 July 12th, 2019. Barcelona fans around the world are cheering one name, the name of one of the most consistently brilliant players in the world, Antoine Griezmann. Antoine Griezmann is now a Barcelona player. Can you imagine Griezmann and Messi together? Yeah. Little one-two's, little balls in behind. Griezmann was signed to win FC Barcelona the Champions League and returned the Blaugrana to European brilliance, but that never happened. Griezmann failed at Barcelona, returning to Atleti with his head down in 2021, eventually making it permanent for just 20 million euros, a loss of 84% of his value in just two years. But despite those very apparent losses, the real robbery had only just begun. The question was, who actually robbed whom? Chapter 1, Transfer to Barcelona. Publicly, it had been clear for a while that Antoine Griezmann had always wanted a move to FC Barcelona. Clean football, the chance to play with Lionel Messi, and finally win a La Liga title. For many footballers, a move like that could be a dream. But for Griezmann, it came out to be more of a nightmare. After taking a year to acclimate to the fast-paced Catalan playstyle, losing 8-2 to Bayern and dropping the league title to Real Madrid by just five points, fans' hopes and expectations were dwindling with the Frenchman, even if it wasn't necessarily fair. See, that team, for all of its weak points and struggles, was pretty decent offensively. They scored the most goals in La Liga, netting 16 more than Madrid, even with Griezmann putting up his worst league goal contribution tally since 2012. They scored and they scored and they scored, even with the slow Luis Suarez and similar profiles of Griezmann and Messi. But why were they so poor? Why didn't anything come of that season? Well, maybe it was because they shouldn't have been shelling out 120 million euros of their money on a forward in the first place. The fact is that when Barcelona signed Antoine Griezmann the last time a team scored more goals than they did in La Liga was 2014-15. Yes, the exact year they won the treble, and so goals, even with an aging Suarez and Messi, were still relatively easy to come by. Whether it was the manager or the board of Barcelona, someone had a false bravado that made them feel like they had to sign a player that made fans ooh and ah while on the attack, instead of signing a player that would help them in the toughest games against the best teams and when it mattered the most, where it mattered the most for this side in defense. Griezmann may have brought the jersey sales, but players like Delict and Rodgerie and Eddermillie Tau, who were all transferred around the same time that Griezmann was and for less money than Griezmann was, could offer the squad a solidity that they didn't have with Piquet, Langley, and Samedo in their back line. Griezmann was a victim of this bravado. He was robbed of a year of his career where he had to acclimate to this Barcelona side and Barcelona, well, they were robbed of their good name. To this day, they are still fighting what came from that 8-2 loss to Bayern. And sadly for Griezmann and for Barcelona, the struggles would continue. The next season, Barcelona was dumped out of the Champions League quite easily, I might add, by Kylian Mbappe and PSG. After all, the financial disaster that was this side was finally revealed that summer and so very few signings were able to be made, leaving the squad relatively thin, especially defensively. To his credit though, Griezmann's form improved a lot. He scored 20 goals and assisted 11 in all competitions, while helping to lead the Blaugrana to the 6th consecutive year of leading La Liga in goals scored. However, that doesn't matter if they don't win. That season Antoine Griezmann would watch the side he had abandoned the year prior, overtake his once city rivals Real Madrid to win their first La Liga title since 2014. Griezmann was solid and he deserves credit for that, but the team was not solid and so changes needed to be made and they would be. The health and existence at all of Football Club de Barcelona hung in the balance and Antoine Griezmann's salary tilted the scale. Chapter 2 Return to Athletic Messi leaves, no significant signings are made and it's clear that Griezmann is next. Earning 35 million euros per year and only putting in 20 goals wasn't good enough, especially without a Lionel Messi by his side to help him. Athletico pounced at the chance to have their main man back and reinforced their already title winning side. With their financial limitations, Barcelona were unable to be shrewd negotiators and Athleti took advantage of that, signing the Frenchman on loan with an option to buy for 40 million euros that would become mandatory under certain circumstances and that are very important for later in the story. Barca needed him off the wage bill, but being without him really showed. That season, the squad only scored 68 goals in La Liga and that's their lowest tally in the league since the 03-04 season. 20 years ago, that's the last time they were that bad and sure, new signings would come with the introduction of Xavi as manager with Ferran Torres abombing in a dama triore, but they weren't going to save the season. Just two years after leaving at Leti for 120 million to help bring Barcelona the Champions League title, he was back at the Metropolitana empty handed. Now it's hard to pinpoint if that season the team struggled so much because Griezmann left or if it was because Messi left, but either way, the team was nothing like it had been before. And at first glance, neither was Antoine Griezmann. Though he was seemingly welcomed with open arms at the Metropolitana, it wasn't that simple. In fact, he wasn't even starting at first and was only being used as a super sub. He was fine and there were great moments of time, but it's hard for players to be consistent when they are played so inconsistently, especially players that have been starters for the past 10 years of their career like Antoine Griezmann was. So why wasn't he getting the playing time? Could it have been that he wasn't the same player anymore, that Barcelona had ruined him just like they had ruined Felipe Coutinho, or maybe Alcolo just didn't think they needed him? After all, they had won La Liga without him? Well, no. That wasn't it at all. See, the terms of Griezmann's loan agreement stated that if he played more than 45 minutes in 50% or more of the matches he was available for, then the feared obligation to buy would kick in. Forgetting that 40 million euros was probably still a pretty solid deal for Antoine Griezmann, Atleti was also decently strapped for cash, and so Griezmann was left out to dry and effectively robbed of another year of his career. That season, the Frenchman scored 8 goals and assisted 7 in under 2500 minutes across all competitions. Never before in his professional career had he played that little football. That proved very costly. He had already seen his reputation decline at Barcelona, just as pretty much every Barca player did at that time except maybe Pedri. But now it wasn't just his reputation at stake, it was his performance, his career because Atleti was limiting his minutes to avoid paying Barca's transfer fee. However, Barca would soon catch on and force Atleti to buy Griezmann for the low low price of 20 million euros. If you split the total cost of Griezmann's transfer fee and salary over his two years at Barcelona and adjusted for inflation, he cost the club 224 million euros in today's money for just 35 goals and 16 assists. In two years, that money evaporated. The club had nothing to show for it except for a Copa del Rey and a few Champions League participation medals. Just think about what that money could have done for Barcelona if it were in smarter hands. Some may say that not spending that money on a proper back line or pivot replacement for Busquets was a clear robbery. But then again, I haven't told you about the robbery, the real robbery that would happen next. 23 Season This season saw the new look Barcelona with Chavi getting his first full season and the introduction of new signings, Lewandowski, Kunde, and Rafinha. The side had been to hell and back with Antoine Griezmann and now things were looking up for the squad. However, for the Frenchman, I wouldn't exactly say the same. Sure, he was back at home at the Metropolitano and back being the main man again. But after the abysmal last season statistically speaking and that very low transfer fee, expectations weren't very high for him. After his fumbled trip to Catalonia, I think everyone expected his downfall as seemed destined for any expensive signing to Barcelona since Neymar left. But Griezmann would stun the world that year. With 16 goals and 18 assists, Antoine Griezmann was rightly considered to be one of the best players, if not the best player in the entirety of La Liga. Atletico didn't walk away with any silverware, but in plenty of matches Antoine Griezmann saved the day. Perhaps he was the single best 20 million euro signing in history, but Barcelona for all the money they were out also had a pretty good year. Yes, they were knocked out of the Champions League group stage for the second year in a row, but with the emergence of Araujo Kunde and Christensen, they won matches and that won them La Liga. And to be fair, a lot of that success for both Barcelona and Antoine Griezmann has continued into this season. He is actually having one hell of a season. He is back to his best and that signaled to me the real robberies that have occurred. One can argue that the financial mess, this terrible investment for FC Barcelona is the only robbery going on. However, I believe there are two more robberies in play here that are much more distressing than that one. The first one being the robbery of what this FC Barcelona side could have been with Antoine Griezmann in it. I've seen a lot of people argue that Antoine Griezmann could be perfect in this FC Barcelona side and after watching Athletic vs. Athletic Club, I think I agree profoundly. In their setup right now, where he looks back to his best, he is playing like a false winger on the right, sometimes linking up with Morata or De Pi as a second striker or picking up the ball deep on the wing to play an insane ball into the box or switching the play to Lino on the left. That matches up with almost perfectly what Xavi is asking of Barca's left winger this season and I believe Griezmann could do a hell of a much better job than Felix has so far and that Ferentores and Roque probably have as well. It truly could have been incredible. With the supreme touch and intelligence of Griezmann on top of his very decent finishing ability, he may have been able to take the pressure off of and therefore bring the best out of Lewandowski. But who knows what could have happened. Maybe if we kept Griezmann, we wouldn't have been able to sign Lewa or Kunde and then therefore might not have won the league last season. Either way, though, we were robbed of being able to see Griezmann play under Xavi to play in this side with Lewandowski with Lemenya Maul. It truly would have been special. However, this doesn't hold a candle to what I believe is the biggest robbery of all. The robbery of the fans. Griezmann is special now and was special before he went to Barcelona. But I don't know if there were many people calling him special while he was there. So what would have happened if he had never made the move? Maybe he scores 25 goals in the 2020-21 season and wins the league with Atleti and then goes on to win the Champions League that season if he helps push them past Chelsea in the knockout stages. We will never know what could have happened, though, because Griezmann had a dream that he really wanted to fulfill and I'm not going to fault him at all for trying to do that. There have been a ton of financial robberies in the past few years, most of them happening to FC Barcelona, but the reason I believe this is the greatest is because of the variety of outcomes that could have been possible had it not occurred, as well as the fact that Antoine Griezmann is just still really good after Barcelona. Griezmann clearly had it, but the thing that went wrong was that he went to FC Barcelona. But if you thought that poster was cool, why don't you check it out at my design company and I want to thank all my channel members for making this video possible. Thank you so much for the support. If you enjoyed this video about robberies, why don't you check out what happened to Robert Lewandowski because I think I consider that a robbery at times too. But thank you for watching and I'll see you in the next one. Peace.