Former Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown still isn’t letting go of the war of words with his former team.
Antonio Brown may be with the Oakland Raiders now, but that’s not stopping him from continuing to take shots at his former team.
His latest target is former Pittsburgh Steelers teammate JuJu Smith-Schuster. After Smith-Schuster sent out a tweet complementing Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger on Monday night, Brown responded on Tuesday by seemingly questioning Smith-Schuster’s integrity.
“Do not listen to any NFL player who haven’t got paid yet!,” Brown tweeted this afternoon. “They will do and say anything to make sure they going to get paid even if it’s compromising integrity or anything! sad but true.”
This isn’t the first time the wide receiver has called out his former team. Brown has spent most of the offseason being openly hostile to the Steelers organization with which he spent the first nine years of his career. He called Roethlisberger an “owner” and criticized General Manager Kevin Colbert for saying the other players on the team were like Roethlisberger’s children. Colbert tried to take back those comments, but that wasn’t enough for Brown.
“Of course he tried to clarify because, you know, he stated the truth and he’s going to backpedal on his words,” Brown told ESPN’s Jeff Darlington in February. “But what grown man is calling another grown man a kid? Fifty-two kids. Like, you don’t have no respect for these guys? Like, these are the guys that go to work for you.”
About Roethlisberger, the already-strained relationship between them reached a breaking point when Roethlisberger accused Brown of running a bad route leading to an interception in Week 16. That comment, Brown says, shows what kind of leader Roethlisberger is. “The type of guy he is. He feels like he’s the owner,” Brown said on LeBron James’ HBO show on March 1. “Bro, you threw the shit to the D-lineman! What the f—? I’m over here wide open! You need to give me a better ball!”
The breakup between the two sides became complete when the Steelers traded Brown to Oakland on March 13.
A seven-time Pro Bowler, Brown has 837 receptions and 11,207 yards in his career, the most of any receiver since his rookie season in 2010. His 74 touchdowns during that time trail only the recently retired Rob Gronkowski.