Our Amon-Ra St. Brown interview: Expectations, celebrations and preparations

USA Today

7 days ago

Since the arrival of Amon-Ra St. Brown in Detroit, there's been nothing but positive results. The losing seasons flipped into winning seasons and he's produced year over year. With that, he's blossomed into one of the most consistent receivers in the NFL and certainly one of the most productive.
For Amon-Ra, it hasn't led to just success on the field. It's led to success off the field, as well. Throughout his career, we've seen him featured in commercials for Little Caesars Pizza, FedEx and others. Last summer, part of his ascension into stardom was by being featured on the Netflix series, Receiver. He was featured alongside other receivers such as Justin Jefferson and Davante Adams.
This summer, it's a whole new accomplishment for Amon-Ra. It's been announced that Amon-Ra will be featured on the boxes of Honey Nut Cheerios in the fall. This is part of General Mills kicking off year two of its Cereal Training Camp. This year, they're introducing a new roster of cereal-loving football stars.
As General Mills stated in their press release, "this season's wide receiver lineup brings the swagger, the celebrations and a serious love for breakfast — with Justin Jefferson, Ja'Marr Chase and Amon-Ra St. Brown putting their passion for competition and cereal to the test." I was fortunate enough to be able to interview Amon-Ra St. Brown ahead of training camp and the release of this new ad campaign. Here's what Amon-Ra had to say about his new partnership with Honey Nut Cheerios, the Lions new offense and so much more!
RB: You will be featured on the Honey Nut Cheerios boxes this season. Athletes being featured on cereal boxes dates back to the 1930's with Lou Gehrig and over time we've seen a long list of great athletes such as Michael Jordan, Troy Aikman, Ken Griffey and so on. What's this mean for you to be able to partner with General Mills and grace the cover of Honey Nut Cheerios?ASB: Man, it's been awesome. Doing the training camp shoot with them was a blast. I had a lot of fun with it, recreating the headstand. Being on the cover of Honey Nut Cheerios for me, I remember being a kid, Honey Nut Cheerios is the first cereal I ever ate. It's the O.G. of cereal. Being on the box, doing my headstand, it's definitely a dream come true. My dad texted me when we were doing this shoot and everything.
He goes, "congratulations, that's a big deal. I always wanted to be on the cover of Cheerios.'
He understands that it's a big deal and I understand it's a big deal. Like I said, the way it all came about was natural and organic. For me, I love doing celebrations, so being able to do mine for the box was a lot of fun. To be with Ja'Marr Chase and Justin Jefferson, hang out with them and do the shoot. It was a blast.
RB: There's so many options to choose from but is Honey Nut Cheerios your favorite type of cereal? And if so, why is it?ASB: For me, as a kid, your parents buy you food or get you food. And Cheerios is kind of nostalgic but it was also the first cereal I ever ate. I love the flavor. It's a simple flavor, not doing too much. It just brings me back to being a kid.
RB: Do you spice it up and add fruit or anything to your Cheerios?
ASB: Nah, I'm plain Jane with it. Just cereal and milk.
RB: On the cover of the Honey Nut Cheerios box, fans will be able to see your headstand skills featured. Last season, we saw the famous headstand touchdown dance against the Green Bay Packers with Tim Patrick behind you. Did you think that this touchdown dance would take off the way that it did?ASB: Honestly, no. I had no idea. Before the game, I thought about doing it. One of my teammates from USC had done it with the Falcons (Drake London) and I was like, man, I might need to do another one. But I stuck with it. As I did it, after the game I saw the picture with Tim Patrick behind me. It just happened at the right time. The guy that took the picture, Tim Patrick doing what he did, and from then on, the fans of Detroit took off with it. I was on socks, the snowman, the cake, and whatever else they did. The fans loved it but I didn't expect it to blow up the way it did.
RB: When you score, we're always ready for some type of dance from you. We know you're going to give us something. You've scored 30+ touchdowns in your career so far. I know it's hard to think back to all the dances but is the headstand dance your favorite or do you have another favorite celebration you've done so far?
ASB: That's definitely up there because of what it meant to the fans and how they reacted to it. I feel like I've had a handful of celebrations that are near the top for me but the headstand one is definitely in my top-5.
RB: Moving to a couple of quick football questions. It's pretty crazy to think that the season is right around the corner and the Detroit Lions play in the Hall of Fame Game at the end of the month. What are some things that you do throughout the summer to get ready for training camp and the season?
ASB: Working out and training are the biggest things for me. When I get back from OTAs, you get like 6 weeks off. I take a quick vacation and then get back to training and working out. Just get ready for camp because I feel like camp is one of the hardest times for us during the year. Just because we're practicing every day, long practices in the heat, we have joint practices going against other teams or whatever it may be. I just like to train and get ready for camp and be in the best shape of my life.
RB: We know the changes are coming within the offense and we don't have to get into too much detail because at the end of the day, football is football. Dagger concepts are dagger concepts, slot fades are slot fades, so on and so forth. But with Ben Johnson going to Chicago and John Morton coming over to run the offense in Detroit. Are there a lot of similarities or is it different and if it's different, has there been good changes up to this point?
ASB: Yeah, it's been great. You know, I was able to sit back and watch. I wasn't running or practicing during OTAs but I was able to sit back and watch and kind of learn. Obviously, a lot of the stuff we did well last year or the last couple of years, we still kind of have in the offense. Stuff that we were successful at. There's still wrinkles that Johnny Morton is adding to the offense that we're enjoying. Something different, something that he feels like we can be good at and something that we feel like we can be good at too. It's been a lot of fun to get back into a new playbook, have to study and have to learn. Everyone is kind of in the same boat, which is cool. I'm excited to get back to camp, get to work, learn the offense. You know, there's going to be some struggles, obviously, because it's something new. But we're going to work out the kinks. I think we'll be just fine. At the end of the day, players make plays. We have the players on the team to make those plays.
RB: When watching you play, you can win from all over the field and I think part of that is based on how you can attack the inside or outside leverage of a defender. Would you be able to go over some of the things that you look for from a defender before and during a play?
ASB: Yeah, for me, it's obviously understanding defenses. You have to know pre-snap if it's man or zone. Obviously some times, teams disguise it. But for the most part, you know, you can kinda tell from the first second the ball is snapped. Understanding that is really big. Understanding the route you have, the progression that the quarterback is going through. If you're the first read, if you're the second read, the last read, if you have time to win, whatever the case may be. Who you're going against, there's so many factors that go into it. But at the end of the day, I'm going to do what I do. I'm going to play fast, the defender has to react to where I go. You know, I play offense and he plays defense. So I feel like I have the advantage off that alone. Like I said, just play fast and try to win and when the ball is in the air I gotta make a play.