Former Pittsburgh Steelers WR Antonio Brown needed Tom Brady to finally claim his Super Bowl trophy—the one he wished he could have won with Ben Roethlisberger. While his behavior at the end of his tenure is inexcusable, his drive for greatness was also unquestionable. That’s something former Steelers LS Kameron Canaday touched on recently in discussing their relationship.
Boiling it down to a single point, Brown felt frustrated that Roethlisberger didn’t work as hard as he did. And at least where everybody can see, Roethlisberger certainly did not work as hard. The two players were at different points of their careers, but Roethlisberger has always wielded that reputation.
Antonio Brown, on the other hand, only got to this point through an immense amount of hard work. That coupled with his desire to win a Super Bowl precluded him from giving 100 percent when necessary. And Aditi Kinkhabwala, asked about Canaday’s comments, said that her own discussions with Brown corroborate that story.
“I do very clearly recall having a conversation with Antonio Brown where he was expressing frustration that the quarterback wasn’t putting in the same amount of work or time or hours, in his view, in his perception, as perhaps other players were, himself included”, she said on 93.7 The Fan—for some reason coyly maneuvering around citing Ben Roethlisberger by name.
“I remember this so clearly because I remember having to say to him, ‘The rules aren’t the same for everyone. This is just the way the world works’”, she said of her discussions with Brown. “For Antonio, I think he really struggled to accept that the star quarterback… could sort of do things the way he wanted to do or didn’t have to do things the way the wide receiver wanted to do them”.
But “that’s never how Mike Tomlin runs things”, she rightly pointed out, and Brown benefited as well. Roethlisberger got special treatment, but so did Brown, particularly with regard to training camp accommodations. They even broke precedent for him by forwarding future money into earlier years.
And we can’t forget about Brown’s increasingly erratic behavior, or the fact that he initiated his exit from Pittsburgh. He forced the Steelers to trade him, a move he probably regrets in hindsight. None of that explains his non-payment of employees, tossed furniture, sexual misconduct, or assault. There is no question that he has had his own host of issues, though he has been working through them.
For a player who worked as hard as Brown did, however, one could see how Roethlisberger’s workout regimen might leave him a bit cold. Other wide receivers have left and talked more glowingly about the work habits of other quarterbacks, most notably Emmanuel Sanders. And perhaps other pressures on Brown to win only exacerbated matters.
Kinkhabwala told a story about how Brown kept a John Stallworth (or Lynn Swann) jersey near his locker, autographed, over the four Super Bowls. “I remember Antonio telling me, ‘That’s what I want now’’. Yet she also recalls Mike Tomlin telling Brown, “You’re done with all the individual stuff right now. The only thing that you should be hunting is Lombardi Trophies”.
Once again, none of this excuses Antonio Brown’s behavior. Nevertheless, it’s an interesting dynamic when reconsidering the history of the Killer Bs era of the Steelers. So much of the discussion focuses on the missed opportunities. But perhaps for guys like Brown, they place a lot of the blame on “fat and sassy” Ben Roethlisberger. He secured his legacy before they were even in the league, and then he practiced 1.5 days per week.
