Jason Brian Odom (born March 31, 1974) is an American former college and professional football player who was an offensive tackle in the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

(NFL) for four seasons during the 1990s. Odom played college football for the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

and received unanimous All-American honors. He played professionally for the NFL's

Tampa Bay Buccaneers The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are a professional American football team based in Tampa, Florida. The Buccaneers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) South division. The cl ...

Early years

Odom was born in

Winter Haven, Florida Winter Haven is a city in Polk County, Florida, United States. It is fifty-one miles east of Tampa. The population was 49,219 at the 2020 census. According to the U.S. Census Bureau's 2019 estimates, this city had a population of 44,955, making ...

in 1974. He attended Bartow High School in Bartow, Florida,

College career

Odom accepted an athletic scholarship to attend the

in Gainesville, Florida, where he was an offensive lineman for coach Steve Spurrier's

Florida Gators football The Florida Gators football program represents the University of Florida (UF) in American college football. Florida competes in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the Eastern Division o ...

team from 1992 to

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The Great Hanshin earthquake str ...

.
2011 Florida Gators Football Media Guide
'', University Athletic Association, Gainesville, Florida, pp. 88, 93, 97, 102, 125, 184 (2011). Retrieved August 31, 2011. Odom was a four-year starter, a senior team captain in 1995, a first-team All-

Southeastern Conference The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an American college athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central and Southeastern United States. Its fourteen members include the flagship public universities o ...

(SEC) selection in

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which sank in the Baltic Sea; Nelson ...

and 1995, and a unanimous first-team All-American in 1995. In his four years as a Gator, the team won three consecutive SEC championships (

1993 File:1993 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Oslo I Accord is signed in an attempt to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict; The Russian White House is shelled during the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis; Czechoslovakia is peacefu ...

), and played for a

Bowl Alliance The Bowl Alliance was an agreement among college football bowl games (specifically the Sugar, Orange, and Fiesta Bowls) for the purpose of trying to match the top two teams in a national championship game and to provide quality bowl game match ...

national championship in the

1996 Fiesta Bowl The 1996 Tostitos Fiesta Bowl game was a post-season college football bowl game which served as the Bowl Alliance's designated national championship game for the 1995 college football season. Played on January 2, 1996, at Sun Devil Stadium in Te ...

. He was also the recipient of the SEC's

Jacobs Blocking Trophy The Jacobs Blocking Trophy is the name of several similar annual college football awards bestowed by a conference upon their best blocker. The awards are named in honor of William P. Jacobs, founder and president of Presbyterian College from 1935 t ...

, recognizing the best blocker in the SEC, in 1994 and 1995. Odom graduated from Florida with a bachelor's degree in exercise and sports science in 1996. In one of a series of articles written for ''The Gainesville Sun'' in 2006, the newspaper's sports editors selected him as No. 28 of the top 100 Gators from the first 100 years of Florida football. He was inducted into the

University of Florida Athletic Hall of Fame The University of Florida Athletic Hall of Fame includes over 300 former Florida Gators athletes who represented the University of Florida in one or more intercollegiate sports and were recognized as "Gator Greats" for their athletic excellence ...

as a "Gator Great" in 2010.

Professional career

Odom was chosen in the fourth round (ninety-sixth pick overall) of the 1996 NFL Draft by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and played offensive tackle for the Buccaneers for four seasons from to . He started forty-one of the forty-six Buccaneers games in which he played. He was placed on injured reserve on August 27, 2000, ending his career.

Life after football

Odom has served as a Hillsborough County Sheriff's Deputy in

Tampa, Florida Tampa () is a city on the Gulf Coast of the United States, Gulf Coast of the U.S. state of Florida. The city's borders include the north shore of Tampa Bay and the east shore of Old Tampa Bay. Tampa is the largest city in the Tampa Bay area and ...

since 2008.Thomas W. Krause, "Ex-Buc, Veteran Become Deputies", ''The Tampa Tribune'', Metro Section, p. 5 (July 12, 2008).

References

Bibliography

* Carlson, Norm, ''University of Florida Football Vault: The History of the Florida Gators'', Whitman Publishing, LLC, Atlanta, Georgia (2007). . * Golenbock, Peter, ''Go Gators! An Oral History of Florida's Pursuit of Gridiron Glory'', Legends Publishing, LLC, St. Petersburg, Florida (2002). . * Hairston, Jack, ''Tales from the Gator Swamp: A Collection of the Greatest Gator Stories Ever Told'', Sports Publishing, LLC, Champaign, Illinois (2002). . * McCarthy, Kevin M.,
Fightin' Gators: A History of University of Florida Football
', Arcadia Publishing, Mount Pleasant, South Carolina (2000). . * Nash, Noel, ed., ''The Gainesville Sun Presents The Greatest Moments in Florida Gators Football'', Sports Publishing, Inc., Champaign, Illinois (1998). . {{DEFAULTSORT:Odom, Jason 1974 births Living people Sportspeople from Winter Haven, Florida Players of American football from Florida American football offensive tackles Bartow High School alumni Florida Gators football players All-American college football players Tampa Bay Buccaneers players