Videos: Rob Gronkowski turns Lucas Oil Stadium into personal roadhouse
Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski has come under plenty of fire in New England for partying alongside Johnny Manziel in Las Vegas while still recovering from season-ending knee surgery this past offseason and partying shirtless after the Super Bowl XLVI loss to the Giants, among other partying-related antics.
Gronk partied plenty again on Sunday, but don’t expect to see much complaining from New Englanders this time around, since the man who once dubbed himself “Yo Soy Fiesta” did his carousing on the field.
Through three quarters of the Patriots’ 42-20 victory against the Colts, Gronkowski had just three catches for 45 yards, doing most of his damage behind the scenes as a run-blocking tight end for Jonas Gray’s 199-yard, four-touchdown effort. In the fourth quarter, though, the 6-foot-6, 265-pound Gronk announced his rather impressive physical presence with a pair of stunningly overpowering plays.
On Gray’s fourth touchdown, which put the Pats up 35-20 early in the fourth quarter, Gronk blocked Colts safety Sergio Brown — his former teammate in Foxboro — into Zionsville, earning a personal foul penalty he didn’t seem all too concerned about. In fact, Gronkowski might still be shoving Brown through the Indianapolis suburbs. Afterwards, he made an apt analogy to describe his manhandling of Brown.
“He was just yappin’ at me the whole time,” Gronkowski told NBCSN. “So I took him and threw him out of the club.”
Not done partying, Gronkowski hauled in a 5-yard toss for a first down on the ensuing drive that would’ve kept the chains moving had he not stomped a trio of Colts defenders on his way to a 26-yard touchdown. Turning Lucas Oil Stadium into his own personal roadhouse, he danced up and down the sidelines.
Gronkowski finished with four catches for 71 yards and a touchdown on five targets in addition to his run-blocking, which aided a Patriots effort resulting in 244 yards on 45 carries. With a healthy Gronk back in the fold, the Patriots look like the NFL’s team to beat, and that’s worth celebrating in New England.
