This Week On Days Of Our Steelers
Shout-out to Urinating Tree, the youtuber who as far as I know invented the “Days of our Steelers” joke to describe the absurd drama that the team has suffered these past two years. If he didn’t, he’s at least where I saw it first. He’s also funny, so if you like hearing someone just shit on sports teams he might be worth your views.
I was all pumped to make a Brown to the Bills related joke but then he went and got traded Sunday morning and ruined all my fun. So for that Brown can suck a lemon.
This whole damn thing is going to have major impacts down the line. Antonio Brown basically acted like a giant baby, threw a fit, tanked his trade value to the point where the Steelers had to ship him off for cheap and get hit with a huge dead money impact. Brown played his hand and got…everything he wanted. His petulant whining worked. The Steelers got completely fucked. I think they got fucked worse than anybody expected. Well, if you hate the Steelers, at least this Sunday was one of your better days.
But it really does make you wonder what this is going to do for future negotiations and the next CBA. It feels like we might be headed for a lockout. It also feels like this is going to be a major point of contention. Brown essentially won. He used his value as a player to intentionally tank himself to get out of a contract and situation he wasn’t happy with, and into one where is apparently should be better off. It was about guaranteed money. This, along with Kirk Cousins and LeVeon Bell, shows how much the players are starting to fight for something the NFL has always been reluctant to give. With how Brown just fleeced the Steelers, you can’t help but wonder how hard the owners are going to push back in the future. Players, meanwhile, are seeing what they could do to earn what they feel they deserve. We are heading into a battle.
Plenty of people are happy a player actually managed to beat the system that screws players so hard and earn what he deserved. It’s certainly a positive way to look at it. I want players to get paid better and I’m all for more guarantees, but I’m worried this mess will end up hurting that goal in the long run since for the most part the owners still have all the power and this nonsense has to make them irritated with the precedent it could set.
So what about the teams involved? The Steelers get a 3rd, a 5th, and a massive dead money problem. They unquestionably got tanked. The Raiders didn’t even have to give up a 1st rounder, of which they have 3. They also got a 30 year old diva who after this past season has shown everyone what a baby he is. But he should sell some jerseys and get some attention and tickets sold for a team currently involved in a full rebuild and who is moving soon. This was a big win for the Raiders. If Brown gets shitty in the next two seasons (we have to assume he will, right?) at least the Raiders should be in a better position to tell him to screw off. I’m excited to see him face Jon Gruden. Gruden already had a famous spat with another diva WR in Tampa named Keyshawn Johnson. Johnson got shut down and sent home for half a season, just one year after he helped win a Super Bowl. Gruden vs Brown aught to be fun.
So for now the Brown drama is finally over and we can look forward to free agency and more bullshit Odell Beckham trade rumors.
Lastly, I know Brown no longer has the lego haircut and has a stupid blonde mustache, but lego haircut Antonio Brown is my favorite Antonio Brown, so he stays lego man forever.
“the system that screws players so hard”
The league MINIMUM… for a rookie… is almost as much as the President of the United States makes. I think it’s bitterly ironic that, in a war between billionaires and multi-millionaires, we’re still rooting for the rich guys.
Well the president isn’t uninsurable due yo the violent, injury-causing nature of his job.
Yeah and the Average NFL career is 3 years.
And a large majority never make it that long. Considering the health risks, they aren’t exactly rich.
Yes, they still make very good money. That doesn’t mean they aren’t also getting screwed. Especially with guaranteed money issues, injury risks, and how short most careers are.
> injury risks, and how short most careers are
Let’s not understate this. You get no health insurance, and you’ve almost certainly destroyed your body. And your career will be 3-5 years, total, on average. You might be making bank, but you’re not making it for very long, and most likely not enough to retire on, even if you are penny-pinching and money wise.
“NFL practice squad players make a minimum of $7,600 per week that they are on the practice squad.”
“a practice squad player in California who is employed all six weeks of training camp and all 17 weeks of the regular season — a highly unusual situation — makes around $88,000 after taxes”
“the president is paid $400,000 a year, plus an extra expense allowance of $50,000 a year, a $100,000 non-taxable travel account and $19,000 for entertainment.”
Considering the amount of money they are making the owners, they are getting screwed
CAPTAIN FAT FUCK LEADER OF MEN!
You’re right Dave, it’s amazing how it worked. After Brown tanked the Buffalo trade I was expecting the Steelers to say “fuck you we’re keeping you” just to avoid this precedent.
I’m just waiting for Tree to hit New England
Hey, remember how the Raiders turned Amari Cooper+3rd+5th rounders into Antonio Brown+1st?
as a fan of chaos and drama, OH GOD YES LET THERE BE A LOCKOUT! The Pats as a team can do the what-suspension-it’s-just-a-short-season thing and go 12-0 in the regular season on their way to #7 which would make everyone’s goddamn head explode.
I get that Antonio was a typical WR diva, drama queen about this process. However, I don’t really believe he’s the issue at the heart of it. I think he did what he did because it got the attention it needed to make a change to his benefit.
The problem is Rapelisburger. He’s a cancer in that locker room. He only gives effort when it helps him, not his team. He’s a terrible person and a terrible leader. He trashes his own team mates, regularly. He trashes his ownership and management. It’s 100% certain that he’s the one that put AB in this situation to begin with. Screw that shithead. And screw the Steelers for sticking with him.
That would be a very nice crossover, Drawplay and UrinatingTree. Something like a Hater´s Guide, Sportsball etc collabed with one of the comics, nice.
ITS TIME FOR A TANK BOWL
UTree and TDP crossover? Is it my birthday?
Only a handful of players have the clout to pull this off. Le’Veon Bell couldn’t, and he was/is arguably a top 3 running back.
I don’t think this will become a big problem.
I think the issue isn’t that this is something other players could do, and more that the owners will panic over the possibility that this is something other players could do and will massively overreact.
I can guarantee this much: whatever happens, the less-than-elite players are gonna get screwed the hardest.
Non-skill players could never do this
I despise the Steelers. I love this. This is wonderful. This is perfect. I wonder if this is really gonna have much of a CBA impact, though. Perhaps in a logical world it should, but this is the Steelers we’re talking about, and I kinda think the other owners despise them to the extent they’re gonna look the other way this time. Sure this kind of move gives star players a better ability to control their destiny, but I bet a whole bunch of owners are thinking, “the Steelers got screwed because they were a shitty destination, unlike MY team which is obviously the best. Why should I change the rules to help the Steelers?” Shortsighted, sure? But owners go in on petty grievances as much as the fans do.
To be honest — and as much as I hate the Steelers — I still think they got the best of this trade. I honestly think it’s addition by subtraction to get rid of both Le’veon Bell and Antonio Brown. And my team, with a depleted secondary as it stands, has to now has to face Antonio Brown twice a year (!!!). I’m not exactly worried: in two years, he’ll pull this stunt again, bring down Gruden and cause chaos.
That said, the Steelers usually don’t take any you-know-what, and a root cause of this because Mike Tomlin and Kevin Colbert did not run a tight ship. You know Bill Belichick would have made an example of Antonio Brown and Le’veon Bell by cutting them if they stepped out of line and made it about themselves and not the team.
I think Brown will go the way of Dez Bryant in another year or two.
This was a very unique situation. The Steelers still try to negotiate like it’s the pre-2011 NFL, which is to say, they offer take-it-or-leave-it superlong extensions with very little guaranteed and refuse to negotiate. It used to be that shortsighted moves like that just kept them perpetually in cap hell, but now with players starting to hate the face of the franchise and exert their agency outside the sphere of influence of the team, they also placed themselves in position to get squeezed by a star player over some stupid comments and what amounted to an $11M signing bonus tacked onto his existing contract.
I’m the only one that could see the Bills version punchline. Where he’s standing in a snowdrift and a Lesean McCoy snowman tells him “Don’t worry, you’ll love it here!”
Am I*
That haircut was actually the same haircut as Nino Brown in New Jack City. I don’t know if it was intentional but I always thought he got it from there.
I knew it’s a UT reference as soon as I saw the title.
Waiting for that spicy OBJ comic
Well, the OBJ trade rumors aren’t so bullshit after all
Looks like the Giants are blowing things up.They will draft a qb and sacrifice Eli this year while the new qb gets ready.
$14 mil net cap hit is steep, but getting a #1, a player drafted #1, and a 3rd is not bad.
He will pull an Antonio Brown in a year or two because most of the guaranteed money runs out this season. So I don’t know if it’s that great a deal for the Browns.
I also came straight here after seeing the OBJ trade, I was hoping some kind of special edition Checkdown would appear immediately. 😀
Guys. The obj trade might have killed Dave. His body was already failing pre trade.