{"id":21102,"date":"2013-05-09T15:44:26","date_gmt":"2013-05-09T19:44:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=21102"},"modified":"2013-05-09T15:44:26","modified_gmt":"2013-05-09T19:44:26","slug":"buccaneers-great-ronde-barber-calls-it-a-career-after-16-seasons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=21102","title":{"rendered":"Buccaneers Great Ronde Barber Calls It A Career After 16 Seasons"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>After 16 NFL seasons, five Pro Bowl selections, a Super Bowl title and 47 career interceptions, <strong>Ronde Barber<\/strong> has decided to call it a career.<\/p>\n<p>The Tampa Bay Buccaneers cornerback-turned-safety will retire Wednesday, according to his broadcast and marketing agent, <strong>Mark Lepselter<\/strong>, president of Maxx Sports and Entertainment. Lepselter added that <strong>Ronde<\/strong> \u201cis at peace with his decision.\u201d \u201cI\u2019ve had a better run than I ever could\u2019ve dreamed of having,\u201d <strong>Barber<\/strong> said earlier in the day.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s an end to what many think will wind up being a Hall of Fame career that began when he was drafted in the third round in 1997 \u2014 one round later than his twin brother <strong>Tiki<\/strong>, who was selected by the New York Giants. <strong>Barber <\/strong>is the only player in league history with 40 or more interceptions and 20 or more sacks. <strong>Barber\u2019s <\/strong>14 non-offensive touchdowns rank him fourth on the all-time list behind<strong> Deion Sanders<\/strong> (19), <strong>Devin Hester<\/strong> (18) and <strong>Rod Woodson<\/strong> (17).<\/p>\n<p><strong>Barber<\/strong>, 38, is walking away despite the Bucs\u2019 being open to his return in 2013. The team signed safety <strong>Dashon Goldson<\/strong> as a free agent and acquired cornerback <strong>Darrelle Revis<\/strong> in a trade with the New York Jets.<strong> Barber<\/strong> officially made the move from corner to safety before last season and had four interceptions, including one he returned 78 yards for a touchdown in a blowout victory against the Kansas City Chiefs.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Barber\u2019s<\/strong> most famous interception return for a touchdown, though, was his 92-yarder to seal the NFC Championship Game victory against the Philadelphia Eagles in January 2003. The Bucs went on to beat the Oakland Raiders 48-21 in Super Bowl XXXVII.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After 16 NFL seasons, five Pro Bowl selections, a Super Bowl title and 47 career interceptions, Ronde Barber has decided to call it a career. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers cornerback-turned-safety will retire Wednesday, according to his broadcast and marketing agent, Mark Lepselter, president of Maxx Sports and Entertainment. Lepselter added that Ronde \u201cis at peace [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":210,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","pmpro-has-access"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/210"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21102\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}