Starting Drake Maye at quarterback for the first time, the New England Patriots were blown out by one of the best teams in the NFL on Sunday. They were competitive at times, but also struggled to keep up with the Houston Texans for a good amount of the game as well.
The end result was a 41-21 loss that was not particularly close. And yet, Patriots fans do have something to feel good about for once: their offense, for the first time all season, showed some life with Maye at the helm.
With that said, here are our takeaways from the game.
1. Drake Maye shows toughness in starting debut: Drake Maye’s starting debut wasn’t all good, but but he also showed why the Patriots made him the third overall pick in this year’s draft. In total, he completed 20 of 33 pass attempts for 243 yards with three touchdowns and an interception; he also led the team with 38 rushing yards on five carries, had a strip sack, and some accuracy issues.
It was clear that Maye can do things physically that a lot of other quarterbacks simply cannot do. He threw a fantastic touchdown to Kayshon Boutte for both players’ first ever NFL score, hit DeMario Douglas in stride over the middle for another TD, and maybe made his most impressive play of the day when hitting tight end Hunter Henry while throwing across his body on a scramble drill.
The kid can also take a hit, standing in and taking a ton of punishment from an offensive line held together by duct tape and bubble gum — something that did not go unnoticed by his teammates.
“I commend his toughness, first and foremost,” said Henry. “His competitiveness was great. It was fun to get some things going, moving in a positive direction.”
“I think he did phenomenal,” added Kendrick Bourne. “Him getting hit, he kept playing, he didn’t seem too rattled. He didn’t just start doing different things, he stuck to what he does, what he practices. I think he understands that he’s going to get hit, and that is huge. Obviously, we’re struggling on the line as everybody knows, in a sense, but he’s doing a good job playing hard.”
Maye’s first NFL start wasn’t perfect, but there were plenty of things to be encouraged about for the future.
2. High number of hits is a concern: The Texans have a fantastic defense, and Will Anderson Jr. is one of the best pass rushers in the league. Nonetheless, the Patriots offensive line was pitiful on Sunday, which was the reason for Maye having to showcase his toughness in the first place.
Obviously, injuries have hurt the unit. The Patriots have played five different left tackles so far this season, three different centers, and have suffered injuries at almost every position along the line this season. In that sense, you cannot fault the group too much for not playing well. When both of your tackles are guys picked up off the scrap heap in the last few weeks, those are the expected results.
Patriots O-line coach Scott Peters will need to coach up whoever he has available, and hope that they can stay healthy while possibly getting some reinforcements as well. Vederian Lowe, for example, looked good last week but got hurt in the second quarter against Houston. If he can bounce back and be ready for Week 7, that could give the unit a boost.
Drake Maye is a tough guy, but you still don’t want him to take too much punishment.
3. Ben Brown is not the answer at center: Nick Leverett looked like he was going to be the Patriots’ starting center this week, but Ben Brown ended up filling that role on short notice. A practice squad addition earlier this week, he was informed of his new role on game day.
Whether that was because of Leverett being banged up — he did suit up but was questionable entering the weekend with an ankle injury — or because they thought Brown would give them a better chance at center is not known. Whatever the reason, Brown ended up starting but also did not look like a viable long-term option at the position.
Unfortunately, Leverett hasn’t been great either and the only other player at the position is practice squad rookie Bryan Hudson. Maybe, Cole Strange will factor into the mix at some point but his timeline for a return is still uncertain.
Whatever the Patriots decide to do, they need at least replacement level play from their center in order to be competitive — and to give Drake Maye the best protection they can.
4. Patriots not good enough to overcome any turnovers, let alone four of them: When you put in a rookie quarterback for his first start, it seems obvious that there are going to be some growing pains, and there were. However, the Patriots also had way too many unforced errors by the entire team on Sunday to win.
The first interception that Maye threw was 100 percent on him. The second, however, was more on replacement left tackle Zachary Thomas not being able to get Will Anderson Jr. on the ground on a swing pass, and then a great catch by the defender. Maye was also strip-sacked on a play where he probably should have expected to get hit, but it was another pretty quick pressure, too.
The last turnover, meanwhile, was solely on Austin Hooper. Yes, the pass by Maye wasn’t overly accurate, but he was still not holding the ball as securely as he should have and got it punched out.
When you are not a very good team — which the Patriots most certainly are not — you cannot expect to win games turning the ball over at all, never mind four times.
5. Defensive losses start to take their toll: The Patriots did a pretty good job stopping the run — if you ignore the two runs of 50-plus yards that they allowed. Outside of those plays, they allowed only 79 yards on 26 carries. The problem, of course, is that they gave up those huge gains and simply cannot allow teams to cash in big plays like that.
The run fits on those plays were awful, and New England just allowed the Texans to bully them off the spot. For a defense that prides itself on being able to prevent big plays and play physical football at the point of attack, that — as Davon Godchaux said after the game — was embarrassing.
“The fundamentals of just tackling and run fits have to improve,” Jerod Mayo said after the game. “They have to improve. I told all those guys, ‘You should feel like crap today. You should feel like crap.’ We had two runs over 50 yards. That’s just not winning football.”
Of course, they are down a lot of their playmakers right now. Christian Barmore is dealing with blood clots, Ja’Whaun Bentley is out for the season, Jabrill Peppers is on the commissioner’s exempt list, and Matthew Judon is in Atlanta. Those losses have started taking their toll, particularly when it comes to defending the run.
6. The kick return unit is poor: The Texans must have seen something on film they thought would give them an advantage, because instead of kicking the ball into the end zone for a touchback, they made the Patriots return their kickoffs. The result benefited them: the Patriots were unable to do anything on the kick return unit, averaging 23.2 yards per runback.
At this point, one has to wonder whether JaMycal Hasty is the best guy to be returning kicks; he doesn’t threaten with his speed, and also was unable to break any tackles. Making the Patriots return every kickoff would make sense, because their unit is anemic at best.
The Patriots need to make wholesale changes if they expect to make things any better and improve their starting field position: on Sunday, they started their average drive at the 27-yard line, compared to the Texans at the 41.
7. Injuries continue to pile up: The Patriots have been plagued by injuries all season long, and Sunday was no different. Vederian Lowe went down with an injury in the second quarter, forcing Zachary Thomas to step in his place at left tackle; left guard Michael Jordan went down as well and was replaced Sidy Sow, a former starter. who hasn’t played well this year.
The Patriots already appear to be past the breaking point when it comes to O-line injuries in particular. The hope is that either Lowe and/or Jordan will be able to make a quick return, because the alternatives are looking continuously bleak.
8. Young wide receivers a mixed bag: The Patriots got some real contributions from their second-year receivers on Sunday, with DeMario Douglas and Kayshon Boutte both catching touchdown passes and creating constant separation. Douglas looked like the best receiver on the team, and Boutte beat a fantastic corner on a go route — Derek Stingley Jr. — to end the first half.
On the other end of the spectrum was rookie Ja’Lynn Polk. The second-round pick had numerous drops, and they are becoming an issue for him: he has now dropped a pass in back-to-back games, including two on Sunday.
He has been getting open, but that does not matter if you cannot complete the process of catching the ball. The Patriots are going to need Polk to be better, but the performances of Douglas and Boutte should be very encouraging moving forward.
9. Refereeing was embarrassing: The Patriots did not lose the game because of the refs, that is obvious. That does not change the fact that the officiating was horrendous on Sunday afternoon. The amount of missed or wrong calls was far too high, with consistency lacking from one decision to the next.
Whether it was a questionable ineligible man downfield penalty, a defensive pass interference call, or one of the most blatant face mask penalties you’ll ever see — Ron Torbert’s crew had a forgettable day. It also missed Drake Maye getting hit out of bounds on more than one occasion, and the defender putting his whole body weight on him on his strip sack.
There is some level of trust that the refs can actually see what is going on out on the field, but this crew just couldn’t do that on Sunday.
Of course, the Patriots also did not make life easy on themselves: four of the team’s nine penalties were procedural in nature.
“We talk about it all the time, and Saturday night meetings we talk about what crew is going to be out there, what do they call frequently, and we knew that this was a high penalty-calling crew,” said Jerod Mayo. “I thought the second half kind of cleaned it up a little bit, but just way too many penalties in the game.”
On the day, New England was flagged nine times for a loss of 50 total yards.
10. A journey across the pond awaits: The Patriots will travel to England to play one of the worst teams in the league, the 1-5 Jacksonville Jaguars. The Jags are staying in England for the week, so they have the advantage over the Patriots in that respect, but the Patriots should be able to at least move the ball against them: their defense is awful and their offense isn’t much better.
The Patriots had some success on offense this week, so the hope is that they can build on it in Week 7. Defensively, the Patriots have struggled the last few weeks, so maybe this can be a get-right game for that unit as well.
