Buccaneers Officially Release Antonio Brown

After several days of “he said, he said”, the Buccaneers have made official what Bruce Arians said on Sunday, Antonio Brown is no longer a Buccaneer.

The release became official on Tuesday after several statements from Brown both through his attorney and on social media. As one can imagine, the posts via social media were far more volatile including sharing texts from both Arians and trainer Alex Guerrero. Brown seems to be accusing the team of mismanaging his ankle injury and essentially forcing him to be on the field against the Jets on Sunday.

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The team officially released a statement Thursday morning.

“The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have terminated the contract of Antonio Brown, effective immediately. While Antonio did receive treatment on his ankle and was listed on the injury report the week leading up to last Sunday’s game, he was cleared to play by our medical team prior to the start of the game and at no point during the game did he indicate to our medical personnel that he could not play. We have attempted, multiple times throughout this week, to schedule an evaluation by an outside orthopedic specialist, yet Antonio has not complied. Maintaining the health and wellness of our players is of the utmost importance to our organization.”

In addition to the statement from the Bucs, a report from Adam Schefter seemed to shed a bit more light on the events leading up to the halftime departure of Brown.

“Last week, Antonio Brown and his agent requested that the remaining $2 million in incentives in his contract for this season be guaranteed, per Bucs’ GM Jason Licht. The team declined to guarantee those incentives,” per Schefter.

The Buccaneers close out their season on Sunday against the Carolina Panthers.