"He don't want you to get your money" - Asante Samuel claims Bill Belichick benched players to avoid giving them bonuses

Bill Belichick has had a rough go of it from a media storytelling perspective since Tom Brady left the New England Patriots following six Super Bowl championships. And it's only set to get worse based on Asante Samuel's recent revelation about the head coach.

Samuel, who played for Belichick for his first five seasons, from 2003-07, claimed on the I Am Athlete podcast that the 22-year Patriots HC would do everything possible to make sure players didn't get incentive-based bonuses.

"Remember we beefin' you know me and Belichick don't see eye to eye he tried bench me. You know Tom, Troy Brown gonna play nickelback. I'm on the bench. This is just Belichick - ain't no reason why. He want to hold you back, he don't want you to get your money...that's true. Yeah, um, so I'm gonna speak all facts I tell no lies that ain't on my profile."

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Asante Samuel says that Tom Brady, not Bill Belichick, is the reason Patriots won those titles

Players will always tend to side with those that fought in the trenches with them. As opposed to the coaches who earlier held that authority over them, so it's not shocking to see Samuel side with Tom Brady over Bill Belichick.

During that same I Am Athlete appearance, Samuel said that Brady was the reason why the Patriots were an NFL dynasty in the two decades the all-time coach and quarterback spent together.

“All of this (creative) stuff is working because of Tom! But that ain’t how we won … It’s one X-factor—it’s Tom. This is the truth … It’s because of Tom because guess what? Tom goes [somewhere else] and just wins a Super Bowl. That’s not a credit right there to him? With COVID, no practice—‘I go and win a Super Bowl!’”

Brady, by virtue of playing QB, had no effect on Samuel's performance outside of how much time he dictated the DB spend on the field by way of his own performance under center.

Billicheck not only designed defensive packages, but he determined who was on the field and when. Apparently, he did so in a way that made his players skeptical of his character.

Though the Patriots won Super Bowls during Samuel's time in New England, Belichick became unpopular with the very same players he deployed to become an NFL coaching legend.

If you use any of the above quotes, please credit I Am Athlete and H/T Sportskeeda