Bucs investigating threatening tweets from a Florida man who was angry about their draft picks

Yes, this headline is real! The NFL Draft wrapped up Saturday, and there’s an odd story coming out from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ camp. The team’s security is looking into a threatening tweet from a Bucs fan that was directed to general manager Jason Licht.

In the first round, Tampa traded down from No. 7 overall to No. 12 with the Bills, and selected defensive tackle Vita Vea out of Washington. The Bucs could have selected Florida State safety Derwin James, who went to the Los Angeles Chargers, which made one particular fan pretty unhappy. The Tampa Bay Times has more:

On Friday night, shortly after the Bucs selected North Carolina defensive back M.J. Stewart with the No. 53 overall pick in the second round, Rogers posted a series of angry tweets, including one that appeared to cross the line.

The tweet featured a GIF of a murder scene from the 1990 film King of New York depicting a drug lord killing a New York City Police Department narcotics officer with blood splattering inside the vehicle.

Rogers, using his Twitter handle @LuvDemNoles22, wrote above the GIF: ”When I see Jason Licht next time I roll through Tampa.”

Now to be clear here, threatening someone in any way is not OK, but there’s a pretty good chance Rogers wasn’t being serious here. On that note — oh, my God, I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything more Florida than @LuvDemNoles22, and it’s glorious. As for Rogers, he told the newspaper he wasn’t actually serious when he sent it.

“Yes, that was a total exaggeration,” Rogers told the Tampa Bay Times. “Just caught up in the moment. It was just a tasteless tweet. I’m not a psychopath.”

For now, it looks like Rogers’ Twitter account has been suspended, which isn’t all that surprising — Twitter has a feature that allows users to call out harassment or threats, which would constitute as what he did, even if he was joking.

And to be fair, the Bucs taking Vea was a bit surprising, given that safety is a much bigger need for them as opposed to defensive line.

Rogers lives in Houston, but grew up in Naples, according to the newspaper, so he fits the Florida Man criteria here.

We’ll update this with any further, or weird, developments.