In last night’s Sunday Night Football game between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the New Orleans Saints, a rare shutout loss for a Tom Brady led team as the Saints won 9-0, the storied quarterback took out some frustrations on yet another Surface tablet:
Microsoft’s Surface tablets taking a beating in the NFL again. “Not an official drop test” says @panos_panay ???? https://t.co/M482Xxt4OU pic.twitter.com/BFN0CA5WWF
— Tom Warren (@tomwarren) December 20, 2021
(thanks to Tom Warren for the tweet, even though it’s not really his brand of “football!”)
Brady had just thrown a late interception and was not happy with the results as he checked the play on the Surface. The NFL has been using prominently branded Surfaces on the sidelines since 2013, and the bright blue tablets are hard to miss. Ex-Microsoft exec Brian Hall recently reminisced about the beginnings of the partnership, and the eventual positive outcome having TV announcers refer to them as “iPads.”
In another famous display of displeasure (note: both were upset with the plays, not the Surfaces), another NFL quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, also famously threw his tablet away in disgust. In the words of an old adage, though, “all PR is good PR!”
