FOXBOROUGH -- Antonio Brown won't officially be a Patriot until Monday afternoon, so it's no surprise that Bill Belichick wouldn't comment on his soon-to-be new wide receiver following Sunday night's supremely impressive 33-3 win over the Steelers at Gillette Stadium.
But Brown's future teammates were a bit more open to discussing the All-Pro wide receiver and what he might bring to New England.
"It'll be fun," receiver Julian Edelman said. "He's an explosive player and we're happy to have him. The more playmakers you have out there, the better things will go."
Josh Gordon, who himself arrived midstream via trade from Cleveland last September, said he experienced a "culture shock" when he first got to Gillette Stadium and begin to acclimate to the way of doing business in New England.
"Antonio is Antonio. He's going to have to figure out his own way, just like everybody else has," Gordon said.
It was brought to Tom Brady's attention that Patriots owner Robert Kraft apparently revealed to NBC's Al Michaels that the quarterback was "a million percent in" on Brown. After joking about the fact that his private conversation with his boss got shared with the world, Brady talked about adding an elite talent and the process of that player getting up to speed.
"I think everybody's excited to add great players. It helps everybody when you have great players that are sharing the burden of a tough football season," Brady said. "I think, like anything else, whether it was Josh last year or Phillip [Dorsett] when he got here a few years ago late, and then this year Antonio, how much can you learn and process and get in here? And we're all going to work hard and try to get up to speed as fast as possible. But, we haven't had a training camp together or that, so you've got to force a lot of information. We're all excited to have him. All I could say is we're just going to work as hard as we possibly can to get up to speed as quickly as possible."
While Brown has to put in the work to become a productive Patriot, Brady will obviously be a part of that process both as the quarterback and a team leader. There is no question Brown has potential as an individual and adds to the potential of an offense that got off to an impressive start against the Steelers, but reaching that potential will take time.
"I think all us players are trying to be the best player that we can be for the team. There's a lot of things that play into that, but we're all trying to reach our highest potential individually so that we can reach our highest potential collectively" Brady said. "It doesn't come together just because you say, 'Oh, all you guys are going to come together.' Antonio's had a lot of production, Demaryius [Thomas] has had a lot of production, Julian's had a lot of production, Josh has had a lot of production, Phillip had a great game tonight. So, the point is we've got a lot of players that are talented and we've just got to figure out how to make it all work. We're going to work hard. It's a long year. It's the beginning of a long marathon and the NFL's very competitive and it's going to be a great challenge, but I think we're all looking forward to it."
And about Brown's social media presence, which was a huge factor in playing his way out of Oakland last week, Edelman admitted he's a fan of his new teammate's digital style.
"I mean he throws out some pretty good stuff. I always double tap and like," Edelman said with a smile.
