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The Antonio Brown-Vontaze Burfict subplot is too good to ignore this week, but Brown said that Burfict has already apologized in person for knocking him out of the playoffs last year with a helmet-to-helmet shot.

Burfict was suspended for the first meeting between the teams, so this is the first time they’ve been on the same field since last year’s Wild Card game.

The Steelers wide receiver said the Bengals linebacker apologized when they were in Miami this offseason.

“[He was] just saying he didn’t have no intentions of trying to injure, that it was a football move,” Brown said, via Jeremy Fowler of ESPN.com. “Play the game long enough, you may take a shot or two. It’s great to be able to bounce back and I’m excited to be in Cincinnati this weekend.”

Of course, there’s a big difference between forget and forgive, and Brown’s teammates have already vowed to have his back. And Brown himself stopped short of saying everything was fine between them.

“I don’t have no issue with any guy. I’m a football player. I’m a competitor,” Brown said. “When we’re in the field, we’re going to compete and be competitive. It’s not personal between none of these guys. It’s all in the game. . . . I represent the Steelers. It’s all business. . . .

“They’ll give us their best fight. They’ll come out with a lot of emotion, trying to get us off our game. We’ve got to be laser-focused, be a sniper out there and get the job done.”

So, yeah, this is far from over.