Two and a half days after the Buccaneers won a championship on their home field to give Tom Brady his seventh Super Bowl ring, they found a way to celebrate in true Florida fashion. For the city of Tampa, this was a much-needed source of joy in the middle of a pandemic — and one of three boat parades in a span of 10 months, with the Bucs’ title sandwiched between the Lightning’s two Stanley Cup wins.

And wait, Brady did what?

It’s been nearly a year and a half since that memorable February afternoon — 80 degrees and beautiful weather — and we sought to look back on the chaos of the parade and Brady’s unbelievable toss, throwing the Lombardi Trophy from his $2 million boat across open water and into the hands of tight end Cameron Brate on another boat.

“Let me preface any answer I have with: We were consuming alcohol, so my memory is a little hazy on some aspects,” said Brate. “But looking back on it, my wedding and the boat parade are probably the two best days of my life. It really was one of the most fun days I’ve ever had.”

For Bucs coach Bruce Arians, part of two previous Super Bowl parades as a Steelers assistant, the experience was “unbelievable” because of the crowds that showed up after an entire season with restricted attendance.

“It never hit me that we’d won the Super Bowl until we were about halfway down the river and ‘We Are the Champions’ came on, and I’m holding the trophy,” Arians said. “I had tears running down my face. I just said, ‘Play it again.’”

Bucs general manager Jason Licht, who shared a boat that day with Arians, other top assistants and their families, can remember seeing thousands of fans lining both banks of the river, hearing Van Halen’s “On Top of the World” and looking to his wife, Blair, to appreciate how perfect everything was around them.

“To live in that moment, with your family, it was so special. It was so awesome. There’s nothing better,” Licht said. “I looked at my wife and I’m holding the trophy up, and I said, ‘Besides our wedding day, this is the best day of my life.’ And she looked at me and said, ‘Oh, this is way better than our wedding day.’”

When Brady first signed with Tampa Bay in March 2020 and wanted a place for personal workouts with his new receivers, lifelong Bucs fan Bennett Barrow — described as “the Bruce Wayne of Tampa” — helped set him up at his alma mater Berkeley Prep, where Barrow is now on the board. Barrow was there with Brate and receivers Chris Godwin and Scotty Miller when Brady pulled up to campus for the first time in his truck with trainer Alex Guerrero. There were no coaches as they worked out three days a week, and Barrow got to know the players well while proudly wearing a shirt his wife got him that read “WATERBOY.”

As the 2020 season began, Bennett was talking with players about the Lightning’s first boat parade on the Hillsborough River that September, and the challenge was set. The hockey celebration, restricted by COVID-19 protocols, was cool, the players said, but how could they do it better?

“Win me a Super Bowl,” said Barrow, a well-connected boater. “And I’ll throw you a boat parade.”

Fast-forward to the Bucs’ win on a Super Bowl Sunday, with much of Monday serving as one long jubilant afterparty. The Bucs, NFL, Tampa mayor Jane Castor, local police and even the CDC talked much of the day Tuesday. School was out in Hillsborough County that Friday, which would allow more families to attend, but with COVID-19 still going strong, did they want to maximize the crowd, even for an outdoor event?

“We were going back and forth, back and forth — everybody in my conference room, from law enforcement to special events to parks and recreation — batting around ideas,” Castor said. “Then I started getting these power texts from (Bucs co-owner) Darcie Glazer (Kassewitz): ‘Call me quick. Call me quick. Call me now.’ So I called her, and she goes, ‘Listen, we’re having a team meeting tomorrow and then everybody’s going to scatter. We have to do this on Wednesday.’”

The announcement went out Tuesday at 8 p.m. that the parade would be held Wednesday at 1 p.m., while the parties involved worked out how players would float down the parade route in downtown Tampa 17 hours later.

The NFL wanted larger boats, and much of the team ended up on four StarShip yachts, huge 90-foot multi-level ships that usually run dinner cruises, as well as an authentic-looking pirate ship called the “Lost Pearl.” Barrow was tasked with finding a boat for the Berkeley gang, borrowing a neighbor’s 41-foot center-console Valhalla and finding a captain at the last minute. On it would be receivers Godwin, Miller and Mike Evans, as well as tight ends Brate and Tanner Hudson. Also in the group was Anthony DelPercio, Godwin’s brother-in-law and former high school teammate, who was celebrating with Godwin and other players at Seminole Hard Rock Casino in Tampa on Tuesday night.

“I’m in the middle of a hand of blackjack, and Chris was like, ‘Yo, can you text Bennett? Gronk (Rob Gronkowski) wants to be on our boat now,’” DelPercio said. “I wasn’t even thinking and I go to pull my phone out, and the dealer’s like, ‘What the hell are you doing?’ I was like, ‘Oh sh-, I’m sorry. I forgot I’m sitting at a blackjack table.’ So I finish the hand and shoot Bennett a text.”

Bucs players met at the team facility and took buses to where they boarded their boats. DelPercio and the players’ wives and girlfriends met at the Tampa Yacht & Country Club, then went to the Davis Islands home Brady was renting from Yankees great Derek Jeter during his first season in Tampa — a seven-bedroom, 30,000-square-foot mansion affectionately known as “St. Jetersburg.” Brady brought his own boat, in this case a $2 million, 17-ton, 53-foot cobalt-blue yacht named “Viva a Vida,” Portuguese for “live life” and the name of one of his wife Gisele’s charities.

“Brady had asked me if he could have his own boat (in the parade), so I had to call the proper people, say, ‘Can he have his own boat?’ and he could, of course,” Licht said. “He was so excited about it, and that got me jacked up that he was so jacked up about it.”

Everything was on the water that day, including a Coast Guard ship with water cannons that sprayed clear a path at the front of the parade, with Tampa Police and Tampa Fire and Rescue boats all over the procession as well. The media covering the parade had their own boats, and TV stations had helicopters overhead as part of three hours of live midday coverage.

Tampa’s COVID-19 protocols for the parade asked for masks to be worn whenever people weren’t eating or drinking. Many fans countered by drinking nonstop, and the Bucs were no different. Center Ryan Jensen gave every teammate a bottle of Crown Royal, so players got a head start at the team facility.

“All of us are waiting two hours in the locker room for the bus, and we all have four glasses and a bottle of whiskey in our locker, so we started pretty early,” Brate said. “Then I had a celebratory drink with Mayor Jane before we even got to our actual boat. It gets a little fuzzy, but I do remember everything.”

Godwin and DelPercio got Hennessy cognac. Others requested Casamigos, the tequila company co-founded by actor George Clooney. Brate and Miller each brought a case of Bud Light, while Jensen (a Colorado native) carried a case of Coors Light to his boat. Plus there was ample champagne to be sprayed and/or consumed.

“We might have been 15 minutes into the boat parade and the Casamigos was gone and the Hennessy was halfway gone. It was like, ‘Holy sh-, we’re going to run out of drinks,” DelPercio said. “We had plenty of other bottles and beers and seltzers.”

Boat parade pro tip: You can hear TV guy tell cameraman “Stay on Gronk!” … pic.twitter.com/AH0pRz8518

— Greg Auman (@gregauman) February 10, 2021

The “Gronk boat” was the center of the party, with live broadcasts anticipating the moment he went shirtless amid hours of dancing with teammates on the edge of the boat. The only true casualty was Godwin’s phone, which got knocked into the river, prompting Evans to live-stream a request to Verizon for a replacement.

“We told him, ‘Look, Tom, you can have the fancy boat, but we definitely had the best time,” DelPercio said. “People are asking, ‘Are you a player? What position do you play?’ and by now, I’m half a bottle of Hennessy deep, so I was signing autographs at one point. It was hilarious.

“It was almost more exciting that we put it together at the last minute. Some of the best things in life are unplanned. We had no idea how many people would turn out for the city, and it was amazing.”

The now-famous Lombardi Trophy toss was also unplanned, coming just over a half-hour into the parade.

Viva a Vida and the Valhalla had just passed through a drawbridge at the Platt Street Bridge. Brady stood at the stern of his boat, with the receivers at the front of theirs, legs dangling off the bow. Brady’s left hand lay on the football atop the trophy, his right hand under it, and after a few underhand practice swings, he let it fly as his 8-year-old daughter Vivian screamed, “Dad, no!”

Stephen Lynch, the Bucs’ director of production, was on Brady’s boat standing directly next to him, shooting video.

“He had the trophy in his hand, and I’m thinking like, ‘Ha-ha. How long are you going to commit to the bit?’” Lynch said. “The Godwin boat starts to get closer and that gap is closing. Suddenly, for me, it’s like, ‘OK, this is not a bit. Here we go,’ and I’m looking into my lens and I see that red light.

“Thank God you’re recording. Let’s throw this thing.”

“DAD, NO!” 🤣 pic.twitter.com/1MbYqtvRrO

— Tampa Bay Buccaneers (@Buccaneers) February 11, 2021

The trophy did a half-turn in midair, such that when it reached the other boat, the regulation-sized football atop the base landed perfectly in the hands of Brate, who made a steady grab, with Hudson also getting a hand on it.

“It was incredible, like the bottle-flip challenge, with the perfect rotation,” Brate said. “There’s no way he’s ever thrown one before, but it was perfect. It turned over perfectly, and the football portion came right to me. I remember: ‘Holy crap, I got it.’ I lifted it up over my head. It was easy for me.”

“If there’s anybody that you’re going to expect to understand the ergonomics of a Super Bowl trophy and the weight distribution and everything, of course it’s going to be the guy who’s held it the most,” said Lynch. “After the fact, our boat is chuckling and I look at him, and I’m like, ‘You’re a madman, bro,’ and he’s like, ‘Ah, not really. Two things happen. Either Cam catches it, or you’ve got 10 drunk guys diving to the bottom of the river trying to get a trophy.’”

One of the reasons Brady’s Lombardi toss is so celebrated is because there are amazing photos and videos from all angles.

Perhaps the most iconic shot came from Kyle Zedaker, one of the Bucs’ team photographers, who spent the day on the Gronk boat. Zedaker had stopped shooting for a moment as he tried to transmit photos despite an inconsistent wireless signal on a boat in the middle of a huge crowd.

“I hear, ‘The trophy’s coming! The trophy’s coming!’ and I went into full panic mode,” Zedaker said. “It was very fortunate for the moment, having a little spot to sneak in and grab a few shots. Looking at the screen on the back of the camera in broad daylight, I didn’t even know if anything was in focus.”

There’s so much to appreciate in the shot: the trophy perfectly upside-down in midair, the outstretched hands on the receiving end, Brady smiling and his daughter (perfectly framed in between fingers) in full terror.

You just had to be there pic.twitter.com/qbQe5AFtTu

— Tampa Bay Buccaneers (@Buccaneers) March 1, 2021

“I tell Kyle all the time: That photo should win all the awards, ever,” Lynch said. “I’m getting goosebumps talking about it right now. It’s hauntingly beautiful. That trophy being upside-down, Tom in the background, Vivian screaming, the hands reaching out to grab it. It exemplifies the beautiful chaos of that moment.”

That the toss had so many good photos and videos was all the more impressive considering how overpacked the river was that day, with police trying to enforce a difficult perimeter around the boats, especially Brady’s.

“I say this in a fun way, but it was overwhelming,” Lynch said. “It was shoulder to shoulder, standing room only, floating room only, but it was chaotic. I was admiring the restraint of the fans, because there is a Beatles-esque, Bieber-esque, whatever you want to call it, with Brady where you want to rush the stage.”

For local TV stations carrying the parade live, the event created all sorts of logistical challenges, starting with having a boat that can stay in optimal position around the key boats.

WFTS was live from a boat next to Brady’s when he made the throw. “That was the most important catch of the season,” anchor Paul LaGrone said seconds later. A lifelong Bucs fan who called the parade “a mosh pit of boats,” LaGrone said he was so eager to cover the parade that he forgot an attachment he needed to hear producers in his ear.

Here is the video! @TomBrady chucking the Vince Lombardi trophy from boat to boat. Cameron Brate helped catch it and says “Tom Brady delivered, as always.” It was live on @abcactionnews thanks to videographer @BradDavis_WFTS pic.twitter.com/QyJBuZJB38

— Erik Waxler (@erikwaxler) February 10, 2021

“I’m in total disbelief that he did it, and that the guys caught it on the other boat,” LaGrone said. “It was the most joyous moment. It was a perfect day. I knew instantly I was watching a moment in Tampa Bay history … you know this is going to be immortalized forever.

“I’ve been to Iraq, I’ve interviewed presidents. This one tops all of it. It was like meeting Santa Claus for real.”

There remains some question as to whether the Lombardi Trophy would sink or float. In September, ESPN had Randy Moss toss a purportedly real copy of it in the East River on air, and it floated. But everyone involved in Tampa operated as if sinking was a real risk.

“I had no pressure on me in that moment,” Brate said. “If I dropped it, nobody’s like, ‘Cam Brate dropped the trophy.’ It’s all, ‘Tom Brady throws trophy in river.’ But alternate reality, I’d be very curious to see what would happen if it went in the river.”

Brady said in one interview he thought the river was 80 feet deep where the throw was made, echoing something that Pro Football Talk’s Chris Simms, himself a former Bucs quarterback, reported to be the case. But it’s nowhere near 80 feet deep where Brady threw the trophy according to the person whose very job would have been to dive in after the trophy that day, Officer Chris Audet of the Tampa Police Department, who was driving the boat shadowing Brady’s in the parade.

A fellow officer had warned Audet that Brady was taking “a couple little practice rocks” back and forth, and sure enough, as he looked over, the trophy was in the air, flying from boat to boat over open water.

“My first thought was, ‘That is absolutely epic. That is the most amazing thing,’” Audet said. “Simultaneously, I was thinking, ‘Oh my God, if this thing goes in the water, it’s going to be absolute chaos.’ It’d be the coolest thing in the world for me as a diver to go down and get it and come up with the Lombardi Trophy.”

Audet, a Tampa native and lifelong Bucs fan, said the water depth around the Tampa Convention Center, where Brady threw the trophy, is only about 12 to 15 feet depending on the tides. The real issue isn’t depth, but visibility.

“It’s brackish, it’s pitch black,” he said. “The bottom of the basin is all silted, so the trophy would have gone straight down and plugged. It wouldn’t have moved around. But the average swimmer, especially if you’ve been drinking, when it’s completely pitch black, is not going to have any sense of bearing. The concept of everybody jumping in, with boats and propellers, God knows where you come up at.”

One of the day’s most memorable moments came after the parade thanks to Ryan Griffin, who continues a remarkable run as a seldom-used backup, having been with the Bucs since 2015 despite making only four career passes. The image of him holding up a drunken Brady after their boat docked immediately became synonymous with the celebration.

“It was totally unexpected,” Griffin said. “It’s one of those things where it happens, you go through the day, you go to the next day, you wake up and are like, ‘Oh, dang. This is how you go viral.’”

After a private gathering for the team at the Port of Tampa, Licht and his family got a ride home and he crashed hard, falling into a deep sleep. He woke up convinced he had slept through a celebration dinner for the coaches and front office. But it was only 7 and their ride to dinner had just arrived, so he didn’t miss anything.

“It was just an amazing experience,” he said. “I get teary-eyed just thinking about it.”

For the thousands of fans in attendance and more who watched on television and online, the boat parade is one of the most vivid memories of the Super Bowl season. The Bucs will seek another ring for Brady at age 45 this fall, and another win would definitely mean another parade, but it would be hard to match the first, especially for the novelty of Brady’s trophy toss.

“There was no talk about this beforehand,” Brate said. “I thought he was giving us pump-fakes, and all of a sudden, it was in the air. Kind of a bold move in retrospect. I know Tom had a few drinks as well, but all’s well that ends well.”

(Illustration: Sean Reilly / The Athletic; Photos: Mike Ehrmann, Julio Aguilar / Getty Images)