Patriots improve report card ranking, but remain bottom-10 team overall

NFL owners tried their best to prevent or limit the release of their own teams' report cards from the NFLPA, but ESPN was able to obtain literally every grade for every team anyway.

And overall, it's technically good news for the New England Patriots: they climbed from 31st to 26th in the overall ranks among NFL teams. But the fact they jumped only five spots and remain in the bottom-10 of the league, despite making the Super Bowl in Year 1 under head coach Mike Vrabel, shows they still have plenty of work to do to keep getting those grades up.

Fortunately for the Patriots, there's only one area where their grade got worse from 2024 to 2025, but it's kind of an embarrassing one: the food/dining area dropped from a C to a D+. That feels like an easy one for the Krafts and Vrabel's staff not to screw up, but they did.

The Patriots' worst individual grade, for the second year in a row, is an F for team travel. Issues with the Pats' team plane are well-documented. We're no longer romanticizing about the planes because they helped deliver supplies during the COVID-19 pandemic. It's about time the Krafts made an upgrade.

As for other grades that stayed the same year-over-year, the Patriots again received a B for their "nutritionist/dietician," and the locker room and training room each got a C-.

Unsurprisingly, the most marked areas of improvement are staffing-related. Vrabel got an A, a big improvement from Jerod Mayo's B+, while the strength coaches went from a B to an A- (which is interesting because Deron Mayo stayed on as their strength and conditioning coach), and the training staff improved from a C+ to a B. Ownership improved, as well, despite the team's shortcomings, jumping from a D to a B-. Their controversial "treatment of families" grade improved from a C+ to a B.

The ESPN report included several new criteria on the 2026 report card. Most notably, the Patriots' "home game field" received a D. The team installed synthetic FieldTurf in the stadium back in 2006, and last made upgrades to the playing surface in 2014. They're installing natural grass for when the World Cup comes to Foxboro later this year, and it's safe to say that the players are praying that it stays.

Elsewhere among the new grades, offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels got an A. The "defensive coordinator" got a B; Terrell Williams held that title but spent most of the season away from the team due to health reasons, while linebackers coach Zak Kuhr called plays for the defense. Special teams coordinator Jeremy Springer got a B+, and the position coaches got a B- as a group.

"General Manager" is a murky one, because the Patriots officially don't have one, but the players graded that spot a B+ after the front office spent big and the roster improved to the point of Super Bowl contention. It's unclear whether the players are basing that on executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf or on Vrabel and right-hand men Ryan Cowden and John Streicher, although the latter group certainly seems to be calling the shots in the front office.

Here's the full list of Patriots grades, via ESPN:

Treatment of Families: B
Home Game Field: D
Food/Dining Area: D+
Nutritionist/Dietician: B
Locker Room: C-
Training Room: C-
Training Staff: B
Weight Room: C-
Strength Coaches: A-
Position Coaches: B-
Offensive Coordinator: A
Defensive Coordinator: B
Special Teams Coordinator: B+
Team Travel: F
Head Coach: A
General Manager: B+
Team Ownership: B-

For the Krafts, improving the team grades feels as simple as spending money, investing. They've already invested $50 million in a new team training facility, so those grades are guaranteed to improve once that becomes operational, although it would be telling if it's not automatic A's across the board.

The goal is clear for ownership: get new planes and upgrade the field. Those will be expensive, though, so we're not holding our breath for those to be fixed within a year. It's more likely they rely on the new training facility, which is set to open this spring, to make the players happy and improve their image.