Lavonte David blames former Bucs WR for costing team back-to-back Super Bowl titles

In an appearance on the Bussin’ With The Boys podcast, Lavonte David opened up about nearly every aspect of his NFL career following his retirement last week.

Among the topics discussed was Antonio Brown’s infamous mid-game exit during Week 17 of the 2021 season, when he ran off the field and quit on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers against the New York Jets, and how it impacted the team.

“To be honest with you, man, AB kind of messed up our chances of going to that second Super Bowl. He was that dude, bro,” David said.

David added that, leading up to Brown’s exit, the warning signs were already there.

“Leading up to that, you saw it stirring up. You saw it brewing,” David said. “You could see, like, he might snap soon.”

According to David, Brown had been visibly frustrated in the locker room and in team meetings over minor issues, including not scoring a touchdown in a previous game. During one practice, he threw the ball at teammates and cursed at both players and coaches while demanding more targets.

Brown finished the 2021 season with 42 receptions for 545 yards and four touchdowns in just seven games. With Chris Godwin suffering a season-ending knee injury just weeks before Brown’s departure, there’s legitimate weight to David’s claim that his absence hurt Tampa Bay’s chances at a repeat.

The Buccaneers’ season ultimately ended in the NFC Divisional Round with a 30-27 loss to the Los Angeles Rams, who went on to win the Super Bowl. Behind Mike Evans, Tampa Bay was forced to rely on Scotty Miller and Tyler Johnson at wide receiver against the Rams. Those were serviceable players, but they weren’t Antonio Brown. 

Had Brown stayed the course, the Buccaneers may have had the firepower to keep pace with the Rams and come away with a victory.

It’s a tough reality to accept, because the Buccaneers had a legitimate chance to make history with back-to-back Super Bowl victories. They finished 13-4 in 2021, and were an objectively better team than the 2020 squad that finished 11-5 and won Super Bowl LV over the Chiefs.

If the injury bug had spared some of Tampa Bay’s key contributors, and if Brown would’ve chosen the team over himself, the 2020 and 2021 Bucs could’ve joined a rare group of teams to have won back-to-back titles.

It's something that David has clearly spent time contemplating, and it's refreshing for Bucs fans to get to hear the usually soft-spoken franchise legend open up about his career and shed some light on behind the scenes stories like this now that he's entered retirement.