PHOENIX — Here's a story about Brandon Browner and broken bones. This one has nothing to do with Richard Sherman’s elbow or Earl Thomas’ shoulder.

This one brings us back a few years, to 2008, and north a few thousand miles to Calgary. This one brings us back to the second of Browner's four CFL seasons, when he practiced in the bitter cold and the snow piled high and the chances at making an NFL roster seemed lower with each passing year. Browner, the 6-foot-4 cornerback for the CFL’s Calgary Stampeders, broke up a pass on the last play of the West final, snapping Calgary’s seven-year Grey Cup drought and, unbeknownst to his teammates at the time, snapping his right ankle.

Browner had landed on a receiver’s foot during the pass breakup. He was soon on crutches. As the Stampeders prepped for the Grey Cup, the CFL’s Super Bowl, cornerback Keon Raymond moved to No. 1 on the depth chart in practice. As Raymond remembers, Browner didn’t drop the crutches until two days before game.

“Everyone was like, ‘Oh man, he can’t move,’” Raymond said. “But I knew it. I knew this dude was going to play no matter what.”

Eight days after Browner fractured his ankle, he suited up in the Grey Cup, and Calgary won. Browner hardly saw any passes come his way.

As outrageous as it seems to think a football player could possibly play on a broken ankle, especially eight days after said ankle became broken, Keon Raymond believed Browner for a simple reason: Browner said he’d be good to go.

And Brandon Browner is nothing if not honest.

If you're a reporter and Browner doesn't like your question, he'll tell you. If you're a teammate or opponent and Browner doesn't like something you did or said, you'll find out about it. And if you're not on social media, just know that Browner was the only Patriot to speak out about deflategate, writing, "For my 2cents Blount scored 3 rushing touchdowns. He could've carried a beach ball. Also doesn't hurt we only gave up 7 points #inflatethis."

Once in Calgary, the Stampeders were trailing Hamilton and coach John Hufnagel was telling his team it needed to hone in on “the little things,” Raymond recalls. Browner, with his booming voice, interrupted: “We aren’t doing what we’re capable of doing. There’s no way this team should be playing with us.”

“And we got it all the way to the end of the game and they need to make a 58-yard field goal and guess who blocks it?” Raymond said. “Six-foot-four Brandon Browner.”

In Foxborough, Browner told ESPN's Josina Anderson that he'd advise his Patriots teammates to "try to break" Richard Sherman's sprained elbow and Earl Thomas' sprained shoulder. He stands by that.

And in Phoenix, at Tuesday's Super Bowl media day, Browner told a TV reporter that he would not again explain his previous comments. The exchange:



Reporter: "Hey Brandon, I've got to ask you the same question I started with. Your comments to Richard Sherman…"

Browner: “You’re not going to ask me the same question you started with. My answer’s not going to change.”

Reporter: “No, no, no, it’s fine. I just didn’t have my camera here.”

Browner: “They’ve got cameras. You can quote them.”

Reporter: “I can’t quote…”

Browner: “Well I’m not going to answer the same question. I’m not going to change what I said about it. My intent was good. Sherm is one of my best friends in life. The (Seahawks) understand, man. That’s the mentality we’ve got. It’s brothers. When I see them, it’s competition all day long — pool table, the basketball court. I’m trying to win. And they understand that. I hope that answers your question.”

Browner said Sherman texted him "LOL" when he saw Browner's interview. Sherman said Browner is still an LOB member. They all vacationed to Miami this past summer.

Browner is a founding father of the Legion of Boom, and he has the tattoo to prove it. Along with menacing safety Kam Chancellor, Browner injected such ruthlessness into the DNA of the Seahawks’ defense, a trait that still defines the unit even with Browner in New England.

Walter Thurmond, who was with Seattle from 2010-2013, initially assumed Browner was a safety, sharing roughly the same first impression as Keon Raymond, who met Browner in 2008 and thought, “Dang, that’s a big ass corner.”

Thurmond remembers when Browner blasted Wes Welker in 2012 (and when Chancellor leveled him a few plays later). Marcus Trufant, who was with the LOB from 2011-12, remembers a "wrestling move" Browner performed during a game.

“Got a little flag, but we’re not going to bring that up,” Trufant said.

And Seahawks receiver Doug Baldwin remembers how Browner was “always ready to get into it.”

“Him and I battled a lot, specifically,” Baldwin said. “We had numerous fights on the practice field.”

To former Seahawks safety Chris Maragos, now with the Eagles, Browner’s personality fit perfectly with the rest of the secondary, especially Sherman.

“The thing I love about BB is he keeps it so real,” Maragos said. “Probably what everyone is thinking, he’s going to be the one to say it. He’s just brutally honest. He calls it like it is. He has no politically-correctness about him. That’s what you love about him.”

In the early days of Boom, there was intense competition among the group of brash, yet inexperienced cornerbacks. Trufant was the incumbent, a one-time All-Pro who had been with Seattle since 2003. Thurmond was entering his second year, but suffered a high ankle sprain in 2011 training camp, opening the door for Browner, the 27-year-old corner with zero games of NFL experience. Sherman was a fifth-round pick, drafted below 22 other cornerbacks.

In the beginning, Maragos said, “it was harder to keep your job than it was to actually go out there and play.”

By the end of 2011, Browner and Sherman were entrenched as starters, bookending a Seattle defense that would soon takeoff as the league’s best.

The only way Browner was sitting was via suspension, which kept him out Seattle’s Super Bowl win a year ago. Browner had family with him for the game, a 43-8 Seahawks romp, but decided to watch it alone.

Every player has a long path to the NFL, and to the Super Bowl, but few have one that rivals Browner's. When he committed to Oregon State out of Sylmar, Calif., a section of Los Angeles, it was "a really big deal for the whole community," his cousin and ex-USC running back C.J. Gable said. And when he excelled at Oregon State, declared for the 2005 NFL draft and ultimately went unselected, there was obvious disappointment. In 2005, he was briefly with the Broncos, who moved him to safety, but a broken forearm landed him on IR and he was cut by 2006. To the CFL he went.

“At first he was kind of mad,” Gable said, “but he always told me, ‘I’m going to be back there. Once you graduate, once you leave SC, I’m going to be back there. You watch.’”

While Gable was in college, Browner had five NFL workouts. No offers. In Calgary, there were no heaters on the field, no indoor facilities. One day the temperatures hit minus-8. After four seasons, Browner admits he thought, Man, I can't do this another year.

Gable graduated from USC in 2011. And true to his word, Browner got the workout with Seattle in 2011. He told Carroll, “If you’re going to sign me, sign me.” The NFL lockout was approaching, but he told Raymond and his teammates he wouldn't be back in Calgary.

And wasn't that the truth.