After his sensational departure from the current Super Bowl winner Tampa Bay Buccaneers, professional football player Antonio Brown spoke up personally for the first time and made serious allegations against his employer and coach Bruce Arians.

Jan Ehrhardt

Sports editor.

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According to a statement published by Brown's lawyer Sean Burstyn, the wide receiver and teammate of quarterback star Tom Brady refused to continue on the field against the New York Jets in the National Football League (NFL) last Sunday due to an ankle injury stand. Then his coach Arians wanted to force him to continue playing.

“I told him that I couldn't play anymore because of my pain.

He didn't get any medical help, but yelled at me that my time with the Bucs was over, ”said Brown.

This was followed by Brown's bizarre appearance, in which he first took off his jersey and protective equipment, and then jumped with his bare upper body and waved towards the stands across the opposing end zone to the cabins.

This behavior was wrong, the 33-year-old now admitted, "but it was provoked by someone who wanted to tell me that I shouldn't feel pain." was hurt so badly, as he now said.

Brown: "The pain was extreme"

According to his statement, an examination diagnosed loose joint bodies in the ankle, a torn ligament and cartilage damage.

"The pain was extreme," said Brown.

"The coach told me that it was the Bucs for me if I didn't play injured," the statement said.

And: "I didn't give up, I was thrown out."

Brown justified the fact that he had been able to play in the third quarter of the game up to this point by the fact that he had been injected with a painkiller in advance by the Buccaneers' team doctors.

The effect wore off during the game, after which he no longer wanted to play.

The fact that NFL professionals are treated with painkillers before or during their missions is part of everyday life for many teams in body-hugging American football. Many former players criticized this approach, in which, because of the suppressed sensation of pain, even more serious injuries are often at least accepted after the end of their careers because of these health-endangering consequences.

The Buccaneers won the game against the big underdog from New York, even without Brown, by 28:24.

Arians then announced that Brown was “no longer a Buc” and concluded: “This is the end of the story.” He would have known nothing of an injury to the recipient of the pass. However, the top athlete is formally part of the Tampa Bay squad for the time being the franchise is currently in the process of finalizing the labor law situation together with the league.

Brown has already attracted negative attention several times in his career, for example through allegations of sexual harassment against him by a former fitness trainer.

Most recently, he was banned from the NFL for three games because of a forged vaccination card.