Steelers negotiating with WR Brown

PITTSBURGH — The Steelers are following through on their promise to offer All-Pro wide receiver Antonio Brown a new contract.

General manager Kevin Colbert said Thursday the team has already begun negotiations with Brown, who has one year left on the $42 million deal that began in 2013. The 28-year-old Brown is coming off his fourth straight season of at least 100 receptions.

The Steelers gave Brown an advance on his salary in each of the last two seasons as a pseudo bonus and vowed last summer to prioritize giving him a long-term contract that could keep him with the team for the balance of his career. Colbert and Brown’s agent Drew Rosenhaus are already in discussions and the team has no issues about Brown’s occasionally eccentric behavior. Brown drew a strong rebuke from head coach Mike Tomlin last month for livestreaming from Pittsburgh’s victorious postgame locker room following a playoff win at Kansas City. Brown later apologized for the distraction.

The dust up did nothing to alter Colbert’s intentions to keep one of the league’s most dynamic players for the long run.

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