From one vote away from winning MVP to leading the league in turnovers. Drake Maye looks out of sorts to start 2026.
The Patriots had the number two scoring offense last season. Through three weeks this year, they are tied for last with the Miami Dolphins. The biggest issue has been the quarterback. Maye, who finished last season with 11 total turnovers, has seven already this year.
So the question is: what happened? There has to be a reason for such a stark drop-off, not just in production but in the ability to play the position confidently. Maye has the yips, and they started earlier than we think. The same issues we’re seeing now started in the regular season, not the playoffs.
Maye hasn’t been the same since New England’s second matchup against the Bills last year. The talk surrounding him and the team was that the schedule was so easy and that the production had to be graded on a curve. A win would clinch the division and legitimize what they had accomplished throughout the year. After taking a 17-point lead into halftime, they were outscored 28-7 to lose the game.
In the ten games since, Maye hasn’t looked like the same player. He’s declined in every passing category, and it’s gotten worse the farther he’s gotten from that game. Most notably, his passer rating fell from 111.7 through those first 14 games last year to 89.3 since then.
This isn’t just a Super Bowl slump. His big game against the Ravens’ bottom-three passing defense just masked the start. Losing in the Super Bowl and then having the rematch to start the season only amplified the trend.
As bad as it is for Patriots fans, there’s no reason to go into a full panic. It’s a mental block, and we’ve seen people recover from that. Sam Darnold was “seeing ghosts” in New York and just lifted the Lombardi Trophy. It can happen, but there is a lot of work to be done.
It’s been a perfect storm of negativity for New England to start the season. They spent to build up the receiving core to help Maye, then A.J. Brown got hurt right away, and the relationship with Romeo Doubs is still a work in progress. Kayshon Boutte was a deep-ball threat for Maye, and they shipped him to Houston.
That amount of newness doesn’t help a guy who’s trying to regain his confidence. It’s clear he’s looking for familiarity because Mack Hollins, who was there last year, leads them in yards, targets and receptions this year.
On top of that, he has two starting offensive lineman on IR. Yes, everybody has to deal with injuries, but losses like that are much more detrimental to a guy trying to dig himself out of a hole.
Maye is a broken player right now. His calling-card was his ability to throw on the run, and now he’s missing open receivers in those situations. His confidence is shot, and it looks like he’s a ways away from rebuilding it. But it will happen. He’s young. He was viewed as a project coming out of college. The Patriots are a well-run organization that will figure it out. Success isn’t linear in the NFL and Maye is learning that the hard way.
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