BLOOMINGTON, MINN. - Surrounded by cameras and media for one final time before playing in the country's biggest sporting event, New England Patriots defensive linemen Alan Branch and Lawrence Guy sat together at a table at the edge of the room. The two are human behemoths - Branch measures in at 6-foot-6, 350 pounds, while Guy is 6-foot-4, 300 pounds - and they have combined for 283 career NFL tackles.

But for the moment, their focus strays away from football, the Super Bowl and the tough Philadelphia Eagles' offensive line. Instead, Guy and Branch have something serious to discuss.

"You've got to get into Dragon Ball Super," Guy told Branch. "It starts out slow, then it gets good, then it gets bad. You have to - it's so good, bad, good, bad -- I'm like are you serious? Then the tournament comes."

Yes, Branch and Guy are big anime fans. Anime is a form of Japanese animation art that is used in movies and TV shows. Perhaps the most popular example of anime is Dragon Ball Z, which aired on Cartoon Network in the United States for years from 1998 to the mid-2000s.

Anime seems to be particularly popular among Patriots defensive linemen this year. In his NES controller beanie, Branch explained that there is a group of about five players on the team - maybe more - that are big anime fans. He does not want to name names, just in case.

"I don't know if people are closet anime fans, so I don't know if I want to put it out there," Branch said.

It comes as no surprise that defensive tackle Adam Butler, and to a lesser extent defensive end Deatrich Wise, are anime fans. The duo picked up the group nickname Goku (Wise) and Vegeta (Butler) earlier this year from kicker Stephen Gostkowski after the famous rivals from Dragon Ball Z. They even celebrated a sack together by acting out a "Kamehameha" wave, which is Goku's signature move in the show.

While Wise said he has a general knowledge of anime shows, it's Butler who knows just about everything there is to know. One might say his knowledge level is "over 9000."

"Adam is the head honcho," Wise said.

For Butler, there is no place in the world he would rather travel than Japan. He would love to see the Nijo Castle in Kyoto. His favorite flower is the cherry blossom. His favorite anime series is "Naruto."

"I don't read the manga anymore because the Shippuden series is over," Butler said. "Now we're into Naruto's son, so what I do is I don't watch it for multiple weeks and let them build up so I can binge watch later."

You could certainly spend a good amount of time binge watching. Between "Naruto" and "Naruto Shippuden," there are 720 episodes to watch. Butler has finished them all, and he's not the only one on the team who has done so.

Butler, 23, says he would read the manga whenever he wanted to see what happened further along the timeline in the show. Branch, 33, used to do something similar in his younger years.

Branch first got into anime in the late 90s, when he was still a kid. Back then, you couldn't simply find anime on any channel or the internet. You had to go to a specific video store and pick up the VHS when it came out. The only language you could get them in was Japanese with English closed captioning. They also came out about a month before the episodes would air on TV.

"I used to spoil all of them," Branch said.

These days, Branch has trouble deciding if "One-Punch Man" or "Hunter x Hunter" is his favorite anime. Guy's favorite is "Dragon Ball Super," though he is excited that "Samurai Jack" came back in 2017. If Guy had to recommend one anime to start with, he would suggest the subtitled version of "One-Punch Man."

While the defensive linemen all understand the same references and can talk intelligently about the same anime shows, they rarely watch them together. It is not often they are on the same episode or watching the same show at the same time. Branch, for one, hates watching shows with anyone else because he watches them the way he always has - in Japanese.

"I'm focusing on the subtitles," Branch said. "You've always got to split your attention so you're not missing a good fight scene. I've split my attention and I've watched with people that are just like, 'Oh, did you see that?' I'm like, 'Nah, bro, shut up. I need to focus.'"

Branch is not worried about anyone making fun of his interest in anime. Who is really going to make fun of a 6-foot-6 Super Bowl champion defensive lineman to his face, after all? But still, he thinks in this day and age, things are a little different than they used to be.

"Some people might be like, 'Man, those are kids shows,'" Branch said. 'But I think anime has gotten big enough where -- In this generation, it's changed. I'd say my generation, my age group are the first ones who still watch anime and cartoons and were getting made fun of and all that. After that, it's almost a regular thing."

When they're working, the Patriots defensive linemen have plenty to talk about. They have to study up on their assignments, especially against the Eagles' play-action and run-pass-option plays on offense. Communication in the trenches is important, and they do their best to stay on the same page.

But even when they're not working, the defensive linemen have a lot to discuss. All you have to do is mention annoying filler episodes, and they'll all understand the same struggle.

"Like the last fight?" Branch said, referring to "Naruto Shippuden" in frustration. "They had 100 fillers between that whole fight. I was like I'm tired of this (expletive). I was like if there's one more filler, I'm going to flip out."