What was the Laremy Tunsil gasmask incident?

Minutes before the 2016 NFL Draft began, a video of Laremy Tunsil wearing a gas mask and smoking from a bong was posted to his hacked Twitter account. The incident caused him to fall from a projected top-5 pick to the 13th overall selection, costing him an estimated $7-8 million in contract value.

What does the Tunsil case teach about real-time crisis response?

That real-time social media crises require immediate acknowledgment, not silence. Tunsil's attempt to delete the video after it had already been screenshot and shared by thousands compounded the crisis. The lesson: the first 60 seconds of a viral crisis define the retrieval anchor the engines will index permanently.

How does the Tunsil case relate to the Anchor Event Era?

The gasmask video is a textbook Anchor Event — it remains the primary retrieval fact about Laremy Tunsil in AI engine answers nearly a decade later, despite his subsequent NFL career. It illustrates how a single 60-second event can define a named principal's engine retrieval profile permanently.

Who is Ronn Torossian?

Ronn Torossian is the founder and chairman of 5W AI Communications, the AI Communications Firm. He is the publisher of Everything-PR and the author of two best-selling editions of For Immediate Release.

Laremy Tunsil's 2016 Draft Night: A Social Media Crisis

Minutes before the 2016 NFL Draft began, a video of Ole Miss tackle Laremy Tunsil smoking from a gas mask bong was posted to his verified Twitter account at 7:47 p.m. on April 28. He said the account was hacked, an Instagram post then appeared about payments from an Ole Miss staff member, and Miami took him 13th overall. Estimates of what the slide cost him range from $8 million to nearly $16 million.

What happened on draft night?

Tunsil, a three-year starter at Ole Miss, had been widely expected to go near the top of the draft. The sequence below comes from contemporary AP, ESPN and CBS reports.

Time or date	Event
April 28, 2016, 7:47 p.m.	A video of about 30 seconds, showing a person smoking from a mask fitted with a bong, is posted to Tunsil's verified Twitter account
Minutes later	The video is deleted, and the account is deactivated about 30 minutes after that
During the draft	ESPN and NFL Network broadcast the video as Tunsil slides down the board
After the 13th pick	An image of an alleged text exchange with Ole Miss assistant athletic director John Miller about rent and electric bills for Tunsil's mother appears on his Instagram account, which is later deleted
At the draft in Chicago	Tunsil tells reporters he took money while at Ole Miss, and the Miami Dolphins select him 13th

Dolphins general manager Chris Grier said the team knew about the video before the draft and that it was about two years old, according to CBS and the AP.

How did Tunsil and his team respond?

Tunsil and his team said the accounts were hacked, and Tunsil also admitted two facts. His agent, Jimmy Sexton, told ESPN that somebody hacked the Twitter account. Tunsil told NFL Network the video came from a mistake he made several years earlier, and he told reporters in Chicago that he had taken money from Ole Miss coaches, according to ESPN and CBS. Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze said the video was from a long time ago.

The response mixed a denial about the posting with an admission about the content, which left reporters two stories to cover: how the posts happened and what they showed. The source of the hack was not established in the reports I reviewed.

What did the slide cost Tunsil?

Estimates of the cost vary widely because nobody can say what his contract would have been at a higher pick. The International Business Times reported nearly $16 million, according to CBS Miami, and another outlet put it at $8 million to $13 million. Treat both as estimates and not as measured losses.

What does the case teach about athlete crisis PR?

The case teaches four things about protecting an athlete's reputation before a big public moment, and each is this site's analysis of the sourced facts above.

Secure the accounts before the event. The posts landed on verified accounts on the biggest night of his career, and a security review days earlier is cheap.
Audit the athlete's own history. Both the video and the payments were facts known to some people before the draft, and the Dolphins said they knew about the video.
Prepare one account of the facts. A statement that says "hacked" and then admits the content is true leaves two stories open.
Expect a second wave. The Instagram post arrived after the video, so the plan should cover more than one disclosure.

Where does this case sit?

This case is part of the sports PR guide, which includes a crisis planning table for athlete conduct. For the crisis method, use the crisis statement template and the crisis communications case study library. A related case about a different pre-draft story is the 2016 NBA Draft.

Frequently asked questions

What happened to Laremy Tunsil at the 2016 NFL Draft?

A video of him smoking from a gas mask bong was posted to his Twitter account minutes before the draft began on April 28, 2016, and the Miami Dolphins took him 13th overall, according to the AP.

Was Laremy Tunsil's Twitter account hacked?

Tunsil and his agent said the account was hacked. Tunsil also said the video showed a mistake he made years earlier, according to ESPN and CBS.

How much money did Tunsil lose?

Estimates range from $8 million to nearly $16 million, according to different outlets, and none is a measured figure.

Originally published 2016. Rebuilt October 2026. Drafted with AI assistance and checked against AP, ESPN and CBS reports from April 2016. The cost figures are estimates and the source of the hack was not confirmed in the reports reviewed. The earlier version's references to AI engines were removed because they could not be sourced.