Over the last two days, the Patriots turned the page from training camp to regular-season style practices.
Patriots head coach Jerod Mayo's team worked out at a slower pace. Mayo split the 90-man squad to create a top group facing off against a scout team offense and defense. The scout team is working off cards like they would in the regular season, where coaches hold up diagrams likely of the Commanders staple schemes for the scout team to run. The idea is for the starters to get a look in practice at the concepts they'll face on Sunday night.
There's always competition in an NFL practice, but for all intents and purposes, that portion of the summer is over. Players hoping to make strong last impressions will have their chance on Sunday night. However, the top half of the roster and the depth chart for Week 1 feel like it's nearly set. Therefore, despite the arrow pointing upward for rookie Drake Maye, I'm almost ready to call the quarterback competition for Jacoby Brissett.
Brissett has led off team drills all summer, and that continued this week. On Wednesday, Brissett led off vs. the scout-team defense, then Maye would take a few to finish out the string. On Thursday, Maye's reps behind the starting offensive line came in a walkthrough and a small handful were in a similar fashion as Wednesday's session vs. the scout-team following Brissett. Maye's one-minute drill at the end of practice was with the twos, while Brissett ran with the ones.
The way the reps were divvied up were reminiscent of the work Maye would get if he was QB2 during the regular season, while it could signal that Maye might get reps with the starters in Sunday's preseason finale. Overall, Brissett practiced like the starter. Maye even said as much when he was asked about taking some snaps from starting center David Andrews.
"You've got to be ready. You're one snap away if I'm the backup," Maye said. "Jacoby has done a great job. He's a great player and a great teammate. He's been repping with the ones all summer, so I'm excited for him."
Now, like the backend of the roster hopefuls, Maye has one more audition to make his case to be the Week 1 starter. Maye could "light it up" against the Commanders on Sunday night, and that could sway Mayo, offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt, and personnel chief Eliot Wolf to reconsider.
However, in my time covering pro football, I've never seen a true quarterback competition with that kind of heel turn this late in the summer. In 2021, Mac Jones emerged when he ran the first-team offense effectively vs. the Giants in a joint practice. Incumbent starter Cam Newton was absent due to a COVID rule violation, opening the door for Jones, and the former Patriots QB seized the opportunity.
Similarly, the Panthers came to Foxborough for joint practices in the summer of 2022, when friend-of-Belichick Matt Rhule was the head coach in Carolina. The Panthers had an open competition between Baker Mayfield and Sam Darnold where the two quarterbacks split first-team reps so the coaches could compare the offense with each quarterback under center.
For this to follow a similar timeline, Maye would've made that push up the depth chart last week when the Patriots hosted the Eagles for a joint practice, and that didn't happen. The door never opened as it did with Mac, and Maye never got the Mayfield-Darnold equal opportunity reps, either. Is it fair to second guess that the Patriots didn't create an opportunity for Maye to truly compete for the starting job? Yes. Still, if we base it on what they do, not what they say, it'll be Brissett under center for the Patriots against the Bengals on Sept. 8.
For the future QB1, it's not all bad news. From this perspective, when camp began, the Patriots were gauging if Maye would be ready to play this year, let alone Week 1. The plan seemed always to be for Maye to sit behind Brissett, and they're likely sticking to that plan. The good news is that Maye has proven that he should play his rookie season sooner rather than later.
The Maye era is on the horizon. He could take over as the starter as soon as October. On Thursday, Van Pelt, who is the main voice in Maye's development, spoke about the progress the rookie made in training camp.
Offensive Coaches Offer Insight Into QB Drake Maye's Development
After reading about Brissett being the expected Week 1 starter from this perspective, the million-dollar question is, what is holding the coaching staff back from giving the job to Maye?
Speaking to reporters before Thursday's practice, offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt gave his perspective on Maye's progress. The veteran OC was asked what is preventing Maye from earning the starting role, and he said, "Jacoby."
"[Brissett] is our starting quarterback. The good news is that this week, we get to play everybody. We're still in the evaluation process. We have one more preseason game, and our guys are going to play, so we have another chance to evaluate."
The follow-up question to Van Pelt was obvious: is there still a chance that Maye could be the Week 1 starter? To that, Van Pelt replied, "Sure, there's a chance. But there's still a process of how you bring a rookie quarterback along."
Van Pelt, whom Coach Mayo tabbed as the head coach of the offense, then explained where the veteran is still ahead of Maye in terms of running the offense. As noted numerous times, Brissett played in Van Pelt's offense with the Browns in 2022, making 11 starts in Cleveland that season.
"Jacoby, having played in this offense, understands some of the tools that you can use to get you out of certain situations. Pressure situations, things like that," Van Pelt explained. "Drake is still learning, but he has been really impressive the last few weeks. He's moving in the right direction, for sure. Jacoby has tons of experience, not just in the NFL but in this system. We've won games with him in Cleveland, so I feel comfortable with his understanding. But, again, Drake is pushing."
The offensive coordinator reiterated that the Patriots coaching staff is pleased with Maye's development. One area where they've seen significant progress from the rookie quarterback is with his footwork—specifically, syncing his feet with his eyes to play in rhythm. Multiple coaches pointed to Maye's third-down conversion to rookie WR Javon Baker in last week's preseason contest vs. the Eagles as a good example of the rookie's progress in this area.
Maye's sometimes disjointed footwork was a huge narrative in the draft process, but it was less that Maye was broken in this regard and more that he wasn't trained in pro-style footwork. In other words, the 21-year-old was a blank canvas when it came to footwork.
"Each offense is different. What [North Carolina] was asking him to do was a lot different than what we are, which I think works in our favor," quarterbacks coach T.C. McCartney told Patriots.com. "He wasn't trained the wrong way, so it was easy for him to come in and pick up what we were asking him to do. I think it worked out just fine."
When discussing footwork for pro quarterbacks, we are really talking about an adjustment to playing from under center. Although the timing is important, shotgun footwork is not overly complex, while college offenses are now so gun-heavy in spread systems that these young quarterbacks are hardly ever under center in the college game.
During his first extended preseason action, Maye was only under-center for one of his 11 pass attempts, and had a botched quarterback-center exchange that led to a fumbled snap. My question to Van Pelt was, is it a prerequisite for Maye to master playing from under center, or would AVP feel good about shifting the offense to a more gun-heavy approach?
"We go under center. Our run game is a big part of what we do, and that starts from under center. I think he's adapted well. It was foreign to him when he got here, but right now, it looks seamless," Van Pelt told Patriots.com. "There are certain things we would do with Drake that maybe we wouldn't do with Jacoby. So there is a little bit of that. But our system is our system."
The last mechanical talking point is Maye's throwing motion, which some point to being on the longer side. The main focus for the coaches with Maye has been on his footwork, and they don't have major concerns with his throwing motion. The explanation was that the coaches would only tweak Maye's throwing motion if he was struggling to throw the ball accurately, which they don't believe is the case.
Although he hasn't surpassed Brissett as the starter to this point, the offensive coaches seemed encouraged about Maye's progress. The next step for Van Pelt is seeing how Maye performs with the starting offense.
"We'd like to get him out there with the first group if we can and see him operate with the first offense," Van Pelt said. "The hardest position in sports to play is quarterback, especially for a rookie coming in and not seeing all the defenses that they're going to see in the NFL. It's a hard transition, and it takes a little bit of time. We're going to be as patient as we can with that process."
"[Maye] is taking steps forward every single day. That's the big thing. There's no regression. He's taking what he has learned from the previous practices and applying it to the next practice. He's been really impressive the last few weeks," Van Pelt concluded.
The coaches spoke about a bright future for Maye, but the general sentiment was that they view it as a marathon, not a sprint, for the rookie. As much as everyone is clamoring to see the third-overall pick take over, New England feels comfortable with Brissett being the short-term starter, so they can bring Maye along properly without rushing him on the field.
DISCLAIMER: The views and thoughts expressed in this article are those of the writer and don't necessarily reflect those of the organization. Read Full Disclaimer
