Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson was acutely pained by the Hollywood Brown trade because the two are “true South Floridians.”
Trades are a part of life in the NFL, but that doesn’t mean they hurt any less. While Patrick Mahomes understood Tyreek Hill’s decision to leave Kansas City for Miami, he was still “shocked” when the deal went down.
The same could be said for Lamar Jackson and Hollywood Brown, although their Ravens brotherhood stretches beyond the NFL field.
Jackson fired off a series of tweets when the news broke that Ravens receiver Marquise “Hollywood” Brown would be sent to the Arizona Cardinals in exchange for the No. 23 and the No. 100 picks in the 2022 NFL Draft.
According to Robert Griffin III, the upset is because of the shared South Florida background between Brown and Jackson.
RGIII explains why Lamar Jackson was so upset by the Hollywood Brown trade
The story between Lamar Jackson and Hollywood Brown stretches back to the Pop Warner days, where the two players played for different teams in the same local league. Brown went on to attend South Broward High School before attending Chaminade-Madonna College Preparatory School, while Jackson played football for Boynton Beach High School.
The South Florida pride remains strong for Jackson, evidenced by his recent visit to his old elementary school in Pompano Beach, FL.
Although both towns are located north of Miami in the Fort Lauderdale area, they are nearly an hour apart — but the two players quickly became close friends on the Ravens.
South Florida is home to a great deal of NFL talent, including Lavonte David and the greatest high school football team of all time at Miami Northwestern. Of course, Hollywood Brown is also the cousin of Antonio Brown, who reportedly had interest in joining the Ravens this offseason.
Although Lamar Jackson is upset by Brown’s departure from Baltimore, Hollywood Brown has clarified that the trade was something he requested: the Raven’s run-first offense wasn’t working for him.
Instead, Brown will now be paired with Cardinals quarterback Kyler Murray, which is ironically the situation Cardinals general manager Steve Keim hoped for during the 2019 NFL Draft.
That’s clearly not what Jackson wanted, but as he made clear, it’s got nothing to do with the center than the Ravens selected at No. 23: Tyler Linderbaum.