A.J. Brown is walking into New England with plenty of buzz, and CBS Sports’ latest rankings may have handed him a little more fuel.
Brown is entering his first season with the Patriots, where the expectations are already loud. He’s set to pair with quarterback Drake Maye, and he’s also reunited with head coach Mike Vrabel, who was on the staff that drafted him in Tennessee in 2019 and helped shape him into the star he became.
The ceiling is obvious. Projections have Maye poised for the best season of his career with a true WR1 in place, and Brown could be in line for a milestone the Patriots haven’t gotten much of over the last six years: 1,000-plus receiving yards. One analyst even thinks Brown has a shot at the Offensive Player of the Year conversation, something no Patriot has done since Tom Brady in 2010.
That kind of talk makes sense when you look at Brown’s track record. He has topped 1,000 receiving yards in every season of his career except 2021, when an injury limited him to four missed games.
And then there’s the chip on his shoulder. The way things ended in Philadelphia should already have Brown motivated, especially now that he’s back with his favorite childhood team. So when Pete Prisco of CBS Sports released his top 100 players entering the 2026 season and slotted Brown at No. 64, it stood out.
Prisco did rank Brown as the seventh-best receiver on the list, behind CeeDee Lamb, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Puka Nacua, Justin Jefferson, and Ja’Marr Chase. But the bigger issue is where Brown landed overall: in the second half of the top 100.
That’s where the disrespect angle comes in. Brown has been better than the 64th-best player in the league for a while now, and if this ranking does anything, it may just give him another reason to come out swinging.
For everyone else in the NFL, that’s the part that should be unsettling. The Patriots are already back in the Super Bowl conversation after spending five years near the bottom of the league, and adding a player like Brown only strengthens the case that they’re here to stay.
If Brown delivers the way many expect, the impact will ripple beyond just Maye. Kayshon Boutte and Romeo Doubs should benefit too, and the whole offense could look sharper with Brown drawing attention on the outside.
The rest of the league may not want a more motivated Brown. The Patriots might already have one.
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