Bill Belichick's addition of Antonio Brown conjured memories of a different former Oakland Raiders receiver joining the New England Patriots: Randy Moss.
Belichick himself made the Moss comparison Tuesday on a conference call with reporters when asked by Tom Curran of NBC Sports Boston what makes him confident Brown won't be disruptive with the Patriots.
"That's the same thing you (the collective media) said about Randy Moss when we brought him in," Belichick retorted.
After Brown caused headaches in Pittsburgh and Oakland, it's fair to wonder how he'll be integrated into the Patriots' culture. Outside noise, however, is not something Belichick spends his time worrying about.
"Yeah, I don't know," the coach responded when asked if outside issues affect a team's ability to win. "There's no way for me to know what's inside every person's mind. That's up to each of us individually. But collectively, we try to get ourselves in the best physical, mental and emotional state to go out there and play as well as we can once a week when we have that opportunity to play. That's what we're all trying to do and there are other things in life besides football, we all know that. In the end, if you're about high performance, which we are, then that's ultimately what we're trying to achieve is high performance once a week when we play, so we try to do everything we can to get to that. Whatever stands in the way of that we've got to deal with, work around at whatever level it's at and try to get past those things to perform well, in this case, on Sunday at 1:00 p.m."
This Sunday at 1 p.m. New England plays the Miami Dolphins. Belichick wouldn't commit to Brown being on the field for his first game in a Pats uniform.
"You know, I don't know," he said. "We just acquired him yesterday. We haven't practiced so I can't answer that question now. We'll take it day-by-day and see how it goes."
