The Pittsburgh Steelers entered Week 17 needing to win and get help in order to make the playoffs. But even that dire situation didn’t stop the team from reportedly benching star wide receiver Antonio Brown after an eventful week leading up to the game.

According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Brown missed the season-ending game against the Cincinnati Bengals not because of a knee injury but because an angry Brown reportedly “threw a football in anger at one of his teammates, several sources said.”

The report does not indicate with which teammate Brown had the heated dispute.

The incident happened during the Steelers’ Wednesday walk-through prior to their practice that day. Brown did not practice the rest of the week from that point on, which was Brown’s — not the coaches’ — decision, according to the story.

This is a shocking development for a player who is in the midst of a four-year, $68 million deal. Brown previously has been lauded for his toughness. He was the Steelers’ second-leading receiver with 104 catches and second in yards with 1,297, but Brown’s 15 touchdowns led the team despite missing the finale.

Despite missing the Steelers’ Saturday walk-through as well, Brown reportedly expected to play in Sunday’s game against the Bengals. He was listed as questionable with a knee injury and was said to be ruled out just prior to the game after testing his health. But it sounds now as if that story was fabricated (or exaggerated) following the midweek drama.

Lions fire offensive coordinator Cooter

The Detroit Lions are not renewing offensive coordinator Jim Bob Cooter’s contract after the team sputtered to a 6-10 season while quarterback Matthew Stafford struggled.

The Lions announced their decision Tuesday, two days after finishing 6-10 in coach Matt Patricia’s first season at the helm. Cooter was a holdover from Jim Caldwell’s staff, but his first season with Patricia did not go well.

Only two teams in the NFC scored fewer points than Detroit’s 324. Rookie running back Kerryon Johnson gave the Lions’ running game a bit of a boost before he was lost for the season with a knee injury. Stafford took a step back, falling short of 4,000 yards passing for the first time since his injury-filled 2010 campaign.

Detroit won its finale 31-0 over Green Bay, but that was the only time in its last 10 games that the Lions scored more than 22 points.

Cooter was a quarterbacks coach for the Lions before taking over as offensive coordinator during the 2015 season. Detroit kept him after firing Caldwell and hiring Patricia, but that continuity didn’t seem to help much this season.

Stafford threw 21 touchdown passes, also his lowest mark since 2010, and his passer rating of 89.9 was his lowest since 2014.

“I think there are games where we were able to execute well in the passing game, and obviously games where we didn’t, and that’s why we are where we are right now,” Patricia said Monday. “We’ll evaluate all of it.”

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