There are few movie genres at present more enervating and ubiquitous than sports documentaries. It is not just that they tend to be unenlightening Wikipedia-style histories and aesthetically uninteresting but that they are often made with the blessing if not involvement of their subjects to ensure maximum humdrum hagiography. When the six-part documentary chronicling one of the most unexciting big-name athletes of our age, Derek Jeter, was announced, I pitched some potential projects to spur us to the conclusion of the boring sports documentary boom sooner rather than later. Among my ho-hum ideas was a six-part documentary about NFL journeyman quarterback Dave Krieg. I proposed six parts because Krieg played for six teams during his career, none of which were the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. And the only thing that might be more dull than a six-part Dave Krieg documentary would be a 10-part documentary on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, a franchise that feels closer in a historical professional gridiron sense to the USFL’s Tampa Bay Bandits (whose former players the Buccaneers briefly employed during the strike season of 1987) than the NFL’s Cowboys, Packers, or Steelers. And yet, a 10-part documentary on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, “Raise the Flags,” presented by Skydance Sports and Prime Video Sports will begin streaming next Thursday, December 11th, on Amazon Prime.
A documentary about the Tampa Bay Buccaneers sounds like a documentary about the Minnesota Timberwolves, frankly, a pitch I have also made, and a franchise that much like the Bucs feels less known for anything of consequence than known for an all-around haplessness. True, Tampa Bay has won a pair of Super Bowls, but their first was a game the veteran NFL scribe Paul Zimmerman used one word - “Bleeaugh!” - to summarize and the Pandemic Super Bowl. No, if Tampa Bay has a claim to fame, it is losing the first 26 games they played as an expansion franchise christened in 1976, or maybe it is their old creamsicle jerseys, which deserve one whole episode in this thing, at least. “The rest of it,” Ray Ratto wrote of Buccaneer history at Defector, “is just a collection of 7-9 seasons with a playoff loss every three years or so on average. Decades of that.” I mean, that is essentially a sports documentary pitch that I would make!
Studio Head: “So, how exactly do you see this movie?”
Me: “As a collection of 7-9 seasons with a playoff loss every three years or so on average. Decades of that.”
Studio Head: “That doesn’t sound so exciting.”
Me: “Oh, God, no. But excitement isn’t what we’re looking for here.”
Studio Head: “Well, will Tom Brady be involved?”
Me: “I don’t really see him as the archetypal Bucs quarterback.”
Studio Head: “Who’s the archetypal Bucs quarterback?”
Me: “Steve DeBerg.”
Studio Head: “Steve DeBerg???”
Me: “Do you think we can get him to sit for an interview?”
Will “Raise the Flags” finally end the sports documentary as we know it? If I had one Christmas wish...