Sergio Brown (born May 22, 1988) is a former

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

safety Safety is the state of being "safe", the condition of being protected from harm or other danger. Safety can also refer to the control of recognized hazards in order to achieve an acceptable level of risk. Meanings There are two slightly di ...

. He was signed by the

New England Patriots The New England Patriots are a professional American football team based in the Greater Boston area. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East divisio ...

as an

undrafted free agent In professional sports, a free agent is a player who is eligible to sign with other clubs or franchises; i.e., not under contract to any specific team. The term is also used in reference to a player who is under contract at present but who i ...

in 2010. He has also been a member of the

Indianapolis Colts The Indianapolis Colts are a professional American football team based in Indianapolis. The Colts compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) South division. Since the 2008 ...

Atlanta Falcons The Atlanta Falcons are a professional American football team based in Atlanta. The Falcons compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) NFC South, South division. The Falcon ...

Jacksonville Jaguars The Jacksonville Jaguars are a professional American football team based in Jacksonville, Florida. The Jaguars compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the American Football Conference (AFC) South division. The team pla ...

and

Buffalo Bills The Buffalo Bills are a professional American football team based in the Buffalo metropolitan area. The Bills compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) East division ...

Early years

Brown was born in

Maywood, Illinois Maywood is a village in Proviso Township, Cook County, Illinois, United States in the Chicago metropolitan area. It was founded on April 6, 1869, and organized October 22, 1881. The population was 23,512 at the 2020 United States Census. Histor ...

. His father, Mario Brown, was the first African-American men's basketball at

Texas A&M Texas A&M University (Texas A&M, A&M, or TAMU) is a public, land-grant, research university in College Station, Texas. It was founded in 1876 and became the flagship institution of the Texas A&M University System in 1948. As of late 2021, T ...

. He attended Proviso East High School in Maywood, where he was a two-sport star in football and track. He played wide receiver and

defensive back In gridiron football, defensive backs (DBs), also called the secondary, are the players on the defensive side of the ball who play farthest back from the line of scrimmage. They are distinguished from the other two sets of defensive players, the ...

for the Pirates

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ...

team. As a senior, he had 710 all-purpose yards and four touchdowns at wide receiver, and 41 tackles, two sacks, and six interceptions as a safety. Academically, he had a 3.2 GPA. Also a standout

track & field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping eve ...

athlete, Brown was a state qualifier in the

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a ...

(top-jump of 23 ft, 9 in). He also competed in sprints, recording a personal-best time of 6.68 seconds in the

55-meter dash 55 metres is a sprint event in track and field. It is a relatively uncommon non-championship event for indoor track and field. The history of the event lies in the 60-yard dash, which is about 5 inches shorter than 55 metres. Since the 1960s almos ...

event at the 2006 Pirate Indoor Classic, where he placed 5th. In addition, he ran a 4.5-second

40-yard dash The 40-yard dash is a sprint covering . It is primarily run to evaluate the speed and acceleration of American football players by scouts, particularly for the NFL Draft but also for collegiate recruiting. A player's recorded time can have a h ...

and had a 31-inch

vertical jump A vertical jump or vertical leap is the act of jumping upwards into the air. It can be an exercise for building both endurance and strength, and is also a standard test for measuring athletic performance. It may also be referred to as a ''Sargent ...

College career

At the

University of Notre Dame The University of Notre Dame du Lac, known simply as Notre Dame ( ) or ND, is a private Catholic research university in Notre Dame, Indiana, outside the city of South Bend. French priest Edward Sorin founded the school in 1842. The main c ...

, Brown primarily played special teams during his first two seasons, and became a starter in 2008 as a junior, starting 6 of 13 games and recording 28 tackles and one sack. As a senior, he started 12 games, and had 50 tackles and one sack.

Professional career

New England Patriots

After going undrafted in the

2010 NFL Draft The 2010 NFL Draft was the 75th annual meeting of National Football League (NFL) franchises to select newly eligible football players. The 2010 draft took place over three days, at Radio City Music Hall in New York City, New York, with the fir ...

, Brown signed with the

on April 29, 2010. He was waived during final cuts on September 4, 2010, and re-signed to the team's

practice squad In sports, the practice squad, also called the taxi squad or practice roster, is a group of players signed by a team but not part of their main roster. Frequently used in gridiron football, they serve as extra players during the team's practices, ...

the next day. After spending the first six weeks of the season on the practice squad, Brown was promoted to the 53-man roster on October 23. He made his NFL debut the next day against the

San Diego Chargers The San Diego Chargers were a professional American football team that played in San Diego from 1961 until the end of the 2016 season, before relocating to Los Angeles, where the franchise had played its inaugural 1960 season. The team is now ...

, recording four tackles in the game. In total, Brown played in 11 games for the Patriots in 2010, all as a reserve. He finished the season with 11 tackles. With the release of Brandon Meriweather and James Sanders during the offseason, Brown became the starting Strong Safety for the season opener. In his first game, he recorded 6 tackles. Brown recorded his first career interception against the Chargers in the second game of the season. Sergio Brown was waived by the Patriots on August 31, 2012 during final cuts before the beginning of the

2012 NFL season The 2012 NFL season was the 93rd season of the National Football League and the 47th of the Super Bowl era. It began on Wednesday, September 5, 2012, with the defending Super Bowl XLVI champion New York Giants falling to the Dallas Cowboys in ...

Indianapolis Colts

Brown signed with the

on September 1, 2012.

Jacksonville Jaguars

Brown signed with the

on March 11, 2015. On April 18, 2016,

released Brown.

Atlanta Falcons

On August 20, 2016, Brown was signed by the Falcons. On August 27, 2016, Brown was waived by the Falcons.

Buffalo Bills

On November 2, 2016, Brown was signed by the Buffalo Bills.

References

External links

New England Patriots bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Brown, Sergio 1988 births Living people Sportspeople from Maywood, Illinois Players of American football from Illinois American football safeties Notre Dame Fighting Irish football players New England Patriots players Indianapolis Colts players Jacksonville Jaguars players Atlanta Falcons players Buffalo Bills players