‘Time to Be a Winner’ — Antonio Brown Revisits Giving Up $30,000,000 to Play With Tom Brady on Patriots

As the 2019 NFL season opened, the New England Patriots looked like they may have built a group of pass catchers on par with their 18-1 team in 2007. Hopes were high as the Patriots acquired superstar Antonio Brown.

Brown had four receptions for 56 yards, including a 20-yard touchdown, in his Patriots debut. But unfortunately, Brown’s off-field troubles and legal issues forced the Patriots to cut ties with the maligned veteran.

Unfortunately for Brown, his spot on the roster wasn’t all that he lost.

Antonio Brown Explains What He Gave Up to Play With Tom Brady’s Patriots

Brown faced allegations of sexual assault and misconduct, including a civil lawsuit, essentially forcing the Patriots’ hand.

After Brown was released just 11 days after acquiring him, the Patriots lost three of their five games after starting the season 10-1 and were eliminated by the Tennessee Titans in the first round of the playoffs in what would be Brady’s last game as a Patriot.

Brown and the Raiders agreed to a three-year, $50.125 million contract with $30.125 million in guaranteed money after he was traded from the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Brown was initially excited at the prospect of playing for Jon Gruden in Oakland, but didn’t think the team had the type of roster that could help him chase a championship.

“I go to Oakland. I get a big deal. I love Mark Davis. I love Jon Gruden,” Brown said on Tyreek Hill’s “It Needed To Be Said” podcast back in 2023. “But in my mind, as a player, you’re thinking like, ‘Yo, I want to be a champion.’ I done everything from making the money. I done really have like $80 million in contracts just with the Steelers. So to me, it’s like it’s time to be a winner. I already got $40 million in the tuck. I just want to do something legendary, like just be a champion.”

Antonio Brown says he gave up $30,000,000 with the Raiders to go play with Tom Brady

“I go to Oakland. I get a big deal. I love Mark Davis. I love Jon Gruden. But in my mind, as a player, you’re thinking like, Yo, I want to be a champion. I done everything from making the money.… pic.twitter.com/nkgtLQp24y

— dank (@cptdankkk) July 26, 2026

Brown said he wanted to handle things the right way, which meant calling the Raiders’ owner to let him know.

“So I called Mark Davis, as smart a man as I am, because I’m a good guy,” Brown explained. “I could’ve just said, ‘Yo, my back hurt,’ and got the $30 million. We played Denver on Monday night. The contract guaranteed once you play the first game as a vet. I could have gotten the $30 million. I said, ‘No, I’mma do what’s right.’”

Brown referred to himself as an honorable man, and since he believed Davis was honorable as well, he “saved” Davis the money and joined the Patriots instead.

“Mark Davis went out on a limb, stood out on a limb for me when I was walking off from the Steelers. And I told him I need $30 million guaranteed right here in my living room, and he did it,” Brown said. “So as an honorable man, I told him, like, ‘Yo, I don’t want to be a Raider.’ Save him his money. And I got a chance to play with Tom Brady at the Patriots.”

Brown’s account leaves out the sequence that preceded his exit. On Sept. 6, 2019, the Raiders fined him $215,073.53 for conduct detrimental to the team, a move that voided the $29.125 million in guaranteed money remaining on his contract. Only after those guarantees were gone did Brown request his release, first in a text message to Davis and then publicly on Instagram; Oakland obliged the following day.

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Brown then spent months attempting to recover the money he now describes as a gift, filing a grievance against the Raiders that was undercut when the team produced his own release-request texts during discovery.

When Brown told a version of this story on Hill’s podcast, Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio noted the contradiction directly: Brown told Davis he wouldn’t take the money, and then tried to take the money.

Obviously, things did not work out in New England, but Brown did get a chance to catch passes again from Brady in 2020 when he joined the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Brown played in just eight games in 2020, but had 45 receptions for 483 yards and 4 touchdowns. He even got to catch a touchdown pass from Brady in Super Bowl LV, where the Bucs blew out the Kansas City Chiefs 31-9.