Former New England Patriots star Julian Edelman has been criticized for an ‘awful’ joke he told about Aaron Hernandez during the roast of Tom Brady on Sunday night.
Brady’s former coach Bill Belichick, his former teammates, comedians and some celebrities took it in turns to ridicule the seven-time Super Bowl winner on a Netflix special hosted by Kevin Hart.
But some also made jokes about each other or turned their attention to other people from Brady’s life or career. One of those was Aaron Hernandez, the former Patriots tight end.
Hernandez killed himself in prison in 2017 while serving a life sentence for the 2013 murder of semi-professional football player Odin Lloyd.
But that didn’t stop Hernandez from being the subject of some very crude jokes on Sunday night and Edelman’s was the most controversial.
Julian Edelman has been criticized for an ‘awful’ joke he told about Aaron Hernandez
Hernandez’s former Patriots teammate Rob Gronkowski looked stunned after the joke
Hernandez killed himself in prison in 2017 while serving a life sentence for murder
Explaining how ‘everyone always asks me how big Gronk’s (Gronkowski) d*** is’, Edelman continued: ‘Now, don’t get me wrong, it gets the job done.
‘But there was this other Patriots tight end (Hernandez). Now he was hung.’
The joke was met with a stunned reaction from the crowd inside the arena while the camera cut to Gronkowski and Kevin Hart.
Gronkowski was left speechless and put his hand over his mouth while Hart looked like he was laughing nervously.
Hernandez’s ex-fiancee Shayanna Jenkins – the mother of his only child – told TMZ that ‘it’s sad that I’m trying to raise my children in such a cruel world.’
The joke did not go down well on social media either as viewers of the Netflix show quickly condemned Edelman.
One wrote: ‘If you make a joke that dark it better actually be funny’.
Another commented: ‘Laughing at a guy who committed suicide for a cheap laugh. F***ed up’.
‘Poor taste. Just awful,’ added another. ‘That joke was so trashed. Uncalled for’, said another viewer.
‘Where’s the funny part?’ asked another.
Viewers of the roast took to social media to condemn Edelman for his joke about Hernandez
After his death, doctors found Hernandez had a severe case of the brain disease CTE
After his death in 2017, doctors found the 27-year-old Hernandez had advanced chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a degenerative brain disease linked to concussions and other head trauma commonplace in the NFL.
Dr. Ann McKee, the director of the CTE Center at Boston University, said Hernandez had Stage 3 (out of 4) of the disease, which can cause violent mood swings, depression and other cognitive disorders .
‘We’re told it was the most severe case they had ever seen for someone of Aaron’s age,’ attorney Jose Baez said in 2017.
Baez also said Hernandez had shown signs of memory loss, impulsivity and aggression that could be attributed to CTE.
In July 2019, Hernandez’s estate also settled a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the families of two men he was acquitted of killing.
Prosecutors alleged Hernandez fatally shot Daniel de Abreu and Safiro Furtado in 2012 after a confrontation at a nightclub.
Hernandez committed suicide just a few days after he was acquitted of most charges in the double murder case.
