Tampa Bay Buccaneers wide receiver Antonio Brown erupted in frustration on the visitors sideline at MetLife Stadium on Sunday, leaving the field in the third quarter with coach Bruce Arians proclaiming after the game that he is no longer a member of the team.
Brown’s bizarre exit in New York already has him the highest Googled athlete so far in 2022.
After Brown bailed on the Bucs, quarterback Tom Brady helped lead a comeback. Brady connected with Cyril Grayson for a 33-yard touchdown play with 15 seconds left to secure a 27-24 victory.
The wide receiver made a grand departure during the second half of the Bucs’ road win against the New York Jets, dramatically stripping off his gear and throwing his undershirt into the crowd before waving, jumping around in the end zone, and then hitting the locker room. From there he reportedly left the stadium and was not welcomed to fly back with the team to Tampa. Head coach Bruce Arians said after the game that Brown’s time with the Buccaneers was over.
According to NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport, Brown felt he was too injured to return to the game at that point. He’d missed several weeks with an ankle injury — which happened to almost exactly coincide with his fake vaccine card suspension — and had been limited leading up to Week 17 after tweaking it in practice.
Brown’s reported claim that he was too injured to play adds a new wrinkle to everything we already know. It’s certainly plausible it was the cause, because an ankle injury would have prevented him from playing last month had he not been suspended by the NFL.
However, Brown didn’t seem to be favoring his ankle when he was jumping around in the end zone like an idiot and running to the locker room.
