Remember when earlier this month — in the days before an agreement of a trade to the Oakland Raiders was consummated — the Pittsburgh Steelers’ efforts to deal Antonio Brown reportedly were centered around the Buffalo Bills?
The Bills general manager says “that was never something that we were even close on.”
Speaking to Pro Football Talk on Monday morning, Buffalo general manager Brandon Beane said while the Bills and Steelers were able to find common ground on a trade, Brown (via superagent Drew Rosenhaus) wasn’t nearly as keen about joining his team.
“We had productive talks with Kevin Colbert, with Pittsburgh, but one of the things I made clear with Kevin early on is we would have to be comfortable with where the compensation is going to have to be with AB’s representatives, and that was never something that we were even close on,” Beane told PFT.
The Steelers eventually settled on a package of two draft picks (third- and fifth-rounders) from Oakland for perennial All-Pro Brown. The reported offer from the Bills involved a swapping of first-round picks (with the Steelers moving up 11 spots from No. 20) in addition to later-round picks.
Beane seemed comfortable with those trade parameters. He just apparently wasn’t willing to acquiesce to what Brown and Rosenhaus were demanding from a new team. Beane said by the time the internet was buzzing with talk that Brown appeared headed to the Bills, he knew it wasn’t happening.
“We just didn’t get far enough down the road,” Beane told PFT. “There’s compensation with the Steelers and then there’s compensation with the player. We were just never able to work out all sides to make that happen. It had totally died down before that tweet came out that was erroneous. It wasn’t like it was heating up at that point. Talks had stalled well before.”
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