The Antonio Brown saga appeared to potentially hit a lull, what with the Steelers out of the playoffs and the dead period of the few weeks before the Super Bowl going on. And then AB decided to tweet through it and things got a little weird.
In fairness to Brown, this all started because Bruce Arians, newly hired as the Buccaneers coach, said he wouldn't really be interested in trading for Brown because AB isn't the same receiver he was back in 2010. "Too much diva," according to Arians.
Twitter is full of tattletales, so someone tagged Brown and included that quote. Brown lives in the Kevin Durant "Petty Zone," so he was reading his mentions and saw the quote. He then quote-tweeted it and decided to fire some shots in the direction of Arians and former Steelers receiver Emmanuel Sanders, now with the Broncos.
Specifically, Brown more or less called Sanders a hypocrite for skipping rehab to appear on NFL Network and say Brown disrespected the Steelers. And then he made fun of Arians' Kangol hats because that apparently makes BA the real diva.
He didn’t draft me he drafted @ESanders_10 same guy who missed rehab to go on networks to talk about me on situation he have zero clue! Arians now wears kangoo hats n glasses 😂 but ima diva! Done seen it all then they say we friends stop lien https://t.co/jALXyhQMAw
— Antonio Brown (@AB84) January 16, 2019
This is not the first time Brown has taken a shot at Arians. The bigger overarching concern for the Steelers is that this does not appear to be a situation that is dying down. Conventional wisdom says the Steelers might hope, despite comments made by owner Art Rooney, that a few weeks removed from the disastrous Week 17 AWOL situation involving Brown and the team, cooler heads could prevail and the team could press on with Brown on the roster rather than part of a trade.
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Brown did request a trade, though, so it does not appear that will be the case. Multiple teams will be interested in trading for Brown -- Jason La Canfora and I highlighted several of them in the latest ep of the Pick Six Podcast below -- and if the Steelers can't figure something out, he's going to get dealt and perhaps Pittsburgh will dip their toe in the first round of the draft for his replacement.
We can probably rule out the Bucs. We can probably also rule out the Broncos, or whatever team Sanders ends up playing for should be released by Denver.
Sanders, naturally, did not just let the comments by AB -- in which he was tagged! -- slide. He fired back at Sanders, saying the Steelers wide receiver needs to "get off the gas yo."
@AB84 😂😂😂😂 you know damn well I didn’t travel to LA to talk about you fam. You trippin yo. I went to be a analyst in which you acting foolish was the topic and I gave my analytical opinion. Get off the gas yo. You did it to yourself
— Emmanuel Sanders (@ESanders_10) January 16, 2019
This probably won't be the last time we write about Brown gaslighting someone on Twitter, whether it be current teammates, former teammates, old coaches, whatever.
What makes this particularly problematic is that Brown apparently has not spoken to/communicated with anyone from the Steelers in an official capacity since before 2019 began. And he's just out here tweeting through it, making public statements as part of a silly beef with an old coach and former teammate instead of working with the Steelers to try and figure out what the situation is and how to resolve it.
That should make anyone following this situation believe that Brown is not long for Pittsburgh.
