Drake Maye played just six snaps last Thursday night in the New England Patriots’ preseason opener against the Carolina Panthers.
The rookie quarterback didn’t do anything spectacular. Nor did he do anything stupid. So, it’s hard to read too much into his first game action since being selected third overall by New England in the 2024 NFL Draft.
Yet, there are some who already are beginning to question Maye’s potential, largely because the other rookie QBs who played this weekend showed a little something that the Patriots’ new signal-caller did not have the opportunity to show.
Maye could flash his upside in time, even though veteran Jacoby Brissett has the inside track on New England’s starting QB job to begin the regular season. It’s just been a slow pace for the 21-year-old in his first NFL camp, which extended into the preseason opener.
And therein lies the important reminder: This is still the preseason.
The other rookie quarterbacks might’ve made strong first impressions with their respective teams, but we really should avoid sweeping judgments this early in their development.
“I think we’re gonna have to judge the rookies when they get to the regular season,” Belichick said Monday on the “Pat McAfee Show,” without mentioning Maye specifically. “Preseason is a good time to gain experience and get a little bit of game exposure, but especially at the quarterback position, the defenses are very basic. There’s not a lot of scheme, and when you’re on the defensive side of the ball, you’re playing, let’s call it, three-deep throughout the course of the game — first quarter to midway through the third quarter to another group to finish the game. You’re running the same things the whole game. You’re not game planning. You’re not showing too much. You’re just trying to run the stuff you’ve been practicing.
“So, what the quarterbacks see in preseason and what they see in joint practices, and then what they see during the regular season, I think, are going to be quite different. It’s almost like playing in an All-Star Game, where you just see a handful of coverages.”
Maye completed just two of three passes for 19 yards last week in the Patriots’ 17-3 preseason win over the Panthers. Bailey Zappe, a holdover from last year’s roster, saw the bulk of the action behind center, while rookie Joe Milton III popped the most.
We’ll probably see more of Maye in New England’s second preseason game this Thursday night against the Philadelphia Eagles. But again — good, bad or indifferent — we should withhold any concrete evaluations until he finally sees the field in a regular-season game.
“What I think the coaches are evaluating is how well the players do the things that they’ve been instructed to do and they’ve practiced to do,” Belichick said Monday of the preseason. “So, the fundamentals, the communication within the limited, watered-down schemes that they’re running and just the live competition that you don’t get to see in practice.”
Although Belichick didn’t offer an evaluation of Maye, specifically, it’s probably worth keeping his comments in mind as the preseason plays out and we overanalyze the Patriots’ quarterback room in wake of the position’s struggles since Tom Brady’s departure
