If Pittsburgh Steelers beat writers and bloggers can credit wide receiver Antonio Brown with anything this offseason, it is keeping the supply chain of news alive. Of course, that is the natural extension of one of the best players in the entire league ghosting his own team (for the older generation, think the silent treatment).
Brown was busy keeping his situation in the news this past week, even going so far as to post a farewell message to the fanbase on Twitter, while conveniently ignoring the fact that he has three years left on his contract. The only way that he can guarantee for himself that he has played his last down in Pittsburgh would be if he were to retire.
But he is in the process of making it pretty clear that he is done with the Steelers, even if he is going to be meeting with team president Art Rooney II at some point this week. At this point, that appears set up to be a perfunctory clearing of the air, without any likelihood of there being any reconciliation at the end of whatever discussions the two have.
As we have been talking about for the past 24 hours, Brown yesterday took to Twitter to tell…well, part of his story. He said that he would answer 10 questions, but he actually only answered six. For somebody as invested in his own statistics, I’m sure he knows how to count, so likely it was intentional that he stopped short of 10. Either he said what he needed to say or he didn’t get the questions he wanted to answer.
One of the questions he did respond to was whether or not there was any chance he would remain with the Steelers. “Love Steelers Nation”, he said in response, saying they are “everything to my heart”. But he added, “no more!”.
Love Steelers Nation everything to my heart ❤️ no more ! https://t.co/uWwi5mB3R3
— Antonio Brown (@AB84) February 16, 2019
So there you have it. As if posting a literal farewell message wasn’t already enough, Brown told a fan yesterday that he was done with the Steelers, even while maintaining that he loves the fans. He has previously criticized them, however, implying that they didn’t appreciate him.
It has been a tumultuous calendar year for the star player, which included a lot of incidents off the field, both related to football and in his personal life. He has been accused of throwing furniture off a balcony, was found guilty of speeding, accused multiple reporters of being racist, attacked former teammates who criticized him…really, I could go on.
But at the very least, I get the sense that a resolution is near. I would imagine that after meeting with Brown, Rooney will have an answer as to whether or not the Steelers have to trade him, and once they have their answer, the process will begin, and we can all be done with the drama.
