The New England Patriots will get better at the wide receiver position with the addition of AJ Brown. They’ll also get a lot more confident.
Brown has been one of the best receivers in the NFL since entering the league, and he has the ego to match it. As NFL Media’s Mike Garofolo reported on June 9, the new Patriots wideout sent one more reminder — on both — to his former team, the Philadelphia Eagles.
“He was there at the (Eagles) facility last week to pick up some stuff at the facility and say his goodbyes. On the walls, they have pictures of Pro Bowl players, and AJ signed — they have players sign it — so he signed it, and from what I was told, he added ‘The best to ever play here. Always open,'” Garofolo relayed during an appearance on NFL Network.
AJ Brown Reminds Eagles What They’re Losing After Patriots Trade
Certainly, the Eagles will have some work to do in replacing Brown. He had arguably the two most successful seasons an Eagles wideout has ever had, setting the single-season record for receiving yards in 2022 with 1,496 and just narrowly missing breaking his own record a year later with 1,456 in 2023. The 106 receptions he hauled in during that ’23 campaign are also the second-most in franchise history, trailing only Philly legend Zach Ertz, who set the record with 116 receptions in 2018.
“Now that signature is going to stay on the wall — they might have to edit out the message as well — but there are no hard feelings or anything like that,” Garofolo added. ” … but there’s still a lot of love for him inside that building.”
And while Brown’s production might have trailed off a bit toward the end of his Eagles tenure amid questions about his age and health, the Patriots believe he can still be an impact player for at least a couple of seasons. New England parted with a 2028 first-round pick to secure Brown, reuniting him with head coach Mike Vrabel. Of course, Vrabel was the head coach for the Tennessee Titans when they drafted Brown in 2019. That decision immediately paid off; Brown surpassed the 1,000-yard mark in each of his first two seasons.
Did Patriots Overpay in AJ Brown Trade?
While Brown was still putting the finishing touches on his Philadelphia farewell, he also wasted no time getting to work in Foxboro. The wideout attended the Patriots’ second OTA session where he showed the first glimpse of what he could do with Drake Maye.
That said, some still believe the Patriots overpaid to land him.
“At the time of the combine, I was told by someone kind of close to the Patriots that they were seeing A.J. Brown as only worth a third-rounder,” The Philadelphia Inquirer’s Jeff McLane told NBC Sports.
Be that as it may, the Patriots had a clear need at wideout, and they made it happen, and it’s the sort of deal that will probably work out just fine for both sides.
” … So, is a 2028 first-rounder along with a fifth in 2027 meeting somewhere in the middle? Possibly,” McLane added. “I do think the fact that you’ve heard, ‘This is a good deal for the Eagles, this is a good deal for the Patriots,’ that it’s essentially kind of a fair deal.”
Insider: Patriots’ AJ Brown Sent One Final Message to Eagles After Trade