A.J. Brown described being traded to the New England Patriots as a “dream come true” in his “7PM in Brooklyn” interview with NBC Sports’ Maria Taylor that dropped Tuesday. The three-time All-Pro wide receiver also said the moment was “like Christmas.”
“I’m truly a kid in the candy store,” he told Taylor.
Right in front of them was a Patriots rug that read “MAN CAVE” with the team’s logo sprawled across the navy fiber. Taylor asked Brown when he got it.
He said he’s had the rug for a few years.
Promptly, Taylor followed up with the obvious question: “While you were an Eagle, you had this rug in your house?”
“Absolutely,” he said.
“Some things just never change. This is my team. This is my team since I was a kid. It didn’t matter. I was doing what I was supposed to be doing as an Eagle, but this is it.”
Brown won a Super Bowl with the Philadelphia Eagles, whom he starred for each of the past four seasons. Before that, he played for the Tennessee Titans, who took him in the second round of the 2019 draft out of Ole Miss.
But he grew up rooting for the Patriots, and Brown explained that the fandom he breathed as a child never really went away as he climbed the football ladder. Despite hailing from Starkville, Mississippi, Brown joined the Patriots’ faithful.
That quirk was inspired by his older cousin, who also was a Pats fan. Brown said he wanted to be just like him.
“And so ever since then, through and through Patriot, Patriot, Patriot,” Brown said.
Although Brown also discussed his stay in Philadelphia — which ended with nonstop speculation surrounding his satisfaction with his involvement in the Eagles’ offense and unrelenting conjecture about his relationship with quarterback Jalen Hurts — he appeared most excited to talk about his next chapter.
Brown recounted memories of wearing a Tom Brady jersey again and again, washing it each time so he could bring it out the next day. He conveyed to Taylor how upset he was when a previously unbeaten New England team lost to the New York Giants in the Super Bowl at the end of the 2007 season.
“Truthfully, anything that the Patriots ever experienced throughout the years, I experienced,” he said. “I went through every high and low with them.”