Of the 71 male cheerleaders on 11 NFL teams this season, Randolph Rivera of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers might be the longest-serving.
Rivera, 31, is entering his ninth season as a dancer and stunt team member, with his first four seasons as a member of the Baltimore Ravens coed stunt squad.
He started with the Bucs in 2021 and his fifth season with the team kicks off Sept. 21 when Tampa Bay hosts its first regular season game against the New York Jets. He is one of nine men on the Tampa Bay cheer team.
Rivera, who is gay, will be cheering on the Bucs all season, but his biggest win came when he married the love of his life, Rene Alonso.
“There’s no place in the world I’d rather be than in your arms,” Rivera wrote about Alonso in a post pinned to his Instagram account. “All I want for the future is to keep sharing it with you, I can’t imagine my life without you by my side and I discovered that love is not sought, it finds you when you least expect it.”
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In January, Rivera celebrated his 80th NFL game to close out the regular season. As a dancer and stunt performer, Rivera must be versatile. One minute he’s shaking pom-poms as part of a routine and in another he is performing stunts that take physical strength.
The fact that he can bench press 215 pounds is a good indicator of the strength needed for the job (at the NFL Combine, prospective rookies must bench press 225 pounds for reps).
Tampa Bay Buccaneers cheerleader Randolph Rivera performs during the 2024 season opener against the Washington Commanders at Raymond James Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images
Of the 71 male cheer squad members this season, 26 are listed as being on a stunt team, with 19 of them on the Baltimore Ravens. Stunt teams featuring men have been around in the NFL longer than men who also danced, the latter starting in 2018.
Rivera is not unique in being a male NFL cheer team member, nor in being gay. The Los Angeles Rams, for example, had five out gay cheerleaders in their last Super Bowl appearance. The weird dust-up in August over the Minnesota Vikings having their first two male cheerleaders is a product more of internet culture than anything new happening in the NFL.
“All of us have had experiences like this since the time we started dancing, growing up, far before we became NFL cheerleaders,” Philadelphia Eagles cheerleader Alex Fan told “Good Morning America.” “We know what it feels like to feel that somebody doesn’t support you for simply doing something that you enjoy, and so it’s been really a pleasure to be on a team that has multiple boys [three], where we can fall back on each other.”
What’s most powerful about Rivera is as an example of an out gay man in pro sports who is thriving, happy and in love.
You can follow Randolph Rivera on Instagram.
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