New York Post

YOU’VE GOTTA BE GRIDDING

Oops, NFLer in teen chat

- By PAULINA DEDAJ

A Michigan high-school basketball team was organizing practices when someone accidental­ly included a wrong number in the group text. What happened next is something the kids will remember for the rest of their lives.

Vinny Tartaglia, a member of the Notre Dame Prep freshman basketball squad, was adding his teammates’ numbers to the text last week when he accidental­ly added the wrong number.

What he didn’t realize was that the wrong number belonged to Tampa Bay Buccaneers cornerback Sean Murphy-Bunting.

“We were trying to add people, and the last person was Luca, but I was one digit off,” Tartaglia told ClickonDet­riot.com.

Murphy-Bunting responded by asking if the boys meant to add him to the chat and, thinking he was their teammate Luca, the teens said yes.

Seemingly amused by the boys’ confusion, the NFL player asked them if they knew who he was and he quickly revealed his identity.

He even sent a selfie in the Bucs locker room to prove it, but the boys weren’t buying it.

“Everyone was skeptical — it’s definitely not an NFL player, right?” Tartaglia told the outlet.

That’s when Murphy-Bunting decided to FaceTime the group.

Tight end Rob Gronkowski, cornerback Richard Sherman and running back Leonard Fournette all hopped on the call and, eventually, Tom Brady made an appearance.

“They were shocked,” Fournette told ESPN Wednesday. “I think that’s . . . to guys in high school, Tom is the figure for them. You know what I mean? Who wouldn’t want to look up to a guy like that?”

“That was sweet,” Brady (inset) added of the call. “I didn’t know who it was. [Leonard] said, ‘Here’s my boy’ or whatever he said. It was nice. It would have been nice for me when I had been in high school, too.”

School counselor P. Jason Whalen, whose son is also on the team, took to Twitter to share screenshot­s of the call.

“I can’t believe they took the time to entertain Colin and his teammates. I’m sure they had a good time laughing at the fact that the Super Bowl champs got randomly added to a freshman basketball team group chat,” his tweet said.

Murphy-Bunting eventually ended the call and gave the team some words of encouragem­ent: “Ball out this season!”

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