3 NFL teams not named the Patriots that Eagles WR A.J. Brown should be traded to

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3 NFL teams not named the Patriots that Eagles WR A.J. Brown should be traded to originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

Today is June 1. The window is open. The framework is reportedly in place. And by most accounts, AJ Brown will be a New England Patriot before the sun goes down.

But before everyone moves on, there is a question sitting in the middle of this trade that the NFL does not want anyone asking out loud.

Should this trade happen at all?

The Patriot-colored Elephant in the room​

This offseason, the New England Patriots became the center of one of the more uncomfortable stories the league has seen in years. Head coach Mike Vrabel found himself at the center of a very public personal scandal involving NFL reporter Dianna Russini, with photos circulating widely and the controversy growing loud enough that Vrabel missed the third day of the NFL Draft to attend counseling. Vrabel later addressed the situation publicly, acknowledging difficult conversations with his family, the organization and the players.

The NFL announced it would not pursue a formal investigation into either party. The league moved on quickly, and then crazy coverage started coming out.

But here is what nobody has stopped to ask: in a situation where a head coach developed a personal relationship with a reporter who covers the sport, a reporter whose job it is to break news, gather sources, and report on exactly the kind of roster moves like this whole Brown trade…how confident can anyone be that the reporting pipeline around this trade has been entirely clean? That is not an accusation to any other writer out there. It is a legitimate question about the integrity of the information ecosystem that shaped how this trade was reported, though.

Not every trade ever. Just the information on this specific trade between the Patriots and the Eagles.

Now the last time a major American sports league actually blocked a trade was when the NBA stepped in to prevent Chris Paul from joining LeBron James in Los Angeles in 2011. A decision made technically by the league office, which at the time owned the New Orleans Hornets, citing competitive balance concerns.

It drew enormous backlash and remains one of the more controversial front-office moments in NBA history. The NFL has never done anything like it.

But that does not mean the conversation should be off the table entirely. The league has the authority to investigate tampering, and the NFLPA has the ability to raise concerns about how a player's market was shaped heading into a trade. If there is any scenario in which someone tampered, then someone should pause to examine whether the reporting around Brown's destination was influenced by a relationship that had no business existing between a coach and a journalist; it is this one.

The NFL chose not to look at it. That is their right. But silence is not the same as clearance. And the fact that this trade has been treated as a fate for months, with Brown's destination barely debated, despite a market that should have had multiple bidders? That is worth at least a raised eyebrow before the ink dries.

Where AJ Brown should actually go​

If the NFL were to pump the brakes on New England, just hypothetically, even just for a conversation about ethics and competitive integrity. There are three trade destinations that make far more football sense and would create far more compelling storylines heading into 2026.

The Kansas City Chiefs

This is the easiest thought process in football. Brown wants to be a weapon. Patrick Mahomes is arguably the best quarterback in the league. He has made stars out of many receivers who have come through Kansas City. Brown alongside Mahomes would be an immediate offensive player of the year conversation and would make the Chiefs instant Super Bowl favorites in a conference that is already loaded.

There is historical precedent worth noting here. Andy Reid has done this before. When he was coaching Philadelphia, he brought in Terrell Owens and the results were electric. That Eagles team went to the Super Bowl. The circumstances were different, and the outcome was not a championship, but the blueprint of pairing a great offensive mind with a dominant receiver and a premier quarterback is one Reid understands better than anyone. The second time around, with Mahomes instead of Donovan McNabb, the ceiling is considerably higher.

The Los Angeles Rams

Matthew Stafford and Brown together is a combination that would have defensive coordinators losing sleep. The Rams already have Puka Nacua and DeVante Adams building something real, and the chemistry in that offense has been a genuine strength. The question is whether you break that up to add Brown, and honestly, it is not an easy call.

Trading Adams to make the financial math work would cost the Rams something valuable, both in production and in locker room continuity. Stafford is 38 and taking things year by year. The window is real but finite. It is the kind of move that could elevate a Super Bowl contender to a dynasty, or it disrupts an offense that is already working. The Rams probably should not do it. But the argument for it is not crazy; they did just trade for Myles Garrett.

The Pittsburgh Steelers

This one is going to catch people off guard, especially after Pittsburgh's additions of Rico Dowdle, Michael Pittman Jr. and Germie Bernard this offseason. Steelers fans are going to ask what Brown adds to a room that already looks stacked.

Here is the answer: do you remember what Brown and DK Metcalf looked like together at Ole Miss? They were absolutely electric. Now give that pairing to Aaron Rodgers on a Pittsburgh Steelers team that genuinely believes it can win right now, and you have an offense that looks like the Monstars suiting up in football helmets.

The cost, however, would be steep, and it would sting. The only logical trade piece that makes sense on the other side is TJ Watt. That sentence is painful to write and probably more painful to read if you bleed black and gold. But with Jack Sawyer developing behind him and capable of stepping into an impactful role immediately, an even one-for-one swap. Then each team absorbs the other's contract for the year and moves forward. The offense Pittsburgh would field with Brown, Metcalf and Rodgers throwing the football would be unlike anything the AFC has seen in years.

A trade should still happen for AJ Brown​

The Brown trade is going to happen today. Probably to New England. The framework is in place, the cap math finally works after June 1, and multiple insiders have been pointing in this direction for months.

But the conversation about how we got here and whether the reporting environment around this trade was ever truly independent of the controversy surrounding the team he is reportedly going to deserves more than a shrug and a wire transaction.

The NFL chose not to look at it. That is their right. But somewhere between the scandal, the silence, and the trade that everyone somehow already knew was coming, there is a story the sport has been too eager to skip past.

Today it becomes official. Whether it should have been this inevitable all along is a different question entirely.

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