Getty Tom Brady encouraged people to show compassion towards Antonio Brown.
Antonio Brown leaves a complicated legacy from his short tenure with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The receiver played a key role in the Bucs’ Super Bowl win, but also made a repeat championship run much harder when he walked off the field mid-game against the Jets.
Minutes before the Buccaneers squared off against the Rams in the Divisional Round, Brown took to Instagram to give his former quarterback Tom Brady a shoutout.
“APG @tombrady good luck today 🙏🏾 #kumbaya,” Brown said in the January 23 post that featured a photo with Brady.
Here is a look at Brown’s message to Brady that has since gone viral.
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A.B. on Brady: ‘Tom Brady’s My Friend, Why? Because I’m a Good Football Player’
Since leaving the Buccaneers, Brown has made conflicting comments about Brady but continues to emphasize he is on good terms with the legendary quarterback. Brown also called out Brady’s close friend and personal trainer Alex Guerrero in a social media post claiming he took money from him for services never rendered. Brown’s most inflammatory comments on Brady came during an interview on the FULL SEND podcast where the receiver implied that the quarterback was only friends with him because he was a talented playmaker.
“It’s not personal, man,” Brown said of his relationship with Brady during the January 8 interview. “Tom is actually my friend, one of my close friends …I’m saying some people have a different definition of friend, because when I say ‘I’m your friend,’ that means I got your back. I mean, to me though that’s what a friend mean, but a friend is not like that in this world and how we living. You know, we play professional sports, like not everybody in sports is going to be your friend.
“Tom Brady’s my friend, why? Because I’m [a] good football player. He need me to play football, right? These guys called me to win the Super Bowl not for the toilet bowl. …They called me and said, ‘Hey A.B., we need you to win the Super Bowl.’ Because Tom Brady saw me come to the Pats and run through those guys.”
Brady on Brown: ‘I Think There’s a Lot of Personal, Obviously, Feelings’
After Brown stormed off the field, Brady encouraged people to show the receiver empathy during his January 2 postgame press conference. Days later, Brady was asked for his feelings on Brown as the wideout continued making his media rounds.
Brady sounded less sympathetic and admitted he had some “personal feelings” about the situation but declined to get into the specifics as the team was preparing to close out the regular season against the Panthers.
“I think there’s a lot of personal, obviously, feelings,” Brady noted during a January 6 press conference. “I don’t think this is really a week to discuss it, though, so. I’m just gonna do the best I can do as quarterback of the team and try to put together a great week, finish strong. You just always deal with different things over the course of the season. That’s what we’re doing this week.”