The kickoff to the new National Football League season is still more than a month away, but one player—Tom Brady, alleged deflator of footballs—has already taken some serious hits. And he's showing companies with data-packed devices that there are potential penalties for e-discovery fumbles.

The “Deflategate” controversy that has swirled around the New England Patriots quarterback since the beginning of the year has not let up, and it only intensified this past week with news that his appeal of a four-game suspension resulting from the allegations was denied by the NFL. The most potentially damning part of the news was the revelation that Brady had destroyed his cellphone and bought a new one right on or around the day he spoke with investigators from Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison for their Deflategate probe. The phone contained thousands of text messages potentially relevant to the case, and its destruction seems to be a large part of why the NFL feels justified in keeping Brady off the field this fall.

Brady is certainly not the first person to ditch a mobile phone he no longer wanted. However, when there is work-related data on a phone (or any other electronic device), everyone from Super Bowl champion to regular corporate employee should be very careful about how and when it's done. If the data on these devices ever becomes part of an e-discovery request and is not preserved, there could be a flag on the play.