What the Patriots’ four potential early-season outcomes would mean for Drake Maye
How Jacoby Brissett’s start to the season – and the team’s start as a whole – could impact Drake Maye’s timeline.
With the New England Patriots set to start the season with Jacoby Brissett under center, the question many Patriots fans have is when they’ll see rookie quarterback Drake Maye start for the first time. The team hasn’t given any sort of timeline beyond talking about the continued competition between the two quarterbacks, leaving things up for speculation.
In reality the Patriots likely don’t have an exact week circled right now for Maye to take over – nor should they. Maye’s readiness is dependent on a number of factors that can’t be determined too far in advance. Some of those are factors related to Maye specifically, such as his continued mechanical and mental progress.
Other factors are external. The team’s performance – and really Brissett’s performance – should be considered. Not simply whether or not Brissett is winning them games, but taking the tone of the locker room. Players want to play with the quarterback they going to feel is going to give them the best chance to win. Pulling Brissett too early, if he has complete command of the locker room, could create issues like the Miami Dolphins had in 2020 with Ryan Fitzpatrick and Tua Tagovailoa. At the same time, the coaching staff dragging its feet before going to Maye has a chance to create different kinds of questions from the locker room.
WATCH: Mike Reiss on Jacoby Brissett and Drake Maye
To boil things down to their simplest terms, there are four potential outcomes for Jacoby Brissett and the Patriots early in the season (assuming Brissett stays healthy). What would each one mean for Drake Maye? Let’s go through them, one-by-one. Keep in mind this isn’t saying all four have an equal chance of happening, but just exploring the potential outcomes of each one.
Jacoby Brissett plays well, Patriots are winning
Pretty cut and dry here. If Brissett is playing well and the Patriots are winning games, there’s no need to rush and make a change. They can take all the time they need with Maye’s development, without much pressure. It’s a win-win.
If Brissett is playing just well enough, the Patriots’ coaching staff would need to find a time to thread the needle and make the quarterback change. On the chance that Brissett is playing at a level higher than that – well, that’s a good problem to have.
Jacoby Brissett plays poorly, Patriots are winning
The Patriots defense took some serious losses personnel-wise this offseason between the trade of Matthew Judon, Christian Barmore’s medical condition. That’s on top of no longer having Bill Belichick as the architect of the unit.
Despite that, is there a chance the unit is still elite? It could happen, but the Patriots would need a lot of ‘what if’s to go there way in terms of internal player development – mainly with players such as Christian Gonzalez, Keion White, and Joshua Uche.
Let’s say that does happen though, and the defense wins the Patriots some games without Brissett playing particularly well. That could expediate Maye’s timeline. If the coaches and players feel he’s a better option he’d take some of the pressure off the defense, without too much being asked of him right away.
Jacoby Brissett plays poorly, Patriots are losing
This is probably the outcome most people are expecting. It’s tough to win the NFL without good quarterback play, and odds are if Brissett struggles out of the gate the team will struggle with him.
What would this outcome mean for Maye? It should get him on the field sooner, as players and coaches both look for a spark. There might be an argument that early losses take the team out of playoff contention, meaning they should take their time with Maye. However, losing games with bad quarterback play while there’s another option on the bench would be a tough sell from this new coaching staff.
Jacoby Brissett plays well, Patriots are losing
This is far and away the least likely outcome, and the one that is the hardest to analyze without actually seeing it play out. As mentioned above, teams generally go as the quarterback goes. For a team whose defense is better than its offense, there is really no excuse to lose with plus quarterback play.
What would this even look like? The Patriots losing shootouts? Brissett playing well but others on the offense letting him down? It’s tough to picture.
As for Maye – if this situation were to play out it would probably lead to him sitting on the bench for longer than anticipated. Clearly the team would have some core issues that need to be cleaned up before putting a rookie quarterback in. At the same time, this is the one outcome where the quarterback decision might become a back-burner topic, with more focus going on the coaching staff’s failure to win despite plus quarterback play.
