A.J Brown to Patriots is a Done Deal! - ESPN gives major UPDATE on Eagles-Patriots BLOCKBUSTER Trade

Added: 2026-05-14

[00:00:00]Plenty? The Patriots and their wide receiver, Romeo Dobbs, spoke about the potential addition of one A.J. [music] Brown. Take a listen. I have a ton of respect for him.

[00:00:11]Um I mean, he's been a dude in this league for quite a long time. I understand there's a lot of rumors going around.

[00:00:18]Like if he's here, I'd love to have him here. And if he isn't here, I'm still going to wish him the best cuz he's one of the guys in this league. So, I was true to my word when I came here that, you know, there is no number one guy in this offense. I'm open to all roles. That's just part of this league. You know, the more you can do, the more you can do for the team, the more you show for yourself, just things of that nature. So.

[00:00:42]Goodness gracious. I guess we have to talk about this until early June. Uh Sam, your thoughts on what you just heard from Dobbs?

[00:00:51]Well, listen. I Look, it's just widely expected that A.J. Brown is going to end up there. And he's going to be the number one receiver in New England when he gets there. The reality is he catches touchdowns. He's a big physical receiver who would have a massive impact on a team that over the last two seasons has tried to improve at that position. It's why they signed Stefon Diggs last year.

[00:01:12]It's why Romeo Dobbs is there now. Look, they feel like they've they have a superstar quarterback who's on a rookie contract. And when that's the case, you need to step on the gas, put people around him so that you can have success.

[00:01:25]If they do that, you know, with A.J.

[00:01:27]Brown, I think he'll have a massive impact. And um and quite frankly, I think he'll make the receivers like Dobbs around him even better. We're talking Packers coming off a third straight playoff berth. Haven't won a division title since 2021. And for 2026, Jonathan Gannon, he takes over as defensive coordinator. He replaces Jeff Hafley, who as you know, is now the head coach of the Dolphins. He has additions, Javon Hargrave, I air Franklin is there.

[00:01:54]And uh second-round cornerback Brandon Ceaser as well. So, they trade as well. So, they trade away their first-round pick for Micah Parsons. They use four of their remaining picks on defense. Peter, what do you make of that overhaul there in Green Bay? Well, I'm still getting goosebumps from that highlight reel, and I would take two Monday night games on ESPN between these two teams if the schedule makers are listening. I I look at the defense, and it's fascinating because Halfley goes to Miami, and now you bring in Jonathan Gannon, and they do not run the same defense. Whereas Halfley Halfley ran like an aggressive 4-3 with that even front. Jonathan Gannon is more of that Fangio style, where it's going to be mixed, it's going to be 3-4, and it really is going to be contingent a lot of that on on that front seven and how they can handle things with Gannon.

[00:02:46]What's interesting is on third down, you would always see Halfley throw some like exotic blitz out there when Jonathan Gannon's defense typically is like, "Hey, let's trust our front four, and let's drop seven back in coverage, Vic Fangio style." So, it's a little bit in the weeds, but same Jimmys and Joes, and I guess you add in Zaire Franklin, and you add in Hargrave, that's fine. But a different defense, and a different person calling the shots. I'm fascinated to see if it's better or worse this time around than it was last year with Halfley, which by the way was pretty darn good. Yeah, different X's and O's.

[00:03:16]All right, so Mina, on the other side, they only take one offensive player, they take a center in round five in this defensive-heavy draft. Do you think overall they did enough offensively to set themselves up?

[00:03:30]I think the skill group should be fine, but with a caveat or a question mark, when is Tucker Kraft going to be back and be the and available? Is he going to be week one? I think this is maybe not as big of an absence of Micah Parsons or a question mark, but it's not that far off in terms of his importance to this Packers passing attack. I mean, folks forget, through the first nine weeks of the season, before Tucker Kraft got hurt, he was receivers like Amon-Ra St. Brown, CeeDee Lamb, Ja'Marr Chase.

[00:03:59]That's how important he was, and he obviously averages 15 yards a catch, pardon me. He was their weapon against man coverage. He was so good at getting yards after the catch and creating explosives, breaking tackles. If he comes back and he looks anything like he did that first part of the season, I feel great about this group with Christian Watson as the deep threat, Jayden Reed as your magic guy. And Matthew Golden, we'll see what he's got.

[00:04:22]But Kraft has to be there, Tim, and if he's not, I start to get a little bit worried about the group.

[00:04:29]Yeah, I think it's a great call on Kraft cuz he really is a good player, and you know, I think, you know, in a way, a little bit like Trey McBride, one of these tight ends that I think people don't really realize how good they are and how much they do, uh, you know, for their team. Uh, Kraft is exactly that. So, him being healthy and and being the player he was, you know, is important for them. I think the rest of it is really good, though. And and like I think they have a proven back who they can rely on. I think their pass catchers have a lot of speed and uh, everything we saw improved play at the position a year ago. I think we'll see more of it with Golden a year older, and so, um, I actually think another part of this is, look, Jordan Love, like you're being asked to elevate the franchise.

[00:05:11]That's what you're going to be asked to do. And so, I think that that's a big part of this. When you look at the division and you say, look, Detroit's good, Chicago's good, Minnesota's got good players. One of the things that are going to differentiate these organizations from each other, some of it is, look, is the quarterback a guy that's just an absolute difference-maker? And I think ability-wise, it's widely believed around the league that Jordan Love has the the the potential to be an MVP type of player.

[00:05:40]>> [sighs] >> But I think that the production needs to start to match that because the last 2 years have not been as good as it was 3 years ago and I think that's really that's really going to be what separates teams in the division. It's Does Minnesota get great quarterback play? Do the Chicago's continue to elevate with their superstar? Like what What is it that will change it? And I think that's the pressure that Jordan Love is under.

[00:06:06]Uh speaking of pressure, he was pressured on 29% of his dropbacks last season. This morning that the Chiefs and Broncos will be kicking things off on Monday night football September 14th.

[00:06:15][music] Broncos head coach Sean Payton spoke earlier this week on the status of quarterback Bo Nix who fractured his [music] right ankle in the divisional round in mid-January.

[00:06:26]He's doing great.

[00:06:27]He'll be well ahead of time for training camp. I think there's a good chance we see him in this off-season program in June.

[00:06:35]We're going to be the ones kind of holding him back, if you will.

[00:06:39]The follow-up procedure was not a surprise. No surprises. We feel real good about where he's at. Um and you guys will have a chance to see it, you know, here in a few weeks. But clearly uh full speed by training camp. We just We just want to be smart.

[00:06:57]All right. So, Tim, assuming that Nix is good to go, this is a team that obviously had a Super Bowl trajectory before he was unable to play in the AFC title game. So, what are your expectations for the Broncos this year?

[00:07:10]I think they're going to be really good again because you know, I would you know, you hear Sean Payton just not concerned about Nix being back. I think they'll be good offensively. The question for me is, you know, defensively, can they repeat how good they were a year ago? Top three scoring defense, top three in terms of yards allowed, first in sacks in the National Football League, first in red zone efficie- efficiency. And so, I think when you look at them defensively, they were really, really good. And you know, that's a big part of the reason I think that you've seen the the quarterback development that you've seen in Denver just uh quite frankly when you're not you know playing from behind or feeling like you always are playing catch up you can kind of control the game the way you want and so are they able to to recreate that are they able to to do that Vance Joseph has come in and done a really good job that to me I think will be you know more so that the key and the concern than hey how healthy is Bo Nix with the expectation he'll be back.

[00:08:07]Yeah I think Nix's you know foot issue is going to be the biggest storyline. I would also add they didn't do much this off season except one big trade and that was going and getting Jaylen Waddle and it was similar philosophy to what Cincinnati had with Dexter Lawrence.

[00:08:21]Here was Denver sitting with the 30th overall pick they wanted a new receiver they looked at the board and they didn't think necessarily that Omar Cooper would be there and they didn't think necessarily that Casey Conception was worthy of that pick or you name it Denzel Boston or Stribling who no one else seemed to think so except for the Niners would be worthy of that pick. Sure enough they said let's just swap it for Waddle. Now you've got Waddle and Sutton and Mims and Bryant and you've got this basketball team at wide receiver and then they add Jonah Coleman to go with JK Dobbins. I like the additions but there was no big splash and as as we're filming this I think we'll find out soon with the Disney up fronts going on where that week one is in Denver or Kansas City and I'm fascinated to see if that offense is better this year than it was when we last saw them in the playoffs season ago.

[00:09:10]I think it will be and and Waddle is a big part of why. I mean I loved this addition for the passing game. I also love Peter what it will do for the run game. You know kind of one of the mysteries or questions watching this Broncos offense in the last couple of years is why don't they run the football better despite the fact that they have a very good run blocking offensive line and you can point to the backs. I do think losing Dobbins last season hurt them and getting him back should help but I also think the lack of fear of this passing attack hurt them as well.

[00:09:39]They face the sixth highest rate of stacked boxes in the NFL. If you stack the box with Jaylen Waddle and Courtland Sutton on the field, as well as some of their auxiliary players, that's a scary proposition. So, I think that will open things up on the ground. They'll face more lighter boxes, and those running backs will benefit from his presence.

[00:09:57]>> Yeah, I can't wait to see what he does in Denver. Only 100-yard receiving game last season. So, it should be a lot of fun. Obviously, they are not going to be sneaking up on anyone this year.