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Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Life After Football: Martin Gramatica

Martin Gramatica had a great career as a kicker in the National Football League. What's he up to now?

Martin Gramatica scored 12 points in the Buccaneers' Super Bowl victory over the Raiders in 2003.

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"I definitely didn't have a plan," Gramatica said. "I really didn't want to coach football. I didn't want to go that route just for the fact that when you win the Super Bowl, there's not much more you can achieve beyond that in that sport."

Not only did Gramatica win a Super Bowl, he was instrumental in the Buccaneers' 48-21 victory over the Raiders in 2003. He scored 12 points, tied for the team lead, and kicked the go-ahead field goal in the second quarter.

It was part of a five-year career Gramatica enjoyed with the Buccaneers after being selected by the team in the third round of the 1999 NFL Draft out of Kansas State.

So when he booted his final football in 2008, and after a lifetime of kicking, he found himself in an unfamiliar situation.

"I thought about maybe coaching soccer, that was what I grew up playing," Gramatica said. "So that was one option."

"And then, something came about – we started this construction company. It started as more of a charity to help re-build homes for victims of Hurricane Katrina. We wanted to figure out a way to help re-build the city, so that was where we started our company that we do now – the energy efficient panels."

By "we", Gramatica means he and his two brothers, Bill and Santiago, both former kickers as well. The three formed Gramatica SIPS, a piggy-back off of his initial project to help re-build homes in New Orleans. The company designs and manufactures air-tight insulation panels for homes.

"We supply the materials for the shell of a home," Gramatica said. "It saves the builder money on the construction site but the residual savings are for the home owner. Our products cut energy costs by as much as fifty percent."

It's something that Gramatica, admittedly, knew almost nothing about when he got involved. But he likes the challenge.

"I knew I wanted to do something in business totally opposite of sports," Gramatica said. "Something where you're learning every day. I didn't want to go into something comfortable, something I knew. I wanted to do something totally different."

"I grew up on a farm, so growing up on a farm you learn a little bit of everything. But construction was something we never did. Every day we learn something new and we get to meet new people and talk to new people and customers. You never know what to expect so that's what I love about it."

Outside his successful construction business, Gramatica, who still lives in the Tampa area, remains involved with Buccaneers charity events and enjoys coming back to games.

He also helps build homes for veterans injured in the line of duty, and will assist in the building of a new home on Jan. 19.

But Gramatica spends most of his free time coaching his two son's soccer teams and attending their sporting events.

"My number one hobby is my family and my kids," Gramatica, who has two young sons and a daughter, said. "They play baseball and soccer so we spend pretty much six to seven days a week at a soccer or a baseball field. That's pretty much what I really enjoy doing. I didn't take up golf when I was playing, there's no chance I'm taking up golf now."

He and his brothers coached a kicking camp for a few years after he retired, but they don't anymore. And his children are too young to play football.

Nowadays, Gramatica isn't really involved in football. But that might not last for long.

"My sons, they love soccer and baseball now but they tell me they eventually want to be kickers when they get older, just like me."

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