NFL’s Female Fan Base: Buccaneers ‘RED’ Women’s Movement Alienated Crucial Demographic

Longtime sports journalist Trenni Kusnierek felt as if she’d time-traveled to a long-gone decade when she heard about RED, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ self-described women’s movement.

Although the initiative attempts to “recognize and celebrate” the NFL team’s female fans, it vows, among other things, to help women better understand football and to dole out “gameday style tips.” For many members of the National Football League’s ever-growing female fan base, the Buccaneers’ program represents a fundamental misjudgment of the way women enjoy the sport.

“Event highlights will include an ‘Insider’s Talk’ with Buccaneers General Manager Jason Licht, surprise appearances from Buccaneer legends, game day style tips from local area experts and even a RED Lifestyle Lounge session to educate attendees on the art of incorporating their passion for the Bucs into their other lifestyle interests such as tailgating and home entertaining,” the press release said.

Elements of the Buccaneers’ press release read like “something out of a 1960s housewives magazine,” said Erin Morris, a doctoral candidate at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who studies women’s sports development.

That the Buccaneers feel it necessary to explain a basic football concept to women is indicative of how RED is missing the mark, said Cheryl Cooky, associate professor of women’s, gender and sexuality studies at Purdue University.

Critics are now linking Tampa Bay’s association with Winston to the RED initiative, as further evidence of the franchise’s overall attitude toward women.