Aaron Hernandez was once one of the brightest young stars at the tight end position in the NFL before everything went wrong. The former member of the New England Patriots reportedly committed suicide on Wednesday and, prior to that, he was infamously convicted of murder back in 2015. Prior to all of his legal trouble, though, the former Florida standout made one simple request of Patriots head coach and personnel head Bill Belichick.
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Albert Breer of the MMQB brings word that, in 2013, Hernandez asked Belichick to trade him in order to stay away from Boston:
The Patriots' then-star tight end was in Indy in February 2013 to tell Belichick he was going to spend the bulk of the coming months rehabbing his shoulder in California, rather than Massachusetts. Hernandez told me he was doing so to be closer to Tom Brady, who was spending the offseason in Los Angeles. It was only after Lloyd's murder four months later that I found out that was far from the whole story.
I later discovered what Hernandez's lawyer, Ronald Sullivan, detailed on WEEI radio in Boston earlier this week. Hernandez told Belichick that day in Indy that, at the very least, he needed to stay away from Foxboro because the heat was on back home in Connecticut. Hernandez broached the idea of a trade to get him out of the area. Belichick told Hernandez he couldn't trade him but offered to help with security measures.
Obviously, that trade never came to fruition and the end of Hernandez's NFL career was swift to follow after his initial arrest. This is a big-time "what if?" in some respects but, in the same breath, it isn't as if Belichick could have possibly known the ramifications.
Aaron Hernandez is gone and, even if some suspect foul play, that is the reality of the situation at this point.
