarter! Then Raiders scored two touchdowns and I went, ‘Whoops, I shouldn’t have said that.’ But those are the things that stand out.”

You have a unique job calling games for a college team on Saturday and an NFL team on Sunday. His difficult is that for you?

“I have quite a drive between jobs. There are only two other guys I know who cover a college on Saturday and the NFL on Sunday. I spoke to Dan Hoard in Cincinnati. He’s got the Bearcats on Saturday and he’s got the Bengals on Sunday. Bill Hillgrove does the Pittsburgh Panthers on Saturday and the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday. I asked Dan once, ‘How far is it from your house to the stadium where the Bearcats and the Bengals play?’ And he says, ‘Gene, I get there 17 minutes.’ He says, on a Sunday morning I get there about two-and-a-half, three hours before kickoff and there’s not that much traffic on a Sunday morning that early. He says 17 minutes from my house. Bill, he says 22 minutes. I have about a four-and-a-half hour drive.”

Gene Deckerhoff – Photo courtesy of FSU

What is your Sunday morning routine after a home game with Florida State on Saturday and then a home Bucs game?

“My wife and I leave Tallahassee at 6:05 a.m. Anne drives half way and we hit Crystal River and I drive the rest of the way, drop her off at the hotel and get to the stadium about 10:30 a.m. I do the broadcast, come back, spend the night, drive home early on Monday morning because I have a talk show on Monday night at 7:00 p.m. with the head coach at Florida State, so I have to be home early in preparation for that. But that’s your typical home game. Before my wife Anne retired, we would drive down at 6:00 p.m. to the post-game show and then drive home after that and we would get home around 11:00 p.m., so it was a very long day but she’d go to work the next morning at 8:00 a.m. That was a tough road but nine years now we’ve been able to stay overnight and enjoy some great restaurants in the Tampa Bay area and then drive home. Sunday morning after a Florida State game when the Bucs are on the road, now you have to knock on wood that the 6:00 a.m. flight gets you to Atlanta because from Atlanta you can get to anywhere in the universe. Then knock on wood that I’ve been fortunate to be able to make every trip. A couple of games, a Washington Redskins game, there were technical problems delayed and I got there at halftime. Then two years ago we played at Chicago and the ‘Noles played in Louisville so I stayed in Louisville and flew through Minneapolis to Chicago. The plane landed early but the driver got stuck in traffic and he just couldn’t get around. Then we had the wrong parking permit and we ended up going into a parking area where no one could find us. I’ll never forget Linda Ryan, my broadcast manager, she was on a golf cart with a member of the grounds crew and they’re driving all over the stadium and parking areas trying to find me so I got there after the first quarter. So those are two games where we’ve had issues, but knock on wood. I’ve not missed an away game on Sunday or on Monday since I’ve been doing this since 1989. I’ve been fortunate. I’ve been blessed. And yeah, you say a little prayer before you go to bed at night. You say, ‘Help me get up on time, help me get to the plane on time and help me get to the assignment on time.’ So it’s work, but that 6:00 a.m. flight would leave about 7:00 a.m. and hopefully that flight comes back early on Sunday. But then again, what began this conversation, Mark, we began this conversation was about Tom Brady becoming a Tampa Bay Buccaneer. Well, the NFL has given us five prime time games. We have Monday night games, we have Sunday night games and we have a handful of 4:00 p.m. games, so travel has become a little easier because of that. Thank you, Tom Brady! Thank you, NFL! Five prime time games are as many as you’re allowed and the Bucs have five prime time games (for the first time in team history) so that helps.”

CANNON BLAST

Cook’s musings and ramblings about the Buccaneers and the NFL. Good stuff. Check it out.

• In my conversation with Deckerhoff he mentioned the Micheal Spurlock 90-yard kickoff return for a touchdown – the first in franchise history – as one of his favorite moments calling Bucs games. It took a while but I finally found the call on YouTube with first Fox announcer Matt Vasgersian on the call, then Deckerhoff. Enjoy Bucs fans!

•  A few months ago in a previous The Hook column, I joked about Deckerhoff’s Sunday morning routine.

Did y’all know for Bucs home games, radio play-by-play legend Gene Deckerhoff gets up on Sunday morning and drives himself from his Tallahassee home to Raymond James Stadium when Tampa Bay is at home and FSU is also at home the day before?

No custom motor home or limo for the Hoff. It’s Geno in his 1976 burgundy Old Cutlass, a bag of beef jerky, two Tab colas, the Silver Fox, Charlie Rich, on eight-track and U.S. 19 South on Sunday mornings. I have no idea if the last sentence is remotely true. But it makes for a good story.

Well I was wrong. Deckerhoff actually does drive down on Sunday morning, but is isn’t in an Oldsmobile. It is in fact a small RV. And he and his wife Anne share driving duties. They take I-10 down where it meets U.S. 19, then Anne drives down to Crystal River, where Deckerhoff takes over and drives the rest of the way to Raymond James Stadium. I didn’t verify, but I suspect that RV does have an eight-track player however. Charlie Rich, Mel Tillis, some Johnny Cash and a little Marshall Tucker Band for the road.

• With the NFL and the players agreeing on no preseason games it pretty much guarantees a start to the NFL season. From there, who knows? But they should be able to get started.

Teams require rookies and veterans to spend training camp in a team hotel and with the virus lurking everywhere in Florida and other states as well, that is a good thing. Teams can keep an eye on players and it is essentially a “bubble” similar to what the NBA is doing in Orlando. The big test is when the regular season gets set to start and players are allowed to return home and can’t be monitored like they will be during camp.

Maybe by then the virus will be better contained than it is right now. And maybe players will understand the importance and staying home as much as possible in order not to create a spread in the locker room. I still don’t know how the league will get a full 16 games in, but I will continue to keep my fingers crossed.

Last Laugh

• As a kid growing up in Pinecrest, south of Plant City, I hated the Tampa Bay Bandits. The Bucs were awful at the time, and the Bandits were really good. They had a former Gator as head coach in Steve Spurrier so that was another reason to dislike them. But the biggest reason I didn’t like them was all the new Bandit fans who claimed that the Bandits could beat my Buccaneers. Blasphemy. Well, thank goodness the two teams never had a chance to play because looking back on it, they just might have been better than the Bucs back in the 1980s. I’d still favor the 1983 Bucs over the Bandits by at least a touchdown. But after watching the below video, it might have been closer than I would have liked.