{"id":44379,"date":"2025-05-12T14:46:12","date_gmt":"2025-05-12T14:46:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/44379\/"},"modified":"2025-05-12T14:46:12","modified_gmt":"2025-05-12T14:46:12","slug":"rob-gronkowski-shares-rumor-that-wouldve-altered-patriots-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/44379\/","title":{"rendered":"Rob Gronkowski Shares Rumor That Would&#8217;ve Altered Patriots History"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Patriots were going to add a tight end during the 2010 NFL Draft one way or the other, Rob Gronkowski says. <\/p>\n<p>Perhaps you\u2019ve heard New England drafted Gronkowski with its second-round pick 15 years ago. Gronkowski only went on to become a five-time Pro Bowler, four-time All-Pro and three-time Super Bowl champion during <a href=\"https:\/\/nesn.com\/2024\/10\/rob-gronkowski-makes-crazy-admission-about-legendary-patriots-career\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">nine seasons in Foxboro, Mass<\/a>., after all.<\/p>\n<p>If not for drafting Gronkowski, though, the Patriots apparently had their eyes on another Pro Bowl tight end: then-Chicago Bear Greg Olsen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI also heard through a grapevine that if I didn\u2019t get drafted to the New England Patriots, Greg Olsen was going to get traded that day for a draft pick to New England Patriots,\u201d Gronkowski said on the <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/DudesOnDudesPod\/status\/1919784220999778700\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">\u201cDudes On Dudes\u201d podcast<\/a>. \u201cBecause the Patriots were looking for a tight end.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>more<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/nesn.com\/2025\/05\/patriots-rumors-why-sought-after-rookie-chose-new-england\/\" class=\"featured-articles__link\" data-analytics-datalayer-category-type=\"MutlipleArticle_\" wp_automatic_readability=\"26\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Josh-McDaniels-2-270x270.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\tPatriots Rumors: Why Sought-After Rookie Chose New England<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tby Sean T. McGuire<br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t2 Min Read\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/nesn.com\/2025\/05\/patriots-schedule-live-tracker-rumors-reports-before-nfl-reveal\/\" class=\"featured-articles__link\" data-analytics-datalayer-category-type=\"MutlipleArticle_\" wp_automatic_readability=\"26\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Patriots-1.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\tPatriots Schedule Live Tracker: Rumors, Reports Before NFL Reveal<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tby Sean T. McGuire<br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t1 Min Read\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Gronkowski also offered a firsthand account of how he landed with the Patriots, who drafted Devin McCourty late in the first round with Gronkowski on the board. New England apparently heard the Ravens were interested in the Arizona product and jumped Baltimore at the start of the second round.<\/p>\n<p class=\"nesn-in-content-ad__copy\">Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Baltimore Ravens were going to pick me, I think it was the 25th pick that they had in the (first round of the) draft,\u201d Gronkowski said. \u201cBut then Denver and Josh McDaniels came scooping in and traded with the Baltimore Ravens. The Denver Broncos took Tim Tebow and I just got booted out of the first round. The Ravens have the 43rd pick now. Well, then the New England Patriots got a sniff of it and they traded up one spot before the Baltimore Ravens at No. 42 where I got drafted.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>With Gronkowski a surefire Patriots Hall of Famer, the organization\u2019s history would have been altered if his recollection of the 2010 NFL Draft came to fruition. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Patriots were going to add a tight end during the 2010 NFL Draft one way or the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44380,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2050],"tags":[7,1167,249,2326,2094,6,208,8567],"class_list":{"0":"post-44379","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-england-patriots","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-new-england","10":"tag-new-england-patriots","11":"tag-newengland","12":"tag-newenglandpatriots","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-patriots","15":"tag-rob-gronkowski"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114495408396795923","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}