Dear 813Preps Readers,

Welcome to high school baseb… wait I mean football season in the 813!

My name is Rick Cantor and I am a staff writer here at 813Preps. If you are a regular reader of our site, you may be wondering what we are doing here. In its six years of existence, our site has become the go-to spot for all things Hillsborough County baseball.

And only baseball.

So again, what are we doing here as the high school football regular season is about to begin?

For starters, we at 813Preps are big football fans, and the quality of high school football in the 813 is simply too good to ignore.

The talent-rich pool of players, the top-notch coaching and the success of our Hillsborough County programs has been just too good for us to continue to leave uncovered. Last year was a great example of this, as Tampa Bay Tech and Berkeley Prep reached the state final, and Jesuit won its second state title in school history.

On a personal note, high school football is a passion of mine. It has been since I went to a game as a nine-year-old to watch a friend’s brother play. I had been to NFL games, but there was something so neat about seeing people you know play in the game.

After playing four years as a mediocre undersized lineman on mediocre team, I assumed that I was done with the prep game. That changed a decade ago as the Tampa Bay Times needed additional personnel to cover the 30 plus games they covered each week at the time.

Although I had no formal journalism credentials, my information ended up on the editor’s desk, and three weeks later I was on the sideline covering a Dunedin vs Clearwater game and rediscovering my passion for the high school game.

Now that you know the why, the next question might be what will our football coverage look like?

Well … the truth is we are not really sure, yet.

Our plan for this first year is to cover one 813Preps Gridiron Game of the Week involving Hillsborough County teams.

Prior to Friday’s slate each week, we’ll give you five games that you should be keeping an eye on, and a small recap on Saturday of any interesting action from Friday night.

Readers of our site know that we like to spread the love to the entire county, and we will publish a weekly notebook with interesting tidbits while trying to provide a feel for the season on a countywide level. We strongly encourage coaches (and coaches only at this time) to reach out with stories on players that they would like to share.

Who knows what our football coverage will morph into, but for now we are pumped up for those Friday night lights, and we hope that you will give our football coverage a try.

Thank you,
Rick Cantor
Staff writer
813Preps.com