Bonded with a young fan in a bad situation.

On face value, it irks Joe that it seems the Bucs franchise does less and less to try to connect with fans each year.

For years the team had a fanfest. They did away with that only to replace it with a night practice at the stadium. Then they did away with that claiming due to the stadium renovations, it couldn’t be held there.

(Joe noticed over the weekend at least three NFL teams holding night practices/scrimmages at their home stadiums and at least a fourth at a local college’s home stadium.)

To make matters worse, the Bucs limited open practices at training camp this year to six and did away with the covered bleachers, so fans could roast — and stand — under the brutal Florida summer sun. It is almost like the Bucs are pushing fans away (trust Joe, no playoff games since Chucky was jettisoned is doing a fine job as it is in alienating the fanbase).

Well, the Bucs did something Monday that should warm the hearts of anyone that is not a tackling dummy.

Recently, a local high school football player had an accident that left him with life-altering injuries. Mark Cook of Pewter Report writes how the Bucs tried to make at least one of the young man’s cumbersome days a little easier.

June 29th was a typical day in the life of Kolton Smith, an upcoming senior at Durant High School who was an offensive line starter. He had just left his girlfriend’s house to head back home and his wheel went off the road. As a young and fairly new driver, he did what many of us have done and overcorrected. His Ford F-150 flipped and Smith was ejected. Surprisingly he didn’t have many superficial wounds on his body, but he couldn’t move. Conscious, he was able to give a good samaritan his mother’s phone number who dialed the phone for him.

The Bucs hosted Smith and his teammates and treated him like a dignitary. He and his teammates got to hang out with Bucs players and got a tour of the entire One Buc Palace compound — even got to watch the local pen and mic club eat Sloppy Joes with carrots and rice.

It was a pretty cool scene.

Props to Team Glazer and the Bucs for doing something kind and generous for a young man in need.