Eagles cornerback Brandon Boykin didn’t really know what Steelers receiver Antonio Brown meant when he called him a “candy bar,” though he surmised it was not a compliment.
“It’s up to me to do what I got to do to make sure they don’t treat me like a candy bar, or whatever they said,” Boykin said, via Zach Berman of the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Brown got the ball rolling yesterday, when he made the unusual reference to Boykin being the weak link in the Eagles secondary.
“He’s given up a lot of plays,” Brown said Wednesday, via the Washington (Pa.) Observer-Reporter. “Whoever gets that guy definitely has to take advantage.”
But Boykin said his brother called him “fired up” this morning, informing him of the slight. To his credit, he did not respond by calling Brown a bag of Funyuns or anything.
“That’s his opinion,” Boykin said. “That’s funny to me. We’re just going to continue doing what we’ve been doing as a secondary, and me as well.
“We’ll see on Sunday. The game’s on Sunday. There’s no point in rah-rahing in the media on Thursday. I’ll let my game do the talking.”
Boykin took the “any publicity’s good publicity” tack, saying it was good that he was playing enough to make other players notice him. But he said he wasn’t aware who Brown was until he started watching Steelers tape a few days ago.
“I don’t know too much about Antonio Brown,” Boykin said. “I just found out who he was this week. ...
“It’s good he’s pointing me out and it’s not doing anything other than giving me a little more attention. I got to go out and do what I do. And if I do right, he’s actually helped me in a sense. So tell him I appreciate it.”
And if anyone can fill an old man in on when “candy bar” became a unit of trash talk, I’d appreciate that too.