The Patriots explored bringing North Andover native Jake Bobo home this offseason — a potential homecoming for the Super Bowl champion wide receiver who grew up just minutes from Gillette Stadium. It never turned into a deal. But the story of how close it came, and how it fell apart, is the kind that's too good not to tell.

"I made the mistake of telling my mom that, who then got very, very excited," Bobo told the Boston Herald. "She doesn't realize there are varying degrees of 'sniffing around.' I think once the Pats realized what they might have to pay the slow, skinny white kid I think they bowed out of it." Seattle ultimately matched a competing offer sheet from Jacksonville, keeping Bobo on a two-year, $5.5 million deal with $4.5 million guaranteed — re-signed in March, months before New England's interest even became public.

Bobo grew up in North Andover and starred at Belmont Hill School, where he earned three All-ISL first-team selections. His coach there, Chris Butler, remembers a kid who played nearly every snap on both sides of the ball. "Terrific work ethic, ton of talent and also very intelligent," Butler said. From there, Bobo played at Duke and UCLA, went undrafted in 2023, and built himself into a reliable blocker and special teams piece in Seattle — modest numbers on paper (34 catches, 323 yards, three touchdowns over three seasons) that don't capture what he actually brought to the field.

Bobo's biggest play came in the NFC Championship Game, hauling in a 17-yard touchdown in Seattle's win over the Rams. That run carried the Seahawks all the way to Super Bowl LX — where they beat the Patriots 29-13 in Santa Clara, with 17 members of the Bobo family in the stands to watch.

New England's own scouting report on Bobo ahead of that Super Bowl flagged him as a good blocker, and that evaluation apparently stuck around into the offseason, when the Patriots went looking for receivers who could contribute in the run game alongside quarterback Drake Maye. In the end, New England filled that need elsewhere, signing Romeo Doubs and trading for A.J. Brown, while Mack Hollins returns to handle the same blocking and special teams role Bobo might have filled.

Bobo said he "didn't want to go anywhere else" after re-signing with Seattle, and married his college sweetheart, Mackenzie Cole, at Duke University Chapel on June 27. Now the storylines line up perfectly: the 2026 NFL season opens with a Super Bowl rematch, Patriots at Seahawks, in the league's Kickoff Game — giving the North Andover kid who almost came home a chance to beat his hometown team on national television instead.