Former Cincinnati Bengals LB Vontaze Burfict has made it very clear over the years that he’s not too fond of the Pittsburgh Steelers. He chirped Joey Porter Jr. after the younger Porter said he grew up hating Burfict, and he obviously delivered a number of dirty hits over the years with Steelers players being the victim. His most notorious was a helmet-to-helmet blow on WR Antonio Brown, and Burfict freely admitted that he would take cheap shots at Steelers players in a video he posted to TikTok on Thursday.
“I didn’t hit people after the play all the time,” Burfict said while streaming Madden. “Just the Steelers.” He then added, “fuck the Steelers.”
Burfict’s Bengals could never get the best of Pittsburgh when it counted, giving away their 2015 Wild Card Round matchup in no small part to Burfict getting hit with an unnecessary roughness flag for the hit against Brown. It’s clear he still harbors bitter feelings over continually getting beaten by Pittsburgh, going 3-7 against them in his career.
One of the most unforgettable memories I have as a Steelers fan is watching JuJu Smith-Schuster absolutely smoke Burfict with a legal block.
I would say that he gave Burfict a taste of his own medicine, but unlike most of the “plays” that Burfict made against Pittsburgh, that one was actually legal. During the 2015 season, Burfict was fined three separate times for hits made against the Steelers, and while he tried to claim that his conduct was reserved for Pittsburgh, let’s not forget his 2019 ejection for an illegal hit when he was a member of the Oakland Raiders, which earned him a season-long suspension.
To give Burfict some credit, he was a solid linebacker, amassing 171 total tackles in 2013 when he was a Pro Bowler and second-team All-Pro. But he faced four different suspensions, three for hits and one for violating the NFL’s policy on performance-enhancing drugs, and his time in the NFL ended after eight seasons.
Now, he streams Madden and Fortnite and tries to take shots at the Steelers. Maybe he’ll have more success against them on the virtual gridiron than he ever did in real life. I guess I’d be bitter too if I had a .300 winning percentage against the team that I despised the most.
