TopShelf Performance's TJ and Steph Brown recall what led to altercation with former league MVP
NFL MVP quarterback Cam Newton went viral on Sunday after footage surfaced on social media of a brawl that broke out during a 7-on-7 football tournament in Atlanta.
Two of the men involved in the altercation, coaches TJ and Steph Brown, say Newton's actions throughout the weekend ultimately led to the physical skirmish that started with him grabbing Steph first before TJ threw a punch.
"It just should never have gotten to that," TJ told Fox News Digital on Monday.
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Football coach TJ Brown of TopShelf Performance spoke to Fox News Digital about a fight he was involved in with former NFL MVP Cam Newton. (TJ Brown)
Unfortunately, the situation was one that TJ and Steph, who run TopShelf Performance's (TSP) 7-on-7 teams while providing training for wide receivers at all levels, saw festering not just this weekend, but for quite some time.
They have had a relationship with Newton, the first overall pick in the 2011 NFL Draft who won league MVP with the Carolina Panthers in 2015, since 2020, when Newton appointed TJ head coach of one of his "C1N" 7-on-7 teams. Steph eventually came into the fold after coaching college ball, becoming Newton's wide receivers coach and a member of his offensive support staff.
Tensions rose within the organization, specifically when TJ's team was beating the team Newton coached. In 2022, TJ and Steph decided to break off from C1N and create their own 7-on-7 team, which became TSP.
NFL MVP CAM NEWTON APPEARS TO GET INTO FIGHT AT 7-ON-7 FOOTBALL GAME
The inaugural "We Ball Sports" 7-on-7 tournament took place in Atlanta over the weekend, when both organizations had teams playing, and TJ felt the organizers knew exactly what they were doing when they pitted their 18U teams against each other on Saturday.
"First off, on the organizer’s part, we weren’t even supposed to be playing Cam. They were on the whole other side of the bracket," TJ said.
TJ and Steph recalled taunting beginning from Newton's side prior to the game even starting. It was nothing new for teams to share some barbs before going at it on the field, no matter the sport. However, they felt it was personal.
"As we’re warming up, you see in most of the videos, Cam has this chant where he’s like, ‘Ayo!’ So he yells it over on his sideline, then he tells them, ‘Man, y’all go over there and do it to them too,'" TJ explained. "So all the players run up on us, and they’re like, ‘Ayo!’ Mind you, he knows a lot of our players don’t mess with his players, and some of them are cool. Obviously, as they’re running up on our players, the We Ball [Sports] folks, they’re recording it. All I said to the camera was, ‘Don’t delete the film when I beat him this time,’ because the last time I beat him – the last three times I beat them – all of a sudden there’s no film. ‘Oh, we didn’t record anything. We took pictures.’"
TSP ended up beating C1N on Saturday, but Sunday is when things started to get even worse, beginning with an interaction TJ said he had with Newton in the parking lot.
Football coach Steph Brown was involved in an altercation with former NFL MVP Cam Newton during a 7-on-7 football tournament. (Steph Brown)
"Sunday comes, I’m walking through the parking lot, walking to the field," he recounted. "Cam jumps out of his car and yells, ‘Hey, all that sorry s--- ain’t gonna work today. What we betting today? What we betting?’ I’m like, ‘I ain’t betting you, bro. I already beat you three, four times. You got to beat me first.’ He like, ‘What we betting? I got plenty of money. I ain’t ever running out of money.’ That’s when I told him, ‘That’s your problem. All you care about is money. You think money is everything. You can’t buy me.’ And I walk off."
Newton's team began to play in Sunday's slate of games, and TJ noted that he was taunting TSP despite not being opponents in the game. Then, when it was TSP's turn to start playing, Newton was at the top of a flight of stairs (seen in videos of the fight) hurling taunts down at the TSP coaches and players on the field.
"It’s probably three minutes into the game, he’s sitting up top with all his kids around him under a tent yelling down on us," TJ said. "‘Hey, I know that play. That’s my stuff. I taught y’all everything y’all know. I’m y’all daddy. I made y’all. I’m the reason for everything y’all got going on.’ He’s just yelling all this stuff."
One anonymous parent who was present for the altercation on Sunday confirmed to Fox News Digital that Newton had been taunting those on the field.
Steph went to confront Newton after their game to talk about what was being said, which is when things began to escalate. TJ was just walking up the long staircase when video shows Newton grabbing Steph by his jacket after they were face-to-face trading words.
TJ jumped in, throwing a punch at Newton before the latter grabbed him and the fight moved toward a fence.
Cam Newton is seen during Fan Controlled Football Season v2.0 - Week Three on April 30, 2022 in Atlanta. (Brett Davis/Fan Controlled Football/Getty Images)
"If you’re walking up a flight of stairs, and you see a 6’6" guy grab your little brother trying to throw him down some stairs, you’re going to intervene," TJ said. "It doesn’t matter who you are, rather it be a punch, rather it be a push, rather it be grabbing him. You’re going to do something. So, at that point, with Cam putting his hands on another grown man, something is going to come behind that.
"If you ask anybody about me, I’m not confrontational, I’m not loud, I don’t get mad at people, I don’t argue with people, I don’t fight, I don’t do none of that crazy stuff. That’s not me."
Atlanta police and others got involved to de-escalate the situation. No arrests were made and no charges were pressed, though Steph, TJ and Newton were ordered to leave the grounds.
The TSP coaches felt there was a lack of accountability by not only Newton, but the organizers of the event as well. While nothing has ever escalated to a fight, it has gotten close for Newton, as they mentioned him getting into it with an event photographer at a Miami 7-on-7 tournament earlier this month.
"This is typical Cam Newton behavior on the 7-on-7 scene," TJ said. "But yesterday was a little worse, and you can even ask people in his organization. Cam ain’t never act like that. I’ve seen him talk crazy to parents, talk crazy to some of the kids because everybody tries to make it seem like, ‘Oh, the kids just be disrespecting Cam.’ No, Cam be disrespecting people, too.
"He’s just got to understand we’re people. Nobody’s just going to let you go around disrespecting and talking crazy to them. I know how to brush it off, but not everybody’s like that."
Former NFL and Auburn quarterback, Cam Newton, throws a pass during Auburn Pro Day on Tuesday, March 21, 2023, in Auburn, Alabama. (AP Photo/Butch Dill)
TJ and Steph both pointed out having good relationships with players and others on the C1N side, which is why they did not like their own actions during the situation.
"To the C1N players, I apologize. This is your big brother telling y’all that," TJ said. "A lot of y’all know us personally. We apologize for putting y’all in that situation like that because it should never come to that. We love y’all. Some of the coaches and people that are a part of the organization, we love y’all. We still have relationships."
Steph added, "I’m disappointed in myself. I let Cam trigger me to that point where I entertained what he was doing, but it was never out of ill will or to put him in harm’s way. I’m 5’9", man, but I stand on what I stand on. I say what I’m going to say no matter what. I ain’t got to be loud, this and that. But me going up there was to let him know, ‘Cam, you’re not gonna disrespect our organization, you’re not going to disrespect our kids or our parents out here. You’re bigger than that.’"
While the situation appears to be a relationship that was once good and now torn to pieces, the TSP side hopes they can reconcile their differences with Newton and C1N soon.
"We got to do better as men," Steph said. "We’re Black men. We got to do better. Cam, I don’t care how much money you got, this and that. But you don’t put your hands on nobody. …I look at you as a brother. You let [something] not football come in between that."
Cam Newton attends 2022 Huncho Day Celebrity Football Game during Fan Controlled Football Season v2.0 - Week Three at Pullman Yards on April 30, 2022 in Atlanta. (Paras Griffin/Getty Images)
"It still ain’t too late to figure this out," TJ said. "Because at the end of the day, it’s about these kids. He’s got kids on his team that I train and coach. We got kids on our team who he knows. We got kids on our team who know some of the players and play with some of the players on his team in high school. Any time it gets to that, we have to figure this out because now these kids and their relationships are involved."
Newton and C1N did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the altercation when asked by Fox News Digital.
Scott Thompson is a sports writer for Fox News Digital.
