The Tampa Bay Buccaneers' 2020 season was one to remember, and 2021 was potentially on track to be another special season.  Unfortunately, the injury bug bit early and often, and several key players were banged up as the calendar turned to January 2022.  

And that, as everyone knows by now, includes former Buccaneer WR Antonio Brown.  Brown, who was nursing an ankle injury, blew up on the Buccaneers' sideline in spectacular fashion against the Jets in Week 17 of 2021 and skipped off the field for what's been – and likely will be – the last time in his NFL career. 

Since, there have been several versions of what really happened between the team.  Then-head coach Bruce Arians offered an explanation regarding Brown's refusal to enter the game.  Brown argued he was being forced to play injured and wasn't targeted enough. 

Antonio Brown took off his uniform and ran off the field vs. the Jets.

? @NFLonFOX pic.twitter.com/VnPepSDoTL

— The Sporting News (@sportingnews) January 2, 2022

Just when it seemed he had disappeared again, Brown joined Tyreek Hill's podcast It Had to Be Said and unleashed a new wave of vitriol against the Bucs and Tom Brady.

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Brown, who has always maintained the Bucs made him play injured, again held that position, but says he agreed to play because Brady was going to "gas him up" with targets. 

“So then Tom [Brady] called me and told me he’d hit me with 10-12 [passes], so he gassed me up.  So for me, that’s all I needed to hear," Brown said.  "But you know as a player, if you f–ked up, but your team around you supporting you, you might suck it up for the team and the game."

But when Brown didn't feel he was getting the targets and usage during the game against the Jets that he deserved – he had 5 targets for 3 catches and 26 yards when he stormed  – he told Hill that he was done.  “You don’t want to throw me the ball and you making me like I’m crazy, so, I was like, ‘I’m crazy, f–k all you motherf–kers, I’m out of here'", Brown said. 

In addition to going in against the Bucs for feeling the made him play hurt, he had a lot to say about the contract that he voluntarily signed in the 2021 offseason.  

“They like minimizing my role off the bat like, ‘Yo, he’s here. He’s staying with Tom.’ It was like I’m just this crazy guy that just came. Only way I’m here [is] to help for the Super Bowl, let’s get it clear,” Brown said of the Bucs.

“So they went to like still making like I was some kind of issue. Then they win, and do everything that we’re supposed to do, we do. And then I’m here the last one getting signed for like a low deal. I already had played eight games [in 2020] for like a million dollars, like nine hundred thousand, and it was like a bonus if I catch like 45 catches for 250 [thousand] and $750 [thousand] if we win.  That’s like some hocus pocus, like if this just happened.

“So it was like I was grateful. But I don’t they was really grateful for me.  So when you're a player, and you're putting your all in this, and you're really living this, putting your life on the line, and knowing where you were at. The next year I was like, ‘Damn, I see the real value of what they think of me.'” – Antonio Brown, It Had to Be Said Podcast

It's obvious that Brown felt he was underappreciated and that a lot of it starts with what he feels the team felt he was worth.  But again, Brown voluntarily signed the one-year deal, and he did it in April 2021, which is still relatively early in the offseason.  If he felt he was owed more for what he contributed to the team's 2020 Super Bowl run – and he contributed quite a bit – then he should have tried harder to earn what he could. 

Instead, Brown exploded in one of the worst look-at-me moments in professional sports history, and it perhaps cost Brown one last chance at another decent contract and the Buccaneers another Super Bowl championship. 

Buccaneers WR Mike Evans reportedly in line for another big payday

Pewter Report’s Scott Reynolds recently reported the Buccaneers are going to give Evans an extension this summer.

Featured image via Vincent Carchietta-USA TODAY Sports