The Pittsburgh Steelers are coming off of a 18-16 win over the Kansas City Chiefs that sends them to an AFC Championship showdown with the New England Patriots next week. Spirits were high in the locker room following the victory, and wide receiver Antonio Brown decided to share that with the world via video.
But putting the postgame celebration on Facebook Live may not have been the wisest idea.
The 17-minute video starts off innocently enough with Brown and his teammates dancing and mugging for the camera, followed by Brown inviting viewers to join them in a team prayer. But then it begins to go off the rails a bit when Mike Tomlin starts talking about the Patriots — and he uses quite a bit of strong language.
Steelers HC Mike Tomlin on Patriots: "We spotted those assholes a day and a half...so be it. We'll be ready for their ass." pic.twitter.com/MB4kLwVgIz
— Rich Hill (@PP_Rich_Hill) January 16, 2017
“When you get to this point in the journey, not a lot needs to be said,” Tomlin says on the video. “Let’s say very little moving forward. Let’s start our preparations. We spotted those assholes a day and a half. They played yesterday, our game got moved to tonight. We gonna touch down at 4 o’clock in the fucking morning. So be it — we’ll be ready for their ass.”
The Steelers-Chiefs game was moved from 1:05 p.m. to 8:20 p.m. ET due to weather. The Patriots beat the Texans Saturday night, giving New England an extra day off rest.
Tomlin’s speech probably wasn’t much different than the way most NFL coaches talk behind closed doors, but he likely didn’t expect it to be shared with the rest of the world.
Brown mentions after Tomlin’s speech that he’s got well over 40,000 viewers watching the video as it’s broadcast live. So even though the video will likely be taken down in the near future, plenty of people saw it.
Several teammates in the video were aware he was filming it, too.
Tom Curran of CSN New England noted that someone, probably a player, can be heard on the video following Tomlin’s speech cautioning players to be careful what they put out on social media this week.
"Keep cool on social media,” they said. “This is about us, nobody else."
Oops.
The league also would like for players to “keep cool on social media,” at least within a specified time frame before and after each game.
NFL policy prohibits players from posting messages on any social media platform 90 minutes before kickoff through post-game interviews.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) January 16, 2017
Brown may well face league discipline for violating that policy.
On Monday, Steelers guard Ramon Foster said he didn’t have any trouble with what Tomlin said about the Patriots.
"As far as I'm concerned, everybody in this league is an a--h---, in my opinion," Foster said, according to ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler. "You have to be to play this sport. Coaches don't become head coaches by being nice guys."
The Steelers will face the Patriots next Sunday with a trip to the Super Bowl on the line, and giving New England a little bulletin board material beforehand probably isn’t the best approach.