Stop us if you’ve heard this before… but what if we told you superstar A.J. Brown’s effort was being questioned? Would you be surprised?
New England Patriots fans are getting a crash course in what it’s like to have Brown on their team — plus some — after the last two games, when he’s seemed uninvolved, unproductive, and full of excuses since returning from a high ankle sprain he suffered in Week 1.
The latest indictment of Brown’s career came in his team’s 30-21 loss to the Chicago Bears on Thursday Night Football in Week 7.
“Death. Taxes. And AJ Brown giving up on a play because it doesn’t involve him,” Eagles fan account That Hurts wrote on its official X account on Friday.
“In two games since returning from injured reserve with a high-ankle sprain, Brown has caught only six of the 16 passes he’s been thrown for only 75 yards and with at least four drops,” Yahoo Sports NFL reporter Eric Edholm wrote on Friday. “After struggling badly in his first game back on Sunday against the Jets, with three dropped passes and a nearly botched onside kick at game’s end, Brown was better against the Bears — but only incrementally. When the Patriots traded a 2028 first-round pick and a 2027 fifth-rounder Brown, they were clearly hoping for WR1 production. All told this season, Brown has nine catches for 101 yards in about 10 quarters of work.”
Brown, as Eagles fans came to know all too well, was full of excuses afterward. In this case the excuse was … the other team played defense on him?
“I know what type of player I am … I get a lot of attention, teams try and take me away and it gives a lot of opportunities for other guys to make plays,” Brown said after the loss to the Bears.
Eagles Got First-Round Pick in Exchange for Brown
The Eagles traded Brown to the Patriots for a 2028 1st-round pick on June 1 — a deal that looks better every time Brown takes the field.
On Friday morning, a deep ball from Patriots quarterback Drake Maye that hit Brown directly in the hands came under the microscope.
“A.J. Brown, come on dude,” ESPN analyst and former NFL quarterback Dan Orlovsky said on Friday morning. “The drops gotta go away … we gave up a first-round pick for you. Come on, dude.”
“Eagles general manager Howie Roseman didn’t have a very good offseason, but the one great thing he did was get a 1 for A.J. Brown,” The Philly Voice’s Jimmy Kempski wrote on X.
A.J. Brown Pouted Way Out of Philly
Brown played four seasons for the Eagles after they gave up a 1st-round pick in a trade with the Tennessee Titans before the 2022 season. In those four seasons, he was a 3-time NFL All-Pro, played in 2 Super Bowls — winning one after the 2024 season — and had at least 1,000 receiving yards each year.
That still wasn’t good enough — Brown spent his final two seasons mostly pouting about his usage in the offense and became a locker-room cancer.
“Complicated tenure,” NFL on Prime’s James Palmer wrote on his official X account on June 1. “Very successful as well. In a short period of time, few WRs accomplished more than A.J. Brown in an Eagles jersey.”
Ex-Eagles WR A.J. Brown Called Out for ‘Giving Up’ on New Team