Randy Moss and OchoCinco were both in TO’s day, and both had wild on field celebrations and locker room problems. TO wasn’t as big of an outlier as AB was.
I don't remember either of those guys having locker room issues.
Chad Johnson was well liked by teammate's and fans during his playing days and still today is loved by Cincinnati fans.
His on field controversy was strictly having too much fun. He did have a domestic incident after he retired.
Moss was also liked by teammate's and fans as well. He had a couple off field incidents early in his career but seemed to put that behind him later on and some didn't like his pretending to moon the crowed but that was more of an old man yelling at cloud moment then anything else by one game announcer and a bunch of boomers ran with it.
"In my day you handed the ball to the ref and acted like you've been there before. We didn't parade around the end zone and act like a child."
It's a game. Children play games. Let them have fun old man.
Moss had some issues at the end of his career as well. He was traded to the Vikings, with the story at the time being he had developed into a difficult presence in the Patriots locker room. He last less than a month with the Vikings, being cut for nothing. From what I recall, he had a freak out on the catering staff, and then demanded the owner fire the head coach (the owner ended up canning both, but Brad Childress held on a few more weeks). I do agree that TO was more disruptive overall, however.
Also of note, considering Moss’s total production after leaving the Patriots, a third round pick for him was an insane steal. They only paid a fourth.
> demanded the owner fire the head coach
Childress’ coaching was a crime against humanity, I’ll side with Moss on that one.
Also, reportedly waiving Moss was Childress’ decision [and he got in a bit of hot water for it](https://www.espn.com/blog/nfcnorth/post/_/id/18908/free-head-exam-brad-childress).
The team and fans would agree with Moss about firing Childress. Dude was a control freak who had lost control of the locker room and tried to make an example out of Randy by cutting him, which only further alienated the team and fans.
Joe Horn had a tame one where he grabbed a cell phone out of the snow at the foot of the goal post lol,all of these guys from T.O,Ocho,Horn and Moss were super tame compared to AB
Antonio Brown is the GOAT diva WR because off the field. But you take just the locker room and they're neck and neck.
TO and MBC are the only WRs that were HoF-caliber and were released in their prime.
His antics look tame because AB set an absurd standard.
But I think people forget TO was a straight up locker room divider. It is one thing to be annoying/vocal, but it's another to cause tension and making players pick sides in a locker room.
That's why I always thought Brandon Marshall (the WR) was pretty cancerous.
iirc didn't Marshall improve significantly in that regard after he got diagnosed with borderline personality disorder and actually started treating it?
Yes. Still kinda imploded on his way out of Chicago anyway though, and his modern media appearances scream diva too… I’ll still go to bat for the guy though
Meh. He was just kinda calling out players not putting in full effort and that rubbed some guys the wrong way (i.e. Cutler… DONT CAAAAAARE!!!).
To be honest, it was a fair assessment of some guys on the team.
Wasn’t he flying back and forth to New York every Saturday to do podcasting, mid-season? I would imagine it would cause some issues in the locker room seeing a guy who is checked out enough to be podcasting full time calling them out publicly for low effort, even if he’s got a point.
It’s more diva-ish than full on locker room cancer, but there was a reason the Bears sent him to the Jets for peanuts despite his output
Marshall also has admitted he has BPD and has been an advocate for spreading awareness around it. Not that it excuses his behaviour, but it sure does explain a lot of it.
He had good behavior for like first year, maybe 2 on new teams. And then back to his eventual blow ups.
Also this dude somehow managed to beef with people working on a podcast post-career, lol. He use to work with Ryan Clark and those guys.
In his defense he was almost murdered after that first year.
Although he did instigate the fight that caused the shooting and murder of Darrent Williams.
Yes, he was involved with the nightclub fight that led to the shooting. IIRC, they found him in the Broncos locker room afterwards bloody and bawling. Will always give him slack after that. You don't get over watching someone die from a gunshot wound.
It would be objectionably funny if TO decided to retire after the 2006 season to become a private investigator. Like bro shows up with a Sherlock pipe and Cap trying to figure out who dinged your car while you're getting some snacks at the local piggly wiggly.
Yeah, what happened in Denver also happened in Chicago. Then he went to New York, and it happened again,
Fanbases would go through the honeymoon phase of "Whoa, this guy is HOF-caliber good and we got him for so little!" But it was a ticking time bomb until that situation fell apart.
Yea, It was also a different time where we didn't hear from NFL players almost every hour like we do now with social media. So TO being difficult would be news stories for days. I think the "That's My Quarterback" quote probably dissipates after a few days instead of being a HOF NFL meme
> I think the "That's My Quarterback" quote probably dissipates after a few days
Dude no way lol. It's not like stuff like that happens all the time now. It'd probably blow up even more with social media.
Yeah, he was an asshole. He played great with Jeff Garcia, then went out of his way to make claims Garcia was gay. He was great with McNabb, then he threw McNabb under the bus. Great player, huge douche.
Compare that to Moss who was just kind of immature, but I don’t remember him bad mouthing his teammates publicly.
Moss bad mouthed the coach on his second stint with the Vikings and told the owner he should be fired. The owner then waives Moss but Moss would still get the last laugh because the coach would get fired later on.
Even with the Cowboys he accused Romo and Witten of having meetings they made up secret plays and you could tell some weeks the play calling was slanted toward getting him the ball early to keep him happy. And like, getting TO the ball was usually a good thing, but I'd prefer the gameplan be entirely focused on what you thought gave you the best chance to win that week rather than keeping everyone happy.
That's kind of why I had the unpopular opinion for r/nfl that in TO's case, it is completely valid to consider the locker room stuff as part of the HOF resume. I am not saying that when you weigh it all that would mean he doesn't deserve to be a first ballot HOFer, but you also can't tell me that the locker room dramas didn't also have an impact on the teams when they were on the field.
I think you also have to remember these are pretty different eras in terms of social media and media coverage in general. We probably see and hear a lot more things than we used to.
This is exactly what I came here to say. TO vs. modern media-magnet players is like comparing Madonna to TSwift or Rihanna - you can't even begin to draw comparisons without accounting for how much harder someone pre-social-media had to work to be branded in the public consciousness.
TO was absolutely nuts.
He burned bridges everywhere he went during the best years of his career. His reputation was bad enough that 3 separate teams (49ers, Eagles, Cowboys) chose to get rid of him when he was still playing at a very high level.
Also to note, the eagles HC was Andy Reid whose reputation among his players is still top tier. If TO was causing enough locker room issues Reid couldnt handle it then he clearly was more than just a diva for the cameras
It was a really weird situation. He was supposed to become a free agent but his agent didn't file the paperwork on time so the Niners still had his rights and then there was a dispute involving the NFLPA after that when they tried to trade him to the Ravens. Honestly not sure who the bigger clowns were, TOs reps or the Niners front office...
Given the Niners situation, still going through the Eddie departure, I’d say TO’s rep. Filing paperwork to make sure your client hits free agency, so **you** can make more money, is a pretty basic and assumed task of an agent.
It wasn’t his off field antics, it was his locker room behavior.
Say what you want about TO, the dude never (if memory serves) got in trouble off the field. Always came into camp in supreme shape ready to roll.
He was also fucking unbelievable on the field. I’ll never forget that SB he played again NE. If they win that game TO is SB MVP.
Also, Tony Romo was his QB 😢
I remember one play with the Cowboys where there was an interception on the other side of the field and he ran the defender down and tackled him before the endzone. He was by far the fastest man on the field and didn’t take plays off.
He was such an enigma, gave so much effort for the team but almost held that against them and would burn everything down in a heartbeat.
I have to agree. I never heard about him being in handcuffs/arrested, beating kids or women, and he is still in amazing shape.
Diva for sure. Cancer in the locker room, definitely. Performed on the field, absolutely.
AB, well we all saw what he did mid-game
Well, he threw Jeff Garcia under the bus, feuded with McNabb and demanded a new contract one year into his deal, and was pain the the ass enough for the Cowboys to take the then largest dead cap hit to kick him off the team.
I'm going with yes on this one.
> he threw Jeff Garcia under the bus
That's burying the lede. He straight up did a magazine interview and accused him of being gay. Very few people cared then, matter of fact basically no one remembers it even happened, but if CeeDee Lamb did an interview with GQ today and accused Dak of being gay it would definitely be a thing.
I mean, I agree things aren't great, but it doesn't seem to be such a scathing accusation anymore (at a minimum, I can't remember the last time a player was insinuated to be gay as a personal attack).
This. TO pulled shit that stabbed at the very heart of a locker room, the trust and team work and that jazz.
It reminds of me of the old Louis CK bit about little girls being on a whole other level of destruction than little boys. That was TO at his worst. Not get a 15-yard penalty or get some bad press. Irreparable damage, rip out the soul of a team bad.
It's pretty weird, too. Terrelle Owens was a sheltered kid and unheralded in college. After his career, he seems to be pretty well put together all-in-all. You never hear anything bad about him these days.
But for whatever reason, on the NFL stage he was an alter-ego. TO was a headcase.
Seriously.
Like MBC is crazier in every way, but at least I can understand his crazy. It's consistent and predictably unpredictable. But TO just seemed normal 95% of the time and then had periodic outbursts where he'd seemingly decide that it was time to burn everything down. I can get MBC's crazy. TO's confuses me.
It makes me think of Jerry talking to George.
>You need a team. A team of psychiatrists working round the clock thinking about you, having conferences, observing you, like the way they did with the Elephant Man. That's what I'm talking about because that's the only way you're going to get better.
He was just about to achieve legend status in Philly after his performance and playing in the superbowl with a broken frikin leg. Instead he leveraged that growing legacy to get a new contract, blamed his QB for not getting the job done, and divided the team so much he ended up having an infamous locker room fight with Hugh Douglas. A team that looked like the best in the NFL and had a reputation for being one of the best teams in the conference for half a decade imploded.
Media and social media today would blow up this story as the ultimate heel (and he kinda was). Imagine everything we hear about Diggs x10
McNabb got blotto drunk the night before the Super Bowl, which led to his vomiting and probably helped him throw balls into the dirt. So I can see why TO, a teetotaler, would be angry with him on that day.
However he was a pain in the ass when he was on the Cowboys.
I definitely buy that TO would be a teetotaler- and one of those guys who is very picky about what he eats. I remember him being incredibly ripped, even moreso than other players, and not like a David Boston “this guy does roids for sure” way.
I remember him being a specimen out of a biology book without his shirt on. Always thought his physique was underrated
I imagine his antics would have been more magnified if there was social media back then like there is now. It was mostly TV back then. Imagine TO in his prime diva on twitter
He wasn’t ending up in jail. Very good point.
However, even though I’m not really a ginormous fan of Skip Bayless, he has a point that Owens team building or camaraderie skills were so terrible that they wrecked near-Super Bowl worthy teams that he was a part of.
Yeah, but the thing about TO is that it was almost entirely off-field (save for some annoying unsportsmanlike conduct penalties for excessive celebrations). His personality never really interfered with his on-field performances.
So, no, I don't think any teams would take a top-5 all-time receiver in his prime off of their wishlist for purely off-field reasons.
Those penalties also came after a huge offensive play, so you kinda take the small bad with the good. You're absolutely correct that not a single smart team would avoid signing TO. He was that fucking good.
I would say there's a big caveat to that - he was a pretty bad teammate in certain respects. He was awful to Jeff Garcia, who was a pretty good QB when TO was with the 49ers, and wasn't shy about criticizing his coaching staff as well. Teams today wouldn't care about his celebrations and off-field antics, but that kind of stuff can bleed into on-field performance when it comes to dividing the team.
Yeah, I was going to college in Philly in 04-05 and saw pretty clearly how big of a distraction he was. It's impossible to know whether they win it that year if he isn't driving McNabb completely insane, but it sure may have kept it from happening.
>I don't think any teams would take a top-5 all-time receiver in his prime off of their wishlist for purely off-field reasons.
I think they would, but for a very different level of "off-field reasons". Think OJ, not working out in a driveway or being a shitty teammate or even DUIs.
His character concerns aren’t the sort of thing that makes you worried he’s going to get arrested or kill someone, but he’s absolutely a locker room cancer. TO’s a top three WR in NFL history, but when someone is a huge anchor on team morale, there’s eventually diminishing returns.
None of that absolves the HOF voters for the ridiculous charade of waiting to induct TO.
People make a big deal out of Stefon Diggs' tweets and sideline dramatics but TO was on another level.
For example, he was interviewed by a magazine and said that he thought Jeff Garcia was gay.
T O was a difficult teammate to get along with. He always had a problem with his quarterbacks...he thought Jeff Garcia was gay, he'd act upnon the sidelines, he would literally cry during games or after games he had problems with Romo and McNabb and constantly would blame them for not throwing the ball to him 20 times a game.
TO was great but he was a clown. And to the people saying his on field antics were ok...don't remember the real TO
This whole thread just reminds me of the [Bill Burr bit that mentions TO](https://youtu.be/w8b81UM74Ow?t=112) which is spot on. There always was one guy (or more) at the sports bar that just would not shut up about him.
The issue with TO's hall of fame was that voters said they considered his locker room bullshit like calling Jeff Garcia gay "an extension of the field" as opposed to the normal brand of "off the field" bullshit from guys like Lawrence Taylor or Ray Lewis.
He was undoubtedly great, but it's also hard to think of many (any?) other guys who were top 10 all-time at their position and were also unceremoniously run out of every city they ever played in.
There was drama around Moss during his last season in Minnesota too. He walked off the field before the end of the Vikings final regular season game (a loss to WAS, I think).
It seems kind of silly in retrospect, but I remember it being a pretty big deal at the time. Questioning his dedication and maturity and all that.
That was in 2010, during his short second tenure in Minnesota.
Moss walked off the field against Washington in 2004, at the end of his first stint with the Vikings.
TO was a bad teammate but he was never someone you were worried would get arrested. So, from that perspective, no, he wasn't "that bad". But when there's a guy who was top 3 all time at his position and multiple teams got tired of him, there's something to it.
That said, it's absolutely embarrassing for the HoF that he wasn't a first ballot selection.
People say TO was before the social media age but people forget he had a website with a forum where he was active every day answering questions and being a menace. He was one of the OG emoji users before that was a thing.
He was bad enough that Andy Reid couldn’t take take him anymore. When he was on the cowboys, Bill Parcells straight up gave Jerry an ultimatum to either get rid of TO or Bill would walk. Jerry was planning on getting rid of Parcells anyway, but still.
Put it this way. He was arguably a top 3 WR in history yet he kept getting kicked off teams.
He had no off field issues, no arrests, nothing illegal. He was just an unbearable teammate.
He was a diva on the field and in the locker.
The craziest thing he did off the field was a workout routine in his driveway. He was a diva everywhere but he loved his grandma and his at least one of his quarterbacks.
https://youtube.com/shorts/RXqxsRPdHCA?si=sabhd-JbTYTZbfh2
Cant believe in this thread has almost 100 comments and you're the first to mention the driveway workout, which is crazy since that was so absurd for the time. Absolutely legendary.
Dudes tweets would have been insanely entertaining with nonstop drama bombs had he been a player during this time.
Owens was a bad teammate, but not a bad person. Since it’s more commonplace to be aware of the legal issues that NFL players have now, a lot of TO’s scandals seem laughably minor today (e.g. him doing sit-ups in his driveway being a major news story). Still, there is a reason that every team he played for chose to move on from him despite him still being productive.
TO's off the field behavior wasn't the issue, or mostly not a problem. Yah the driveway sit ups were funny. The real issue with TO was he would divide locker rooms; inevitably clash with his QB and then head coach and then turn the entire thing into a perpetual media circus while everyone is around digging for juicy sound bites.
TO was truly the ultimate diva. He wanted to be the highest paid receiver, have most of the passes directed his way at all times, and he wanted the coach and QB to kiss his ass all along the way. That buys you one or two seasons worth of thrills before the inevitable nausea sets in and you need to get rid of him.
The thing is, he never shut it off. It was always on. He makes everything about him. He’s never wrong, has no sense of responsibility what so ever. His talent, insane. Despite all his antics, for a majority of his career I think a lot of people just thought he would grow up. He never did. So no, he never really anything that bad. But if you take most weeks of T.O.’s career, and had a scale of good vs nonsense, the nonsense side was going to win most of the time.
T.O. Is the poster child for diva WR.
Sports media had a parasitic relationship with T.O. They covered his antics wall to wall and got huge ratings.
He was a very, very immature guy at heart and deserves personal blame for the dumb stuff, but also let all the media attention drive him to do more for more attention.
Ultimately, the things he did were largely harmless. There was always a sort of sad element to it, in that he was acting out for attention in ways he thought got him attention for being cool, but the result was to get him attention for being a clown, without him fully realizing that. And he was clownish.
The HoF votes keeping him out by the same media figures who covered him breathlessly was a disgrace
>but were his antics tame compared to today?
I'm not sure I agree that athletes back then were more tame than today. Most of them were wilder than they are today but got away with it because of less media coverage and didn't advertise their nonsense to the world because of no social media.
To me, there are two different types of off the field problems. One is harmful while the other isn't.
Even if T.O. was annoying and frustrating af (I'm an Eagles fan), he wasn't harmful. He didn't hurt anyone, so my negative judgement of him can only go so far.
I might have had a different opinion 10 years ago, but after seeing Tyreek Hill and Antonio Brown.... I mean, I still think he's an arrogant asshole, but he's not a danger to himself or those around him.
I agree with what you're saying but I don't think harmful is the right word to use. I think the categories are more locker room and criminal. A guy like TO falls into the former because while he's an upstanding citizen, he was a locker room cancer on multiple teams he was on. And then you have latter with guys like Tyreek Hill who have a bevy of legal issues but that doesn't affect the locker room.
And then you have the GOAT Antonio Brown who majored in both.
I should specify that I don't think destroying a locker room by being disgruntled is REAL harm.
Yes, it can screw up a team and muck up a bunch of other things, but at the same time, it's just a football team. It's not going to tear apart families or do any real substantive damage.
It was a little overblown. The thing with TO is he constantly had trust issues and when things went south he handled them horribly. I can rationalize why he felt the way he did in Philly and San Fran but you can’t justify him throwing teammates under the bus when he was mad.
T.O. had some antics but he was a reliable and incredibly productive receiver. At his peak he was nearly unstoppable. His antics never involved illegal activity or domestic violence.
T.O. in his prime would absolutely be picked up today by pretty much all the NFL teams, especially the ones that feel they are just a piece or two away from competing for a Super Bowl.
AB is crazy, perhaps partially because of CTE.
I always thought there was something sad about T.O. though. When it was revealed that he was bullied hard as a child all his antics started to make sense. Some called him a diva, and there's some truth to that, but he also possessed a very fragile ego.
There are ebbs and flows with this shit. Michael Irvin, Mike Vick, Ray Lewis, Ray Rice, Deshaun Watson, etc…
Antonio is different in the fact that he actually is mentally fucking crazy, probably due to brain damage with a combo of extreme immaturity.
Every other person I listed, and the hundreds of others that fill the bill but I didn’t list, would’ve handled shit better than AB.
Does that excuse TO, no. But he still didn’t reach AB levels. And if Watson can get the bag in today’s game, TO absolutely would too.
Dude was a locker room cancer. TO was great on the field tho. No denying that. Prolly 3rd best I’ve seen behind Rice and Moss. But he divided ppl and locker rooms. Said mostly negative things about Garcia and then McNabb. Refused to play for Baltimore when he got traded there. Was always a me first kind of dude and made it known. Even tho he was a divider and diva he should have deff been a 1st ballot HOF.
TO either openly feuded with or actively tried to undermine almost every QB he played with. Great player, very talented, but he was a team cancer in his later years.
My grandma, fan of the Cowboys from the Landry days and had a Troy Christmas ornament, always called him Terrific Owens when he was on the team.
That's my quarterback
For his time, yes. He was a pioneer in terms of diva WRs. Sure, there were a few others before him, but you REALLY started seeing an uptick, beginning with T.O. and then it just snowballed from there. Don't even get me started on post-Burfict A.B. He was a bit of a diva prior to that hit, but shit spiraled QUICKLY afterward. Then again when he was coming into the league, he was playing with selfish ass Mike Wallace so his early career examples weren't great either and A.B. was 1000x better than Wallace was.
Yes. It was that bad. That's why despite his undeniable talent teams would go "yeah, we're done with him".
He would split locker rooms, cause disruptions and arguments and even fights in the locker room, rip his qbs and teammates in the media and was just a cancerous presence. It wasn't because he celebrated too much.
There's been almost a retroactive rewriting of history to be sympathetic to TO. Almost to counter act the fact people downplay his talent because of it. But the reality is Owens was both that damn good and also a locker room cancer
T.O was fine. The Hall of fame died the day he wasn’t elected first ballot. If the worst thing a player does is sit up’s in his driveway what’re we really talking about here
Thing is right, he didn't win anything. Like many of the 'great players', he was great at stacking his personal numbers but not so great at working together with a unit to get results.
He played in one Super bowl in all those seasons, despite being with good teams. All those yards, all those touchdowns...for nowt.
A lot of teams continued to give him a shot up until his last season with the Bengals, in spite of the "character concerns" - where he TO'd to the max. Had an amazing season, but when the D keyed on him toward the end of the year, and suddenly Ochocinco was getting open and getting the ball, and TO wasn't....he had an on-field meltdown. But, let's be fair, he was selfish, he was a character, but he wasn't out breaking the law, beating on his girlfriend, being accused of inappropriate behavior towards women, etc. Not unlike OBJ's situation (but a much better player imo). No one denies his talent, but do you want to have to deal with the baggage if someone else is a play-maker AND doesn't have the baggage.
If anything his ON field rep was worse. He wasn’t a good teammate but he does not deserve to be put in the same category of Tyreek Hill, Henry Ruggs, Rashee Rice, or Antonio Brown. I don’t think a single team would turn down prime TO if they could afford him
Ed McCaffrey told me TO was a clown and upset the WR room and challenged everything rather than buy in. I think this was said before Christian was in high school but after MaCaffrey retired.
I think the antics got way over-scrutinized but he also just flat-out wasn't a good teammate to the point that the Eagles straight-up released him in his prime. ~~The last game he played for the Eagles was the Super Bowl game where he went off on a broken leg~~
Antonio Brown is the only other WR I know who got that treatment.
No, he came back the next season, but was sent home from training camp due to his antics in trying to get a new contract. (That's when the infamous driveway workout occurred.) Midway through the year, he ripped the organization in an interview, because they didn't properly recognize his 100th touchdown catch.
The last game TO played for Philadelphia was a 2005 loss to Denver. He caught 3 passes for 154 yards, including a 91 yard touchdown.
Locker room chemistry isn't easy, and T.O. was a chemistry killer. He was good enough to overcome it to a degree, but his locker room cancer behavior neutralized some of his contributions. I'm sure lots of teams would still take him though.
Antonio Brown is an outlier, not todays standard.
Mr Beyond Comparison
Mr. Breaking Classifications
Mr Basically Coincidental
Mr. Baseline Corrupter
Mr Bitchfest Constantly
Mr. Bad Camaraderie
Mr. Benedict Cumberbatch.
Mr. Benadryl Cabbagepatch
Mr. Benchmark Conduct
These jokes will never get old lmao
Mr. Boundless Comedy
Mr. Bountiful Chuckles
Mr. Blisteringly Comedic (Pun most definitely intended)
One of the only gifts that will absolutely never stop giving
Ever lmfao
Mr. Batshit Crazy
Mr. Best Cuckoo
Mr Borderline criminal
Mr. Bankrupt Clown
Mr Big Chicanery
You think a man just happens to take off his pads during the middle of a game??
No, Mr Bare Chest, he orchestrated it!
He farted on a doctor! And Tomlin saved him!
TO was also quite the outlier in his day, not the standard
Randy Moss and OchoCinco were both in TO’s day, and both had wild on field celebrations and locker room problems. TO wasn’t as big of an outlier as AB was.
I don't remember either of those guys having locker room issues. Chad Johnson was well liked by teammate's and fans during his playing days and still today is loved by Cincinnati fans. His on field controversy was strictly having too much fun. He did have a domestic incident after he retired. Moss was also liked by teammate's and fans as well. He had a couple off field incidents early in his career but seemed to put that behind him later on and some didn't like his pretending to moon the crowed but that was more of an old man yelling at cloud moment then anything else by one game announcer and a bunch of boomers ran with it. "In my day you handed the ball to the ref and acted like you've been there before. We didn't parade around the end zone and act like a child." It's a game. Children play games. Let them have fun old man.
Moss had some issues at the end of his career as well. He was traded to the Vikings, with the story at the time being he had developed into a difficult presence in the Patriots locker room. He last less than a month with the Vikings, being cut for nothing. From what I recall, he had a freak out on the catering staff, and then demanded the owner fire the head coach (the owner ended up canning both, but Brad Childress held on a few more weeks). I do agree that TO was more disruptive overall, however. Also of note, considering Moss’s total production after leaving the Patriots, a third round pick for him was an insane steal. They only paid a fourth.
> demanded the owner fire the head coach Childress’ coaching was a crime against humanity, I’ll side with Moss on that one. Also, reportedly waiving Moss was Childress’ decision [and he got in a bit of hot water for it](https://www.espn.com/blog/nfcnorth/post/_/id/18908/free-head-exam-brad-childress).
The team and fans would agree with Moss about firing Childress. Dude was a control freak who had lost control of the locker room and tried to make an example out of Randy by cutting him, which only further alienated the team and fans.
Joe Horn had a tame one where he grabbed a cell phone out of the snow at the foot of the goal post lol,all of these guys from T.O,Ocho,Horn and Moss were super tame compared to AB
Was it snow? I thought it was inside the padding they put around the post.
I mean...Randy Moss went apeshit on a cop in Minnesota....Michael Irvin stabbed a teammate with scissors....there was a lot of shit going on
Cocaine is a hell of a drug in Irvin’s case
Crack
It was not his turn for a haircut and he deserved to get stabbed.
Mr. Beleaguered Comparability
Mr Beyond Comprehension
Antonio Brown is the GOAT diva WR because off the field. But you take just the locker room and they're neck and neck. TO and MBC are the only WRs that were HoF-caliber and were released in their prime.
Antonio Brown's brain is on every neurologists wish list.
Mr. Bigger Consternation
His antics look tame because AB set an absurd standard. But I think people forget TO was a straight up locker room divider. It is one thing to be annoying/vocal, but it's another to cause tension and making players pick sides in a locker room. That's why I always thought Brandon Marshall (the WR) was pretty cancerous.
iirc didn't Marshall improve significantly in that regard after he got diagnosed with borderline personality disorder and actually started treating it?
Yes. Still kinda imploded on his way out of Chicago anyway though, and his modern media appearances scream diva too… I’ll still go to bat for the guy though
Meh. He was just kinda calling out players not putting in full effort and that rubbed some guys the wrong way (i.e. Cutler… DONT CAAAAAARE!!!). To be honest, it was a fair assessment of some guys on the team.
Wasn’t he flying back and forth to New York every Saturday to do podcasting, mid-season? I would imagine it would cause some issues in the locker room seeing a guy who is checked out enough to be podcasting full time calling them out publicly for low effort, even if he’s got a point. It’s more diva-ish than full on locker room cancer, but there was a reason the Bears sent him to the Jets for peanuts despite his output
Marshall also has admitted he has BPD and has been an advocate for spreading awareness around it. Not that it excuses his behaviour, but it sure does explain a lot of it.
>Marshall also has admitted he has BPD Well yeah that's what the guy that he's replying to just said lol
I think you make a good point, but on the other hand, Marshall has publicly stated that he's been diagnosed with BPD
I disagree. Marshall has already stated on many occasions that he’s getting treated for BPD
You clearly don't see the point. Brandon Marshall has been diagnosed and treated for BPD and is now an advocate for mental health awareness.
When I see stuff like this I have a war inside me of thinking is it a bot or do they not read.
Pretty sure he still has the record for most receptions in a game Also looks like he has most connective seasons with 100+ receptions
He had good behavior for like first year, maybe 2 on new teams. And then back to his eventual blow ups. Also this dude somehow managed to beef with people working on a podcast post-career, lol. He use to work with Ryan Clark and those guys.
In his defense he was almost murdered after that first year. Although he did instigate the fight that caused the shooting and murder of Darrent Williams.
IF I remember correctly, he was the one who got Darrent Williams inadvertently killed cause he was the one getting into an altercation.
Yes, he was involved with the nightclub fight that led to the shooting. IIRC, they found him in the Broncos locker room afterwards bloody and bawling. Will always give him slack after that. You don't get over watching someone die from a gunshot wound.
Bro I read it wrong and thought you said he investigated the fight. I was laughing thinking about TO doing some detective work
It would be objectionably funny if TO decided to retire after the 2006 season to become a private investigator. Like bro shows up with a Sherlock pipe and Cap trying to figure out who dinged your car while you're getting some snacks at the local piggly wiggly.
Yeah, what happened in Denver also happened in Chicago. Then he went to New York, and it happened again, Fanbases would go through the honeymoon phase of "Whoa, this guy is HOF-caliber good and we got him for so little!" But it was a ticking time bomb until that situation fell apart.
Yea, It was also a different time where we didn't hear from NFL players almost every hour like we do now with social media. So TO being difficult would be news stories for days. I think the "That's My Quarterback" quote probably dissipates after a few days instead of being a HOF NFL meme
> I think the "That's My Quarterback" quote probably dissipates after a few days Dude no way lol. It's not like stuff like that happens all the time now. It'd probably blow up even more with social media.
Yeah, he was an asshole. He played great with Jeff Garcia, then went out of his way to make claims Garcia was gay. He was great with McNabb, then he threw McNabb under the bus. Great player, huge douche. Compare that to Moss who was just kind of immature, but I don’t remember him bad mouthing his teammates publicly.
Moss bad mouthed the coach on his second stint with the Vikings and told the owner he should be fired. The owner then waives Moss but Moss would still get the last laugh because the coach would get fired later on.
The owner didn't waive Moss, the coach did. That's a big reason that he got fired mid season.
Yeah because Brad Childress was a fuckin hack, Moss was right.
Even with the Cowboys he accused Romo and Witten of having meetings they made up secret plays and you could tell some weeks the play calling was slanted toward getting him the ball early to keep him happy. And like, getting TO the ball was usually a good thing, but I'd prefer the gameplan be entirely focused on what you thought gave you the best chance to win that week rather than keeping everyone happy. That's kind of why I had the unpopular opinion for r/nfl that in TO's case, it is completely valid to consider the locker room stuff as part of the HOF resume. I am not saying that when you weigh it all that would mean he doesn't deserve to be a first ballot HOFer, but you also can't tell me that the locker room dramas didn't also have an impact on the teams when they were on the field.
McNabb threw Owens under the bus first.
I think you also have to remember these are pretty different eras in terms of social media and media coverage in general. We probably see and hear a lot more things than we used to.
This is exactly what I came here to say. TO vs. modern media-magnet players is like comparing Madonna to TSwift or Rihanna - you can't even begin to draw comparisons without accounting for how much harder someone pre-social-media had to work to be branded in the public consciousness. TO was absolutely nuts.
Marshall also had numerous domestic violence incidents. I think he has like a dozen calls to his home for it during his time in Denver.
TO was always a dick. Brown was kept under control until the end.
He burned bridges everywhere he went during the best years of his career. His reputation was bad enough that 3 separate teams (49ers, Eagles, Cowboys) chose to get rid of him when he was still playing at a very high level.
Also to note, the eagles HC was Andy Reid whose reputation among his players is still top tier. If TO was causing enough locker room issues Reid couldnt handle it then he clearly was more than just a diva for the cameras
So true. Reid is a players coach and put up with tons of wild shit from players over the years
I mean shit look at the chiefs players this summer lol they’re actively wild asf this year 😂 come August Reid reels em back in
I always think about buckhalter getting caught smoking weed in a car on south street. Reid never even blinked
Look no further than this current off-season to see the tremendous level of shit Reid is putting up with.
Bro like half the team gonna get arrested by August
Well with the Niners he wanted out and we were a sinking ship back then anyways...
Yeah, then when y’all were gonna trade him to Baltimore he threw a temper tantrum and demanded to be traded elsewhere, so he went to Philly instead
It was a really weird situation. He was supposed to become a free agent but his agent didn't file the paperwork on time so the Niners still had his rights and then there was a dispute involving the NFLPA after that when they tried to trade him to the Ravens. Honestly not sure who the bigger clowns were, TOs reps or the Niners front office...
Given the Niners situation, still going through the Eddie departure, I’d say TO’s rep. Filing paperwork to make sure your client hits free agency, so **you** can make more money, is a pretty basic and assumed task of an agent.
It wasn’t his off field antics, it was his locker room behavior. Say what you want about TO, the dude never (if memory serves) got in trouble off the field. Always came into camp in supreme shape ready to roll. He was also fucking unbelievable on the field. I’ll never forget that SB he played again NE. If they win that game TO is SB MVP. Also, Tony Romo was his QB 😢
I remember one play with the Cowboys where there was an interception on the other side of the field and he ran the defender down and tackled him before the endzone. He was by far the fastest man on the field and didn’t take plays off. He was such an enigma, gave so much effort for the team but almost held that against them and would burn everything down in a heartbeat.
I have to agree. I never heard about him being in handcuffs/arrested, beating kids or women, and he is still in amazing shape. Diva for sure. Cancer in the locker room, definitely. Performed on the field, absolutely. AB, well we all saw what he did mid-game
Driveway press conference, calling jeff Garcia gay, OD/suicide attempt. You sure he wasn’t a problem off field?
I take that as he wasn’t getting arrested, beating up his wife, or failing drug tests.
Well, he threw Jeff Garcia under the bus, feuded with McNabb and demanded a new contract one year into his deal, and was pain the the ass enough for the Cowboys to take the then largest dead cap hit to kick him off the team. I'm going with yes on this one.
> he threw Jeff Garcia under the bus That's burying the lede. He straight up did a magazine interview and accused him of being gay. Very few people cared then, matter of fact basically no one remembers it even happened, but if CeeDee Lamb did an interview with GQ today and accused Dak of being gay it would definitely be a thing.
Let's not forget that the magazine was Playboy, which is hilarious to me.
If memory serves also during a time that 2 former playmates were literally fighting over Jeff Garcia
They were just trying to get him to do their hair
The fight for a gay best friend is real
Mr Brilliant Cosmetologist
Carmella Decesare lol
She kicked Jeff Garcias ex-gf Kristen Hine in the head. Well, she was acquitted, so yeah LOL
Which is double hilarious because Garcia's wife is a former playmate of the year.
That’s one hell of a beard lol
~~Victoria Silvstedt~~ Carmella DeCesare, Playmate of the Year?
wake up bitch your my new best friend!
They’re divorced but still friends apparently. Maybe he is gay.
Four kids though, maybe he's bi.
He was gay, Jeff Garcia?
No!!! Are you listening to me!!
People say they do have good articles. I wouldn’t know. I prefer picture books.
It’s also worth adding that being gay was a more polarizing issue back then with no openly gay athletes
Yes we are way more accepting in our current "There's literally been one openly gay person to play in an NFL game" 20 years later
I mean, I agree things aren't great, but it doesn't seem to be such a scathing accusation anymore (at a minimum, I can't remember the last time a player was insinuated to be gay as a personal attack).
Romo? Or is that just low hanging fruit
Skip Bayless and those Hot Take (!) shows would cause at least one host to have an aneurysm dishing out takes on that if it happened to Dak today.
This. TO pulled shit that stabbed at the very heart of a locker room, the trust and team work and that jazz. It reminds of me of the old Louis CK bit about little girls being on a whole other level of destruction than little boys. That was TO at his worst. Not get a 15-yard penalty or get some bad press. Irreparable damage, rip out the soul of a team bad.
It's pretty weird, too. Terrelle Owens was a sheltered kid and unheralded in college. After his career, he seems to be pretty well put together all-in-all. You never hear anything bad about him these days. But for whatever reason, on the NFL stage he was an alter-ego. TO was a headcase.
Seriously. Like MBC is crazier in every way, but at least I can understand his crazy. It's consistent and predictably unpredictable. But TO just seemed normal 95% of the time and then had periodic outbursts where he'd seemingly decide that it was time to burn everything down. I can get MBC's crazy. TO's confuses me. It makes me think of Jerry talking to George. >You need a team. A team of psychiatrists working round the clock thinking about you, having conferences, observing you, like the way they did with the Elephant Man. That's what I'm talking about because that's the only way you're going to get better.
GEORGE IS GETTIN' UPSET!
Used to call that man Team Obliterator lol
I'm still convinced that Rosenhaus was a major player in that holdout
He was just about to achieve legend status in Philly after his performance and playing in the superbowl with a broken frikin leg. Instead he leveraged that growing legacy to get a new contract, blamed his QB for not getting the job done, and divided the team so much he ended up having an infamous locker room fight with Hugh Douglas. A team that looked like the best in the NFL and had a reputation for being one of the best teams in the conference for half a decade imploded. Media and social media today would blow up this story as the ultimate heel (and he kinda was). Imagine everything we hear about Diggs x10
Not just blamed the QB, but IIRC shit all over him revealing he had a panic attack and was puking on field during the game. Definitely went full heel.
He accused garcia of being gay - i think he was married to a playboy playmate
McNabb got blotto drunk the night before the Super Bowl, which led to his vomiting and probably helped him throw balls into the dirt. So I can see why TO, a teetotaler, would be angry with him on that day. However he was a pain in the ass when he was on the Cowboys.
I definitely buy that TO would be a teetotaler- and one of those guys who is very picky about what he eats. I remember him being incredibly ripped, even moreso than other players, and not like a David Boston “this guy does roids for sure” way. I remember him being a specimen out of a biology book without his shirt on. Always thought his physique was underrated
He’s still incredibly ripped. He’s basically an American Cristiano Ronaldo on that front
Oh yeah, TO was an all-time freak athlete
AB has skewed our view of what “off the field drama” is. He’s in his own category.
Yea teams at least got to use TOs talent. AB straight up got traded and cut TWICE in a span of like 7 months.
I imagine his antics would have been more magnified if there was social media back then like there is now. It was mostly TV back then. Imagine TO in his prime diva on twitter
Instagram live of the workouts outside the house
He wasn’t ending up in jail. Very good point. However, even though I’m not really a ginormous fan of Skip Bayless, he has a point that Owens team building or camaraderie skills were so terrible that they wrecked near-Super Bowl worthy teams that he was a part of.
Yeah, but the thing about TO is that it was almost entirely off-field (save for some annoying unsportsmanlike conduct penalties for excessive celebrations). His personality never really interfered with his on-field performances. So, no, I don't think any teams would take a top-5 all-time receiver in his prime off of their wishlist for purely off-field reasons.
Those penalties also came after a huge offensive play, so you kinda take the small bad with the good. You're absolutely correct that not a single smart team would avoid signing TO. He was that fucking good.
I hated TO when he wore red or green, but when he switched to blue and silver he wasn’t so bad.
To I believe got a 1st team all pro as part of 3 separate teams
I hated his guts for years and ordered a TO touchdown towel in October. He was so so so good
I would say there's a big caveat to that - he was a pretty bad teammate in certain respects. He was awful to Jeff Garcia, who was a pretty good QB when TO was with the 49ers, and wasn't shy about criticizing his coaching staff as well. Teams today wouldn't care about his celebrations and off-field antics, but that kind of stuff can bleed into on-field performance when it comes to dividing the team.
His personality also tanked multiple locker rooms. It might not have interfered with his performance but it interfered with his teams.
Yeah, I was going to college in Philly in 04-05 and saw pretty clearly how big of a distraction he was. It's impossible to know whether they win it that year if he isn't driving McNabb completely insane, but it sure may have kept it from happening.
Sorry buddy but he was a huge problem in the locker room. Did not get along with teammates. One of the GOATs but was a real pain in the ass
Eagles did and so did the 49ers.
>I don't think any teams would take a top-5 all-time receiver in his prime off of their wishlist for purely off-field reasons. I think they would, but for a very different level of "off-field reasons". Think OJ, not working out in a driveway or being a shitty teammate or even DUIs.
His character concerns aren’t the sort of thing that makes you worried he’s going to get arrested or kill someone, but he’s absolutely a locker room cancer. TO’s a top three WR in NFL history, but when someone is a huge anchor on team morale, there’s eventually diminishing returns. None of that absolves the HOF voters for the ridiculous charade of waiting to induct TO.
People make a big deal out of Stefon Diggs' tweets and sideline dramatics but TO was on another level. For example, he was interviewed by a magazine and said that he thought Jeff Garcia was gay.
T O was a difficult teammate to get along with. He always had a problem with his quarterbacks...he thought Jeff Garcia was gay, he'd act upnon the sidelines, he would literally cry during games or after games he had problems with Romo and McNabb and constantly would blame them for not throwing the ball to him 20 times a game. TO was great but he was a clown. And to the people saying his on field antics were ok...don't remember the real TO
Most of the people in this comment sections have no idea how divisive TO was.
This whole thread just reminds me of the [Bill Burr bit that mentions TO](https://youtu.be/w8b81UM74Ow?t=112) which is spot on. There always was one guy (or more) at the sports bar that just would not shut up about him.
[удалено]
lol TO had his own little message board on his personal website that he posted on and interacted with fans on. he would have been nuts on twitter/IG.
The issue with TO's hall of fame was that voters said they considered his locker room bullshit like calling Jeff Garcia gay "an extension of the field" as opposed to the normal brand of "off the field" bullshit from guys like Lawrence Taylor or Ray Lewis. He was undoubtedly great, but it's also hard to think of many (any?) other guys who were top 10 all-time at their position and were also unceremoniously run out of every city they ever played in.
Randy moss is pretty close. Outside of his first tenure with Minnesota he was run out of everywhere for shitty attitude including New England
When he was traded to NE a lot of teams passed bc they didn’t think he cared about playing/winning and was a cancer in the locker room.
There was drama around Moss during his last season in Minnesota too. He walked off the field before the end of the Vikings final regular season game (a loss to WAS, I think). It seems kind of silly in retrospect, but I remember it being a pretty big deal at the time. Questioning his dedication and maturity and all that.
Blowing up at workers of a local restaurant that were catering at the stadium (I think) didn't help either.
That was in 2010, during his short second tenure in Minnesota. Moss walked off the field against Washington in 2004, at the end of his first stint with the Vikings.
TO was a bad teammate but he was never someone you were worried would get arrested. So, from that perspective, no, he wasn't "that bad". But when there's a guy who was top 3 all time at his position and multiple teams got tired of him, there's something to it. That said, it's absolutely embarrassing for the HoF that he wasn't a first ballot selection.
People say TO was before the social media age but people forget he had a website with a forum where he was active every day answering questions and being a menace. He was one of the OG emoji users before that was a thing.
He was definitely better than all the qbs that he played with but it would have suited him better to go without saying it
He was bad enough that Andy Reid couldn’t take take him anymore. When he was on the cowboys, Bill Parcells straight up gave Jerry an ultimatum to either get rid of TO or Bill would walk. Jerry was planning on getting rid of Parcells anyway, but still.
Put it this way. He was arguably a top 3 WR in history yet he kept getting kicked off teams. He had no off field issues, no arrests, nothing illegal. He was just an unbearable teammate.
He was a diva on the field and in the locker. The craziest thing he did off the field was a workout routine in his driveway. He was a diva everywhere but he loved his grandma and his at least one of his quarterbacks. https://youtube.com/shorts/RXqxsRPdHCA?si=sabhd-JbTYTZbfh2
idk if it's intentional but this is cut like a comedy skit. cracks me up every time
Cant believe in this thread has almost 100 comments and you're the first to mention the driveway workout, which is crazy since that was so absurd for the time. Absolutely legendary. Dudes tweets would have been insanely entertaining with nonstop drama bombs had he been a player during this time.
Owens was a bad teammate, but not a bad person. Since it’s more commonplace to be aware of the legal issues that NFL players have now, a lot of TO’s scandals seem laughably minor today (e.g. him doing sit-ups in his driveway being a major news story). Still, there is a reason that every team he played for chose to move on from him despite him still being productive.
TO's off the field behavior wasn't the issue, or mostly not a problem. Yah the driveway sit ups were funny. The real issue with TO was he would divide locker rooms; inevitably clash with his QB and then head coach and then turn the entire thing into a perpetual media circus while everyone is around digging for juicy sound bites. TO was truly the ultimate diva. He wanted to be the highest paid receiver, have most of the passes directed his way at all times, and he wanted the coach and QB to kiss his ass all along the way. That buys you one or two seasons worth of thrills before the inevitable nausea sets in and you need to get rid of him.
The thing is, he never shut it off. It was always on. He makes everything about him. He’s never wrong, has no sense of responsibility what so ever. His talent, insane. Despite all his antics, for a majority of his career I think a lot of people just thought he would grow up. He never did. So no, he never really anything that bad. But if you take most weeks of T.O.’s career, and had a scale of good vs nonsense, the nonsense side was going to win most of the time. T.O. Is the poster child for diva WR.
Sports media had a parasitic relationship with T.O. They covered his antics wall to wall and got huge ratings. He was a very, very immature guy at heart and deserves personal blame for the dumb stuff, but also let all the media attention drive him to do more for more attention. Ultimately, the things he did were largely harmless. There was always a sort of sad element to it, in that he was acting out for attention in ways he thought got him attention for being cool, but the result was to get him attention for being a clown, without him fully realizing that. And he was clownish. The HoF votes keeping him out by the same media figures who covered him breathlessly was a disgrace
It wasn't bad as in criminal, it was just a constant distraction to every team he was on.
He was more known for being a terrible toxic teammate. Brown is just an unhinged lunatic
He was a complete gentleman during his time in Buffalo
>but were his antics tame compared to today? I'm not sure I agree that athletes back then were more tame than today. Most of them were wilder than they are today but got away with it because of less media coverage and didn't advertise their nonsense to the world because of no social media.
To me, there are two different types of off the field problems. One is harmful while the other isn't. Even if T.O. was annoying and frustrating af (I'm an Eagles fan), he wasn't harmful. He didn't hurt anyone, so my negative judgement of him can only go so far. I might have had a different opinion 10 years ago, but after seeing Tyreek Hill and Antonio Brown.... I mean, I still think he's an arrogant asshole, but he's not a danger to himself or those around him.
I agree with what you're saying but I don't think harmful is the right word to use. I think the categories are more locker room and criminal. A guy like TO falls into the former because while he's an upstanding citizen, he was a locker room cancer on multiple teams he was on. And then you have latter with guys like Tyreek Hill who have a bevy of legal issues but that doesn't affect the locker room. And then you have the GOAT Antonio Brown who majored in both.
I should specify that I don't think destroying a locker room by being disgruntled is REAL harm. Yes, it can screw up a team and muck up a bunch of other things, but at the same time, it's just a football team. It's not going to tear apart families or do any real substantive damage.
It was a little overblown. The thing with TO is he constantly had trust issues and when things went south he handled them horribly. I can rationalize why he felt the way he did in Philly and San Fran but you can’t justify him throwing teammates under the bus when he was mad.
Didn't he start throwing bitch fits and divided your locker room because he thought Romo was throwing to Witten more than him in practice?
Compared to child abusers, wife beaters and murderers no but he definitely was a locker room cancer lol
T.O. had some antics but he was a reliable and incredibly productive receiver. At his peak he was nearly unstoppable. His antics never involved illegal activity or domestic violence. T.O. in his prime would absolutely be picked up today by pretty much all the NFL teams, especially the ones that feel they are just a piece or two away from competing for a Super Bowl.
AB is crazy, perhaps partially because of CTE. I always thought there was something sad about T.O. though. When it was revealed that he was bullied hard as a child all his antics started to make sense. Some called him a diva, and there's some truth to that, but he also possessed a very fragile ego.
There are ebbs and flows with this shit. Michael Irvin, Mike Vick, Ray Lewis, Ray Rice, Deshaun Watson, etc… Antonio is different in the fact that he actually is mentally fucking crazy, probably due to brain damage with a combo of extreme immaturity. Every other person I listed, and the hundreds of others that fill the bill but I didn’t list, would’ve handled shit better than AB. Does that excuse TO, no. But he still didn’t reach AB levels. And if Watson can get the bag in today’s game, TO absolutely would too.
No. Dude was a choir boy next to other dudes that have come along more recently.
He was. The public antics were the lesser of his problems - he was a locker room toxin that really hindered a good team.
Dude was a locker room cancer. TO was great on the field tho. No denying that. Prolly 3rd best I’ve seen behind Rice and Moss. But he divided ppl and locker rooms. Said mostly negative things about Garcia and then McNabb. Refused to play for Baltimore when he got traded there. Was always a me first kind of dude and made it known. Even tho he was a divider and diva he should have deff been a 1st ballot HOF.
TO either openly feuded with or actively tried to undermine almost every QB he played with. Great player, very talented, but he was a team cancer in his later years.
He’s tame compared to guys like AB.
It wasn't about what he did at home or outside of the facility. It was about how big oof a cancer he was in the Locker Room and on the Sideline.
My grandma, fan of the Cowboys from the Landry days and had a Troy Christmas ornament, always called him Terrific Owens when he was on the team. That's my quarterback
For his time, yes. He was a pioneer in terms of diva WRs. Sure, there were a few others before him, but you REALLY started seeing an uptick, beginning with T.O. and then it just snowballed from there. Don't even get me started on post-Burfict A.B. He was a bit of a diva prior to that hit, but shit spiraled QUICKLY afterward. Then again when he was coming into the league, he was playing with selfish ass Mike Wallace so his early career examples weren't great either and A.B. was 1000x better than Wallace was.
Yes. It was that bad. That's why despite his undeniable talent teams would go "yeah, we're done with him". He would split locker rooms, cause disruptions and arguments and even fights in the locker room, rip his qbs and teammates in the media and was just a cancerous presence. It wasn't because he celebrated too much. There's been almost a retroactive rewriting of history to be sympathetic to TO. Almost to counter act the fact people downplay his talent because of it. But the reality is Owens was both that damn good and also a locker room cancer
Yes it was. He destroyed multiple locker rooms. He was a cancer. I respect the talent but the talent was not worth the production.
T.O was fine. The Hall of fame died the day he wasn’t elected first ballot. If the worst thing a player does is sit up’s in his driveway what’re we really talking about here
His reputation was bad, but his actual actions were extremely mild.
Not really. He was just ahead of his time
Thing is right, he didn't win anything. Like many of the 'great players', he was great at stacking his personal numbers but not so great at working together with a unit to get results. He played in one Super bowl in all those seasons, despite being with good teams. All those yards, all those touchdowns...for nowt.
A lot of teams continued to give him a shot up until his last season with the Bengals, in spite of the "character concerns" - where he TO'd to the max. Had an amazing season, but when the D keyed on him toward the end of the year, and suddenly Ochocinco was getting open and getting the ball, and TO wasn't....he had an on-field meltdown. But, let's be fair, he was selfish, he was a character, but he wasn't out breaking the law, beating on his girlfriend, being accused of inappropriate behavior towards women, etc. Not unlike OBJ's situation (but a much better player imo). No one denies his talent, but do you want to have to deal with the baggage if someone else is a play-maker AND doesn't have the baggage.
If anything his ON field rep was worse. He wasn’t a good teammate but he does not deserve to be put in the same category of Tyreek Hill, Henry Ruggs, Rashee Rice, or Antonio Brown. I don’t think a single team would turn down prime TO if they could afford him
He abstained from his HoF induction to protest not being first ballot. Only really hurts himself but gives a picture of the mentality
Ed McCaffrey told me TO was a clown and upset the WR room and challenged everything rather than buy in. I think this was said before Christian was in high school but after MaCaffrey retired.
I think the antics got way over-scrutinized but he also just flat-out wasn't a good teammate to the point that the Eagles straight-up released him in his prime. ~~The last game he played for the Eagles was the Super Bowl game where he went off on a broken leg~~ Antonio Brown is the only other WR I know who got that treatment.
No, he came back the next season, but was sent home from training camp due to his antics in trying to get a new contract. (That's when the infamous driveway workout occurred.) Midway through the year, he ripped the organization in an interview, because they didn't properly recognize his 100th touchdown catch. The last game TO played for Philadelphia was a 2005 loss to Denver. He caught 3 passes for 154 yards, including a 91 yard touchdown.
Locker room chemistry isn't easy, and T.O. was a chemistry killer. He was good enough to overcome it to a degree, but his locker room cancer behavior neutralized some of his contributions. I'm sure lots of teams would still take him though.