Twitter trolling between professional teams is standard behavior these days, but some of it is more successful than others.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers exhibited a bit of both worlds on Monday, as they first posted the team’s attempt to capitalize on a gadget-of-the-moment:
These are going FAST! Check out the official #Buccaneers Fidget Spinner at our online store!
SHOP NOW: https://t.co/dp3Q13TNhL pic.twitter.com/RS2eoAKjFg
— Tampa Bay Buccaneers (@Buccaneers) May 22, 2017
Side note: I saw an elementary-aged kid with a fidget spinner the other day, and I asked him if he though it helped. He said, and I quote: “Not really. It’s supposed to reduce stress, but instead it adds stress because you’re just worried the teacher will take it away.”
That was both funny and sad.
Anyway, the Bucs’ NFC South rival Atlanta Falcons posted a reply, which also probably falls on the lower end of the team Twitter trolling success scale:
Are you nervous about something? pic.twitter.com/i6S4ExDCLF
— Atlanta Falcons (@AtlantaFalcons) May 22, 2017
Now, the Falcons are perhaps not the team that should be attempting to dish out troll tweets, and the Bucs quickly demonstrated why that is:
https://twitter.com/TBBuccaneers/status/866711443449794561
Oh, that’s so good. Just so good. The timestamp is fantastic; I like to imagine the Bucs social media people searching for just the right picture for an hour, then jumping around for joy once they found it.
Of course, because we can’t have nice things in this world, Tampa Bay head coach Dirk Koetter took the unusual step of acknowledging the tweet en route to apologizing for it:
“I want to make sure on behalf of the Bucs organization that I apologize to the Falcons for whatever that was supposed to be that went out on social media,” Koetter said. “That’s not what our organization is about.”
He went on:
“That was totally unprofessional and not smart on our part, whoever was responsible for that,” Koetter said. “Heck, we wanted to be playing in the Super Bowl, and we were home sitting on our butts while they were playing. We’ve got no room to make fun of anybody that was in the Super Bowl, whether they won or not.”
Okay, so a few things. Koetter’s general point isn’t actually a bad one; it’s always infuriating when players or fans of teams that miss the playoffs spend the postseason being critical of more successful participants.
However, he’s misinterpreting the entire social media culture here. It’s only tangentially connected to the product on the field, and there aren’t really any written or unwritten rules beyond “be funny.” It’s also probably not a great precedent to acknowledge things like these, and he’s also calling out an employee when there’s no chance Koetter has a full understanding of what that employee is getting paid to do. (The fact that the team hasn’t yet deleted the tweet probably shows that, as well.)
In short: loosen up, Dirk. You wear a visor for a living—maybe don’t take things so seriously.
[ESPN]
