TAMPA, Fla. _ Rob Gronkowski said late Wednesday that he was "joking around" with ESPN SportsCenter host Sage Steele when he suggested he had the Bucs' playbook a month ago while still under contract with the Patriots.
Pro Football Talk reported earlier in the day that "it's possible that the Bucs may have fractured a rule or two" after their new tight end told a YouTube audience over the weekend that he had the team's playbook well before he was traded to Tampa Bay.
That would have meant Gronkowski received a playbook in late March. At that time, he was retired but still under contract with the Patriots. He wasn't traded to the Bucs until April 21.
"I was in a Tampa Bay Buccaneers playbook four weeks ago, and I wasn't even on the team," Gronkowski said Saturday night on the Bud Light Seltzer DrafterParty on YouTube Live, according to Pro Football Talk. "Don't fall for that."
Gronkowski was responding to a comment by Steele that Bengals rookie quarterback and No. 1 overall pick Joe Burrow had "been working with that playbook for weeks, he says, right?"
But Gronkowski said he was trying to joke with Steele when he made his comment.
"This seriously a story?" Gronkowski said in a text message late Wednesday to the Tampa Bay Times that he later posted on his Twitter account. "Lol! I was just joking around with Sage as I was pretty much the whole show that night. But wowsers. My co-hosting skills on point!! Lol!! I actually just received my team-issued Surface today from the Bucs, and it's still in the package and hoping it's all pictures and drawings. I'm pumped to open it one day and follow the arrows to learn where to run to. Hehe."
Six days earlier, Pro Football Talk suggested that rules might have been violated after new Bucs quarterback Tom Brady's visit to the home of offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich was called into question. The visit received national attention because Brady first entered a neighbor's house by mistake.
Earlier this week, it was determined that the visit violated no rules because "it was a brief personal visit, and Tom picked up the playbook," an NFL spokesman said.
Because league facilities remain closed due to the coronavirus pandemic, teams can't conduct offseason organized training activities together. The Bucs began virtual activities this week.
In Gronkowski's first interview with Bucs reporters last week, he said his biggest priority was to get the playbook down but said he hadn't "dived" into it yet.
"I'm very excited to," Gronkowski said. "I'm letting things settle down a little bit."
