Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers locked up the NFC South crown on Sunday with a dominant 32-6 win over the Panthers, and as such they can turn their attention to trying to reel in the Packers for the No. 1 overall seed in the NFC in the last two games and earn the coveted first-round bye.
One of the reasons Tampa needs some help to get to the top seed in the NFC is their dreadful 9-0 loss to the Saints on Monday Night Football two weeks ago, that created a viral moment from Brady when he was seen on the sidelines smashing one of the Surface tablets they use on the sidelines to watch film and go over pictures in frustration.
It was quite the destruction of a tablet, but also didn’t seem to be worthy of much in the way of official concern for the NFL. However, Brady said he got a warning from the league about his Surface smash, as he said on his “Let’s Go!” podcast with Jim Gray that he’ll catch a fine if he does it again, via ESPN.
“I did get a warning from the NFL,” Brady said. “I can’t throw another Surface or else I get fined. Imagine that! Imagine that.”
Brady said it won’t happen again and offered a semi-apology, while also noting that he thinks it worked out pretty well for Microsoft to get as many people talking about the Surface as he did.
“I won’t throw another Surface,” Brady said. “Although I think it was pretty good marketing for the Surface at the end of the day. I think it worked out pretty well for them.”
It would be pretty funny if he did get fined and it ended up being more than the tablet itself costs, and while it’s easy to promise this on a podcast, it’s another to avoid the temptation of tossing another tablet if the Bucs find themselves in similar future struggles. If nothing else, Microsoft should be thrilled that everyone’s at least calling it a Surface now instead of an iPad, which happened a lot in the early years of their sponsorship.