To be honest I like this signing for you. I see a BIG Slot WR like David Nelson of the Bills, or a Matchup Nightmare at TE
Nice writeup on him
Throughout all of our lives, at some point we ask, “what if?”
What if I had picked a different college? What if I didn’t blow it with that one relationship? What if I hadn’t said that one thing or done that one thing differently?
Most of us never get the opportunity to answer that question.
Les Brown does.
After choosing basketball out of high school, rather than football, Les, 24, now has the chance to rekindle that urge to put the pads back on due to some freak athleticism he showed on March 29th at the BYU Pro Day.
Brown ran a 4.44 40 while adding a 39-inch vertical jump and a 10-3 broad jump at 6-4 238 pounds.
After his impressive workout, NFL scouts were interviewing him with the idea of playing him at tight end. Tony Pauline of Sports Illustrated
tweeted out that the Chiefs, Jaguars, Patriots and Raiders were among the teams interviewing him.
Now, we’ve all heard the story of the basketball player turned NFL tight end before. It’s actually become a kind of cliche. This isn’t your typical story though.
Brown’s football skills aren’t coming out of nowhere. He was a wide receiver at Highland High School in Salt Lake City, which also produced All-Pro DT/DE Haloti Ngata. Les led the state in receptions his junior season while picking up all-state honors. Due to being a self described “late bloomer” and measuring it at 6-4 185 in high school, Brown chose basketball despite having offers from BYU, Oregon, Washington State, Colorado State and more in football.
“Basketball kind of seemed like the logical pick at that point in time. It was an opportunity where I could stay close to home. I’m the oldest of five kids and my dad, he travels a lot for work, my mom was pretty sick at the time, so it was a good opportunity for me to stay close to home and take watch over my brothers and sister and also do something that I love and that’s play basketball,” said Brown.
Les went on to play small forward for NAIA Westminster College. After starting 34 of Westminster’s 35 games his junior season as a defensive specialist averaging 2.4 points, 3.2 rebounds, 1.8 assists and .4 blocks per game, Brown walked away from basketball to take a full time position for Huntsman Gay Global Capital before the 2009-2010 season.
“I kind of weighed my options, and I thought I was just making the big boy, grown up decision, ‘You’re not gonna play in the NBA, you’re not 6-10, you play small forward, at 6-4 you’d have to play point guard,’ I’m not a point guard. I just moved onto the next step as far as my life,” said Brown.
After working two years in the accounting department, Brown got the athletic itch once again. He first began to scratch that itch simply going to the gym to stay in shape and build his strength. Once he started getting bigger, some influence from his brothers didn’t hurt.
Two of Brown’s brothers are current players on BYU’s football team.
Braden was the team’s starting right tackle as a junior this past season, while
Trevor was a freshman tight end.
“Having a couple of younger brothers that play college football and watching them play and seeing them develop and having success in football I started to think, ‘My brothers are successful at this, and I know that I’m a better athlete than them.’ I’ve got that older brother stigma where I can’t let my younger brothers show me up. I really started to push hard for it.”
Braden especially pushed Les, telling him that he had all the tools to be an FBS tight end.
“Just him saying things like that and going, watching the games and being there at the pregame down on the field watching the guys warm up, it just got me excited and kind of lit this fire inside of me where I would look at these guys and be like, ‘Man I know I can do that.” So that kind of just motivated me to get started and start pushing my body to new limits as far as in the weight room and with my diet.”
That’s when Les got in touch with Chad Ikei, a fitness trainer who specializes in getting players prepared for their NFL Combine and pro day performances. Brown started training with Ikei in Hawaii back in December, and his results showed at the BYU pro day.
Most of Brown’s training for this pro day was focused heavily on the workout portion, rather than drills. They trained three times a day, six days a week switching between speed, agility and strength workouts.
Despite not focusing on football drills during his workouts,
Tony Pauline of Sports Illustrated said that Brown “did not struggle catching the ball” at the BYU pro day.
Still, Brown hasn’t laced up the cleats since his senior season back in 2005. He’s a mostly clean slate who seven years later will hope to stick in an NFL training camp.
Brown has come a long way physically from his days in Highland High School, but it seems like he may still possess the skills that made him a highly touted high school player.
“I basically had a reputation for being a guy who could just go up and get the ball. I could move pretty well and I jump pretty well and I had pretty good hands. I was also a pretty solid blocker on the outside. I have a little bit of a mean streak in me, so it was nice to get physical out there too.”
It seems like Brown is coming into this process at the right time despite taking a different route than guys like Antonio Gates, Jimmy Graham, Julius Thomas, etc. The highly athletic “joker” TE is really emerging, and it seems being a former basketball player only helps.
Despite having that history as a receiver, Brown said he’d be willing to contribute in any way on the football field.
“I just want an opportunity to play and develop as a player and ultimately help teams win games. It doesn’t matter if I’m an offensive end, defensive end, special teams. I like contact, I like to bang around. If it means me being on special teams flying down there and knocking some heads, I’m more than happy doing that. Obviously making plays, catching the ball, scoring touchdowns is fun, but what it comes down to is helping a team win games and I’d really like that opportunity.”
Coming back to football after seven years away from the game, and having opportunities after high school from some top FBS schools, you’d think that Les might regret his decision to walk away from the game after high school. Brown doesn’t think that way though, and ultimately thinks the path he chose might have been the best for him.
“I don’t really necessarily regret it. I think the decision I made and the experiences that I had ultimately developed me into the person I am now. I don’t know that if I had played football out of high school if I had stuck with it or not being kind of a scrawny little kid. I just focus on what I can control at this point in time. I made my decisions, I try to live my life without any regrets and just make the most out of what i was given.”
After looking over CBA rules, Brown and his agent Evan Brennan have determined that Les is likely not eligible for the NFL Draft. Since his high school graduation year was 2006, Brown’s draft class would have been in 2011. Brown is likely an undrafted, rookie free agent who can start negotiating with teams immediately.
Rooting for Les won’t be difficult. We all wish we had that opportunity to try again at something that we love to do. It’s not the most typical path to the NFL, and we actually may never see this exact path again, but with the athleticism that Brown showed, and with his past success in the sport, opportunities in pro football will likely come to Les.
“I believe in myself and I don’t need every team in the league to believe in me or even five or two or three teams. I just need one. Hopefully when I get that chance I’ll make that team look like the smartest team in the NFL.”
