The DJ’s sound system was not loud enough to drown out Cam Newton on Sunday in Atlanta as the former NFL quarterback watched a game at a 7-on-7 youth football event.
‘It’s tough to be my son, I know!’ he hollered. ‘I raised you!’
Newton, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2011 draft, seemed to be having fun at someone else’s expense.
Overlooking the field below, Newton was taunting TopShelf Performance (TSP), a team led by two men − Steph Brown and TJ Brown − who used to work for Newton’s 7-on-7 program, C1N.
‘I raised you!’ Newton shouted.
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Then all hell was raised.
The two coaches left the field with the game in progress, tracked down Newton and videotape that went viral captured the melee that ensued.
‘I was wrong for letting Cam get in my head,’ Steph Brown told USA TODAY Sports.
As of yet, no such apology from the quarterback who relished the nickname Superman.
Newton did not respond to requests for comment made by USA TODAY Sports through his representatives.
Newton, 34, hasn’t played in the NFL since 2021, but he’s still an All-Pro trash talker equipped with custom-made hats and freeform dreadlocks.
‘Cam’s always been a bit of a showman,’ said Chris Circo, CEO of Battle Sports, which hosts invite-only 7-on-7 tournaments. ‘Why would he turn it off?’
‘Get this guy out of here’
The fight in Atlanta was not the first altercation at a 7-on-7 tournament involving Newton this year.
On Jan. 27, a photographer captured an on-field incident between Newton and Jay Wimbrow, the director of operations for South Florida Express, another elite 7-on-7 team.
The teams were playing at a national Battle 7×7 tournament in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and Wimbrow said tensions boiled over when Newton made himself at home on South Florida Express’ sideline.
‘When I was telling the refs, yo, get this guy out of here, (Newton) grabbed my wrist,’ Wimbrow said. ‘And in that (photograph) you see I’m pulling my wrist away from him, that’s what’s going on there.’
At 6-5 and 250 pounds, Newton towers over Wimbrow and most everyone else on the 7-on-7 circuit.
‘He tries to get in people’s face and tries to kind of just intimidate people,’ Wimbrow said. ‘And because he’s Cam Newton, people give him the benefit of the doubt.’
But Circo, who oversaw the tournament for Battle Sports, said Wimbrow should not have been on the field because Wimbrow is not a coach.
‘Jay was way out of line and came at Cam, which I thought was insanity,’ Circo said. ‘I didn’t see Cam do anything wrong at our event and I didn’t see him really do anything other than defend himself.
‘You know, he’s very vocal. But he’s fun. … he gets a bit of a bad rap.’
Circo later clarified by text message that if Cam ‘crossed the field during a game to the other team’s sideline that’s not acceptable.’
The bad blood between Newton and TSP’s Browns can be traced back to success.
When they were a trio working for Newton’s C1N program, the 18-under team won the Pylon 7×7 Nationals in Dallas in 2021. But the Browns, who are not related, said they began to think Newton was working against them.
Specifically, the coaches said, Newton was depriving them of film of C1N teams they coached separately from Newton. It was the type of film used to promote the teams and players online.
In 2022, they left C1N and started TSP.
Engaging in sideline antics
Since then, Steph Brown and TJ Brown said, Newton has poked and prodded at them on social media. Until last Saturday, when there was a chance for something else – to meet on the field at a 7-on-7 tournament sponsored by We Ball Sports, an athletic apparel company.
Before that game, videotape shows, Newton’s players crowded on TSP’s sideline. TJ Brown could be seen frowning before Newton’s players dispersed without incident.
At least one videographer working for Newton was filming the scene – the type of content that ends up online to promote teams or tournaments.
Ashley Green, a marketing consultant who began representing TSP after the fight, said a tournament organizer was taping the scene instead of directing Newton’s players to their own sideline.
‘It’s important to note the role that the organizers also played in not drawing a line in terms of disrespect,’ Green said, adding that a greater emphasis on sportsmanship could have kept the friction from escalating into a fight.
Nehemiah Mitchell, the co-founder of We Ball Sports and a tournament organizer, declined to comment.
Despite the sideline antics that day, TSP prevailed, 24-20.
On Sunday morning, TJ Brown said, he crossed paths with Newton in the parking lot at B.E.S.T. Academy, site of the tournament.
Brown recalled Newton saying, ‘Hey, what are we doing today? Let’s bet. I ain’t never running out of money. I got plenty of money.’
(Newton, who earned more than $130 million during his NFL career, is known for his talk of money. That includes offers to pay teams that beat his own for championships.)
‘You think money is everything,’ Brown recalled telling Newton. ‘You can’t buy me.’
And with that, TJ Brown said, he walked off.
On elimination day, their teams never met on the field. But the trash talk continued when they crossed paths. And when TSP played Money Team, Newton started trash talking – or, more accurately, bellowing trash – from above the field.
About five minutes into the game, the Browns did something unprecedented – they left the field with the game still in progress.
According to a statement issued by TSP, Steph Brown left the field to address the taunting with Newton. The two men met face to face at the stop of a set of stairs and, according to the TSP statement, Newton reportedly grabbed the coach ‘by his jacket trying to choke him.’
Close behind, TJ punched Newton ‘and the situation as a whole escalated,’ according to the TSP statement.
When order was restored, all three men – Newton, Steph Brown and TJ Brown – were asked to leave the premises.
‘Cam knew what he was doing,’ TJ Brown said. ‘He was trying to antagonize us during the games so that we’d lose and he was just trying to get us riled up. And this is not nothing new. This is typical Cam Newton behavior.’
‘Probably drive you crazy‘
Paul Nickel is the father of Luke Nickel, the starting quarterback on Newton’s 18-under team. He played tight end at Stanford from 1989 to 1993.
‘I’ve seen a lot of stuff,’ Paul Nickel said. ‘Even at a place like Stanford.’
But there is only one Cam Newton.
‘Does he sometimes jaw back and forth with people? Of course he does,’ Nickel said. ‘I mean, that’s kind of why he’s polarizing, right? He’s Cam Newton. That’ s just how he is.
‘If you don’t know him, he’ll probably drive you crazy.’
But Wimbrow suggests Newton is putting himself at risk.
‘Eventually, you keep poking the bear, somebody’s going to poke back,’ he said. ‘And they’re not going to care you’re Cam Newton.’