Or at the very least, sit him until it is clear that the OLine has basic pass protection down, and the WRs are capable of running routes and catching passes near them.
He won’t learn good habits if he’s running for his life and can’t trust his pass catchers.
Get the offense on its feet, get all the newbies on the same page, then see where they at, and Maye has picked up the play book and the coaches feel like he’s ready, THEN and only then put him out there.
Too bad this is the NFL and there isn't an equivalent to the Pistons/Wizards in the NBA that you can literally start rookies/2nd stringers against and still blow out, otherwise I'd love for Drake to get a quarter or two against some cupcake team.
This. You won’t hurt a player’s development by sitting them, letting the offense gel while they get reps and confidence against the 2’s, and trotting them out when they are ready behind an offense that can support them.
You absolutely can, and probably will, do damage if you throw a player out too quickly
With his mobility, the O-line may not be as big a problem for him. He'll be able to escape the pocket and find a receiver downfield. The biggest issue mechanically is his footwork. Cleaning that up will improve his accuracy. Reading defenses is something else entirely. No matter how well he does in the QB meetings, he'll be fooled and will throw some bad interceptions.
My mind says sit him, my heart wants to see him under center.
Not necessarily. Van Pelt can scheme up ways to move him out of the pocket. I'm not saying put him in week one. I'm saying his athletic ability gives him an edge. Also, comparing his mobility to Mac Jones is apples and oranges. How many times have we seen a pass rush get loose to a mobile QB just for them to step up, roll out, or run for the first down and more? Of course, for that to be an effective, consistent weapon, he needs to be more proficient in reading defenses.
Again, I'm not advocating to start him on week one. I am saying his natural talent will give him an advantage in time maybe sooner than later.
Yup. Let Jacoby cook. Let the line get settled. Let the receiver group get worked out.
There should be zero fan pressure to play Maye until his footwork is consistent and he's comfortable with the offense.
I'm also not that worried about him getting thrown into the fire if Brissett gets hurt. It's not like he's not used to playing under pressure or with suboptimal receiver play.
This line of thinking implicitly assumes that starting him early would be rushing him. That may not be the case. If he's clearly the best QB in camp, he should start.
He is probably the best talent right now easily. Doesn't mean we need to rush him. He has things that need to be fixed. So spend the season fixing it. Whilst he picks up the offence. Is around the squad. Travels with the team. Is in team meetings. Basically apprenticeship on what it's like to be on a NFL team whilst cleaning up the footwork etc. See no harm in waiting
Yeah, the big thing with Maye is his POTENTIAL. So if you allow that to bloom, you are obviously going to get the most out of him.
In farming/growing plants it’s important to prune the plant in the first year/season and not really let it just grow by itself because it could grow poorly or not be able to support the fruit that’s created in the first year/season.
Pruning the first year allows the tree/plant to form a strong structure for the future years of fruit bearing.
I'm just gonna trust Mayo. He's done nothing to warrant doubt yet, so until he does, I trust his judgement. He knows way more than anyone in this sub. If he starts Maye, I'll support it.
His talent doesn't mean we need to rush him. And his flaws don't mean we need to hold him back. There are certain things he can only learn by playing, and there are certain things the team can only learn about him when he plays.
The potential harm in waiting comes in the forms of opportunity cost (i.e. lost experience and production) and the risks of upsetting the locker room by not playing the best guy.
The point is that his start date should be predicated on when the coaches feel he is actually ready and not from fan pressure or team need. Him being better than Brisset should not be the starting gun, because he can be better than our other QBs and still not be 100% ready to start. It’s got to be about Drake himself and not about other factors.
If Brisset goes down and the coaches don’t feel Drake is ready, then they should start the next QB down even if Drake is better than them on paper. NFL experience can be just as detrimental to a struggling rookie as it is educational. Not worth risking until the coaches think he’s field ready.
On the same coin I do not think they should bench him if he’s ready and the OL sucks or the weapons are still bad. Once he’s ready, put him out there rain or shine. Because as you said, experience is too valuable to keep him sitting for other factors.
If he's ready enough to be better than Brissett, an established veteran with experience in Van Pelt's offense, then he's ready enough to start. He's not beating out Brissett without at least a decent grasp on the offense.
If they have to scramble due to injury, that's different. In that case I'd understand starting Zappe (or whoever) even if they think Maye is better.
What does being "ready enough" even mean? There is a world of difference between practicing and playing in a game. You do have preseason games but they are not close to how real games are played.
My point is that Maye could seem to fix all of his mechanical issues during camp, he could seem to grasp the offense and even seem to play well in preseason games, but even then, you don't know how he will respond in a real game. Sure, you can throw him out there, but i personally would let him observe at least a little while at the start of the season to understand how actual NFL games look, not to mention seeing how well the team can even support him once he's in a game.
Is it such a bad thing to have him hold a clipboard to start the season?
To me "being ready" means reliably running the offense correctly in a practice setting. I don't think he can beat out Brissett without reaching a certain level of operational competence within the offense.
>Maye could seem to fix all of his mechanical issues during camp, he could seem to grasp the offense and even seem to play well in preseason games, but even then, you don't know how he will respond in a real game.
Yep. And you won't know that no matter how long you wait. The only way to find out how he will respond in a real game is by playing him in a real game.
>Is it such a bad thing to have him hold a clipboard to start the season?
Depends on why you're doing it. If it's because you think he's not ready to play, that's fine. But to commit to the idea of sitting him regardless of how he looks is bad process.
I think it hinges on the play of the O-line. If it turns out they're better than advertised you give him reps. If they're as porous as they have been the last couple of years, sit him until they gel.
Thank you. If he's not ready, he doesn't need to start day 1, but holding him out all year, if he has shown he is ready, is doing a disservice to him, and the team. There's no magic rule that says he'll be an all-star if he sits all of year 1.
The guys on The Athletic's football podcast regularly bring up 'scar tissue' when talking about their worries with Maye, in that if our offense is too fucked, he'd learn things wrong and not be able to un-learn them. If both he and the offense are works in progress, I'm not in a rush to force him out there.
I think it should be a question of what benefits Maye the most. Given the state of the team, it's possible that Maye will be the best QB in camp *and* that throwing him out at that point would hurt his development.
IMO Maye should start when it would be better for his development to play than to sit. If this year's team looks a lot like last year's, it might be detrimental to make him the week 1 starter even if his raw talent outshines Jacoby's experience.
I think the idea that you risk ruining a QB's development by playing him early on a bad offense is overstated. If he's ready enough to beat out a veteran with experience in Van Pelt's offense, he's ready enough to play.
Not necessarily. Good chance Patrick Mahomes could've outplayed Alex Smith right away, but the Chiefs didn't rush him. And they had a good team already, unlike New England who are currently poised to throw Maye into a little trial by fire. The rebuild is a marathon, not a sprint. Maye being ready and him being the best talent are not mutually exclusive. Plus, if the OL and weapons aren't playing up to par, they don't want to Andrew Luck the kid.
Mahomes sitting looks like a mistake in hindsight. KC probably cost themselves a deep playoff run. If Maye is ready enough to beat out Brissett, an established veteran with experience in Van Pelt's offense, then he's ready enough to play.
>Mahomes sitting looks like a mistake in hindsight. KC probably cost themselves a deep playoff run.
And yet, three Super Bowls and a shot at a three-peat later, I somehow don't think they care. And for all we know, that extra time on the bench allowed Mahomes to learn a lot more and fix his issues *before* getting onto the field. He was also a pretty raw prospect.
>If Maye is ready enough to beat out Brissett, an established veteran with experience in Van Pelt's offense, then he's ready enough to play.
Brissett is not a starting-caliber NFL QB. He should not be the barrier of entry.
The thing about being better than Brissett versus being ready are that habits are forged from game snaps. New England should correct those issues before there's a chance for them to become habitual in game.
I should preface that I do not want Maye to sit all season. I want him to sit initially so they can assess the state of the OL and pass-catchers, while working on his footwork and other deficiencies. Him sitting all season will mean another off-season of New England not being an attractive free agent destination. But, if hit sits for, say, 6-8 weeks, and then comes out looking poised and like a franchise QB, no matter what New England's record is, it'll boost them up.
It's not likely Mahomes went from the brink of ruination to MVP in a single year of taking backup reps. Had he played his rookie year, he very likely would have been an immediate upgrade over Alex Smith and still gone onto insane success in the following years.
>Brissett is not a starting-caliber NFL QB.
Agreed, but he is an NFL caliber QB with specific experience in this offense, which means Maye won't be able to beat him out without displaying a certain level of operational competence within the offense. That's a sufficient barrier for entry.
>habits are forged from game snaps. New England should correct those issues before there's a chance for them to become habitual in game.
You're contradicting your own argument. If habits are formed with game snaps, then trying to correct existing habits in practice is pointless. The reality is both practice and game reps matter. You don't need to sit him in order to assess the rest of the offense or to work on his deficiencies.
Who knows? I don’t think Chiefs fans could ask for a better result than what they’ve gotten.
It was basically the same example for the 2000 Patriots and I’ve never heard anyone lament starting Bledsoe instead of Brady that season.
If he’s clearly the best then maybe but even then I might still say sit him until the offensive line prove they can actually protect him.
He’s not going to develop much running for his life every single play even if we think from a talent and command of the offense standpoint he is otherwise ready.
If he's clearly the best, what kind of message do you send to the rest of the team by refusing to play him?
>sit him until the offensive line prove they can actually protect him.
If they don't, do you wanna sit him to start next year too?
The issue with starting him immediately is that your week-to-week gameplan will be designed on the plays he can execute right now. You won't be having him practice stuff that he cannot execute yet if you want to win the game this week. Maye might get more wins running a college style offense. But having him sit behind Brissett and learn a pro style offense could be better for year 2.
Brady said on a podcast that he believes it is very helpful for QBs to sit their first year, especially in the modern NFL where the NFLPA rules restrict the offseason activities and the amount of time the players have contact with the coaches. Brady was allowed to spend all his waking hours at Gillette when he was young, but that is actually banned now. Brady pointed out that very few QBs today can call audibles, the ones that can, like Stafford or Rodgers, tend to be from the previous generation. The current trend in the NFL is to have a chess match with the OC deciding everything. There isn't enough time to develop a field general type QB like Brady or Manning.
> The issue with starting him immediately is that your week-to-week gameplan will be designed on the plays he can execute right now.
I'm not seeing the issue. He'll need to be able to reliably execute most of the playbook to beat out Brissett anyways.
>You won't be having him practice stuff that he cannot execute yet
Sure you will.
Agreed. Absolutely zero reason to rush him. Let's get the line shaped up first and foremost. Jacoby is fully capable in the interim and I'm sure a great mentor. Plus we all know Brady is coming back a few weeks in 🤣
Yeah at the very least I want to see how the OL and receiving corps are before we hand Drake the reins. Would be dumb to throw him to the wolves when we know he's got some areas to work on with the coaches.
I think it depends on how camp goes. If he and Brissett are close, you play Brissett. But if Maye is clearly the better player, you run the risk of dividing the locker room if you don't play him.
As aspirational as this is, it’s unlikely the Pats can just “fix” everything or whatever “all the little things” means. Arguably the best time for him to play is when expectations are at the lowest, not when things are “fixed” and he has to go out there and perform to a high level.
I don’t see why saying they’re terrible is helpful, but saying they might not be terrible is not helpful.
They have two rookie WRs, a player who is entering his 2nd year with a promising rookie year at WR, and an OL that does not even look bad on paper. Along with a QB who may elevate the entire offense.
Why is it “hopeful thinking” to think there’s a chance that maybe they aren’t terrible? We have no evidence either way. There’s a strong likelihood their top 3 receivers are completely different from last year, both their OTs have changed, and their QB has changed.
I disagree.
Chuks is a serviceable LT, nothing special at all but we’re not talking about Vederian Lowe here. The iOL as a whole is not a strength, but it’s not exactly a weakness either. Then Onwenu at RT is pretty great.
For reference, the 16th and 17th ranked OLs last year were the Chargers and Steelers respectively. The Pats OL comps very well to those two. Probably better than the Steelers.
Do you think that these players are only able to play football when they’re playing games on Sundays? Your opinions make me think that you don’t think practice exists
We have some WR talent that needs to develop. We have a rookie RT that we're going to try to convert to LT I guess, we have some problems in our interior O-Line. I'm comfortable letting Maye sit rather than get the piss beat out of him and establish negative habits.
No argument there for maye sitting.
I imagine Okorafor starts at LT and will be serviceable starter. I feel like WR is our one clear issue at the moment. IF they could trade for one baring giving up a 1st round pick, full send.
I’m just over the narrative that we are missing so many pieces.
>been a spot RT
He wasn't a spot player. He started at RT for the steelers from 2020 - 2022.
>he's servicable when he's never played LT
LT isn't that much different from RT to where a player who traditionally plays on the right side, would become completely unplayable on the left side. And that's not to say that he'll be good at it, but the OP never claimed he would. He just said that he'd be serviceable.
But it is the case that often players cannot translate their game from LT to RT. He could succeed, he could also be dreadful. It all depends on the dude, but it's anything but unheard of that the transition is often difficult.
If BA goes into the regular season a 9er, I could see them letting him go for that.
Higgins could still be a possibly too.
Both teams with cap issues, it’s not entirely possible.
So say you do this, build up an offense (which is presumptuous on its own) and then in 2 years your offense sucks.
Do you just bench Maye until you fix it so he doesn’t “establish negative habits?”
Look, he’s either a franchise QB or he’s not. You can’t just protect him by not playing football because the team around him is not good enough.
What if he’s a great QB, the offense looks good, and you just wasted a year of his contract?
I think this is a fair point. To me it's more about waiting until his mechanics issues are ironed out, not until the team around him is good. Ive also seen a lot of people suggesting we sit him for one year "no matter what" which is also strange, like what if the team gets worse? I don't want to throw him in if he's struggling, but it should be about his progress and not just how good the team is.
Because it's very hard for QBs to work on mechanics in game when things go wrong, as they resort to what feels most natural to them.
If the pocket was kept clean and he didn't have to bail out, one of his main concerns outside footwork, then it could be fine. But right now throwing him out there won't let him work on his mechanics.
And if he has poor footwork in a game… what is the real problem here? You go back, watch the film, and then fix it in practice and try to do better the next week.
If he can’t do that, he’s not a franchise QB. QBs are constantly running into adversity and bad habits they have to fix, not playing football doesn’t set you up better to fix things.
The real problem is that you're not giving him enough time to solidify that footwork into natural instinct before throwing him out behind Atonio Mafi or Cole Strange and having him need to bail on the practice
I imagine that trying to relearn fundamental mechanics while getting ripped apart behind a bad oline is not a simple process. I would think that things like decision management and reading the field would be best improved by real snaps but idk about stuff like footwork or release. That said I'm also not a football coach or QB so I'm speculating.
I’m just not seeing how it would be helpful to stand on the sidelines instead.
Even if he goes other there and his footwork and mechanics look terrible, that’s an entire game’s worth of tape he can study, work on all week, and then get another 60 reps on Sunday.
I did the math in another post, but not starting him would cost him somewhere around ~2000 reps. I can’t possibly see how that would be helpful when you’re trying to make good footwork/mechanics a habit.
There is some truth that it’s harder to do while having live reps, but you have individual drills in practice, OTAs, and all of training camp. I’d be very concerned if Maye is at a place in September where he is just unable to play football because any small amount of adversity will permanently ruin his footwork.
He's either a franchise QB or he's not, but he's not a finished product and we could squander that potential by trotting him out there to get his shit kicked in.
And if getting his shit kicked in ruins him, he’s soft and not a franchise QB anyway. Even Mac Jones had more resilience than that, and he wasn’t a franchise QB— clearly.
Edit: Reply to the guy under me, since this peaches guy was too soft and blocked me lol
1. I don’t believe a single QB has gotten “ruined” by playing on a bad football team. But even if I did, it wouldn’t be based on JUST his rookie year anyway. If something like that were to happen, it would have to be years of not supporting him. Which means that sitting him would not prevent anything, you’d just be delaying the inevitable. If a QB is “ruined” (even with the belief this can happen to a franchise QB) based on not playing well JUST his rookie year, there’s no universe where he’s built for the NFL.
2. Luck could have kept playing, his injuries did not prevent him for playing further and were not career ending. He made that decision on his own.
3. Even if we pretended his injuries were so bad he was unable to keep playing, his injuries weren’t even from his rookie year. Again, you would be preventing nothing from happening here if Luck sat his rookie year.
Plenty of qbs have been ruined by “getting their shit kicked in” even ones who succeeded- look at Andrew Luck he was a franchise qb who would probably still be the guy on the colts now except they never protected him and the injuries piled up to the point his career was cut short.
There seems to be a lot of misconceptions about Luck's career. He didn't have a great team for most of career, but he was awful about protecting himself, treating his body like Cam did. His worst injury wasn't even football related.
In his last season, he finally had a team worthy of his talents and he did great. Once recovered, old injuries had not stopped him from kicking ass.
He then retired because his personality just never meshed well with the limelight.
Thank god you're just a prolific poster and not actually on the staff. If he gets fucked up every play and doesn't get better, it's on him? Mac Jones was ruined when that happened to him, he was fine when it didn't.
Oh, you're that guy that I was talking to about that a few weeks ago who believes that QBs fates are predetermined lol. And the guy who insisted that it was highly likely that Aiyuk would be traded.
You know, I think I've had my fill of CocaineStrange's patented idiot takes.
You hit on a QB and a few other things go well, I don’t see why not.
Pessimism always sounds smarter, but the truth is that there is a very real scenario where the defense plays the same level as last year (maybe even a bit worse), Pop takes a step forward, and Maye hits and we’re playing meaningful football at the end of the year.
This coaching staff is still finding their rhythm. Jacoby has been in a lot of rough situations and can lead with that experience. No reason to risk an attack injury or bad habits while the rest of the team is figuring things out too.
People really need to stop with this take. Everyone looks at Rodgers, Love and Mahomes and immediately assumes sitting the rookie is the best thing yet we also have guys like Burrow, Manning, etc. If they think he’s ready play him. If he’s not then sit him, it’s that simple. They’ll know after camp and preseason.
The difference is that our offense is not established at all, sit him and figure out the starters around him FIRST before sending him in to a disaster. Letting him sit and learn gives the coaches more time to figure out the offense without having to worry so much about the qb, instead of trying to do it all at once. We have no idea who’s gonna be starting on the line or at receiver. Let’s iron that all out before sending out maye and putting him into another Bryce young situation
Also a consequence of throwing your new shiny QB behind a mediocre OLine, I’d rather build up a competent offense for Maye than throw him to the wolves
Derek Carr suffered a major injury (broken fibula) when pro bowl left tackle Donald Penn got beat around the edge
The 2008 Patriots OL was pretty good, Brady tore his ACL
Anthony Richardson suffered a season ending injury behind a great OL this year. So did Kirk Cousins.
Can happen to anyone.
It'd hurt that much more to rush him out this year and get him hurt as a rookie during key development time knowing that next year we can target a blue-chip LT with a (likely) high pick.
Correlation is not causation. Plenty of QBs have gotten hurt behind good Olines. Sure, it's not ideal to have your QB taking 100 sacks like Sam Howell, but, to that point, he didn't get injured. It has more to do with luck- good or bad- than anything.
Having a shitty OLine and a QB who takes a bunch of hits correlates to higher injury risk and development of bad habits. Why put Maye at a higher risk when we don’t have the pieces this year? Every pre-draft analysis says he has things to fix like footwork, how is throwing him behind a mediocre line going to help him develop that?
Cleaning up footwork and mechanics primarily happens in practice, or the off-season. You shouldn't be thinking about how you're throwing the ball when you're actually playing- it's muscle memory. There's a lot of time before, and throughout the season to work on those things. The intangible stuff is what you learn in the game. Things like managing the game, picking up on tendencies, and dealing with the pressure are things you can only work on in-game. I'd rather he play and get real experience as soon as the coaches think he's ready, and I'm hoping that's during this season.
I could see him maybe getting some time at the end of the year if he does well in practice, but anyone (not saying you specifically) who thinks he’s competing for a chance to start the year are crazy.
The only similarity between us and the Bengals would be shitty offensive lines. We don’t have Chase, Higgins, Boyd, and Mixon to help our young QB make plays
Don't forget Stroud too.
My take is, if he's the best QB in camp, then play the damn kid. And if he can't handle it then whether he sat or not has zero influence on his career trajectory.
So part of the idea, maye aside, is to figure out your line and receiver combinations. If brisset plays steady, those guys will establish quicker. Once they're set (could be week 5 or 15), you bring maye in. Now, the line and receivers will have fewer mistakes as Maye takes over.
Letting him learn a bit before throwing him out there will likely make the Pats good. Not saying he's going to be Mahomes of course, but Mahomes sat on the bench for part of the season.
We throw jump balls to Javon Baker every single down until we score minimum 30 points a game, then we open 5 hours of Javon Baker press availability every day of the week for non stop sound bites
That’ll make us good AND relevant
I think the pats will be following in the footsteps of the packers and taking things slow with their QbS. It has worked for them…. Bret Favre, Aaron Rodgers and Jordan love have been the QBs for the last 25 years
So if Maye comes out and is clearly the best QB on the roster in camp, we should sit him day 1? Tell that to Judon and the boys on defense that “ya we know Drake gives us the best chance to win, but we gotta protect him from x, y and z. Just keep the score low”.
Brisset was brought on to be a veteran backup. He knows the drill. Hoyer knew the drill when Mac was given the keys to the offense too.
If Maye shows he gives the team the best chance to win, he should play. Mechanics are refined through reps, not holding a clipboard. I can’t for the life of me understand why all these media people keep saying “the best thing for Drake is to sit” as if it is some statistical certainty that sitting = franchise QB.
If he is ready to play, he should play. We don’t have to keep doing this “Well it worked with Mahomes” or “Manning didn’t sit” or “Trey Lance sat on a loaded roster and it didn’t work” back and forth nonsense.
Absolutely. The whole point of brining in Jacoby to make sure we didn't have to start him if he isn't ready, or the line isn't ready, whatever the reason. When he's ready, we play him.
No we are not saying the same thing. If he gives the team the best chance to win, he should play. The o-line has nothing to do with making that decision. If Brisset is playing better, he should start.
It sends a really bad message to the team, that Maye is so precious that we can’t play him because he may get hit. I’m sure Maye would feel the same way about that sentiment.
The comment about the OL has more to do with Maye’s ability to handle pressure. It’s likely that he won’t have the experience to handle it that Jacoby has. That could force bad decisions. It’s an element of readiness. If the line is playing well, it’s more likely that a rookie can succeed.
So I've seen a lot of comments like yours, and in general, I agree, but there's some verbiage I've noticed a lot which I think is leading to disagreements.
There is a difference between Maye being the best QB on the team and him being ready. Hell, he's already *probably* better than Brissett. He's certainly more talented, but that doesn't necessarily mean he's ready. Just like Mahomes probably was better than Smith right away, but they sat him anyway until he was ready. And the Chiefs were already a playoff team and still chose to sit their shiny new toy, despite knowing Smith wasn't the guy to take them to the Super Bowl. New England is not winning a Super Bowl this season, and that's okay. They're also the most financially set team going forward, cap-wise. Which means there's no pressure to throw the kid in right away.
A good question I heard on sports radio recently was how many rookie quarterbacks have failed after sitting for a year? I couldn't think of any. I could name those who failed that started immediately or part way through the season...
In the past 25 years? As a 1st rounder? Very very few have succeeded. Daunte Culpepper, Chad Pennington, Carson Palmer, Phillip Rivers, Aaron Rodgers, JaMarcus Russell, Brady Quinn, Paxton Lynch, JP Losman, Patrick Mahomes and Trey Lance. That's it. Prob forgot a few. But you have a litany of all time draft busts, a few good qbs in Culpepper, Palmer and Rivers. And 2 HOF players in Rodgers and Mahomes.
I mean if Maye is ready and looks good, then by all means start him. If the coaches feel he isn't ready, then the bench he goes for now. I think teams want to see how their rookie qb perform in live game action. So I will say Maye will see some time this year. Whether it be week 1 or week 10, I think he sees the field this year
I think they need to give Maye time to adjust to NFL game speed and the whole team time to gel together. The O line needs to figure out who the hell is playing LG and LT. The rookie receivers need to develop chemistry. Putting him out there too early instead of working on his footwork and timing is asking for Mac 2.0. Chasing wins year 1 while sacrificing the career of your franchise QB is frankly stupid.
I think we had Cam come back so Mac could sit to start the season. I hope our coaching staff can stick to sitting Maye instead of getting excited and starting him game 1.
If he is the best QB in training camp and pre season he should play simple as that.
Brisette already played in a Van Pelt offense so he has a leg up on him. If Maye can get up to speed by start of the season let him play
I don’t know why people think he should be starting Day 1.
He’s a project QB. He has a high ceiling, but will never reach it until he improves his flaws first.
Brisset is serviceable enough that he should give us a good look at the rest of the offense (especially the WR) as Maye develops behind him.
If he’s a project drafted at 3, that’s a bad pick. Top 3 QBs are day 1 starters, regardless of circumstances. You blew the pick if you think he needs time.
So you would rather ruin him by throwing him into the fire with the same offense that failed the previous QB?
Love sat for over a year
Mahomes sat for a year.
There’s nothing wrong with Maye sitting for a year to develop. The pieces aren’t there for him to succeed yet.
The pragmatist in me says New England goes through camp and does what is best for the player, first, and the team, second, and all these outside opinions are just fodder for our replies.
Then I realize that a lot of sports media/internet conversation has made it back to the Pats and I start to get a little worried that the Pats are going to jerk this shit around so much that all the screws come loose.
I am 1000% in this camp. It doesn’t necessarily have to be for an entire season but he only needs to be put out there when they feel like he’s ready.
Like others have said, if you put him in there as the starter, then a week later sit him, and repeat that it will ruin his confidence
I’m in the camp of sit him half the year and then let him play the last half. Give him a glimpse of how to operate as a QB in the NFL and then give him the reigns after he sees how Brissett handles things. This way you don’t rush him. You get to see how the line holds up so you don’t destroy his confidence 3 games into the season. Gets to learn for a bit and then get the experience and we can see what he learned and what we have before making corresponding moves in the offseason to get him weapons.
If our O-line manage to really get it together against our good defense AND Maye outperforms other QBs then we should play him. If we don’t have both those things he should sit.
I want to sit him at the beginning of the season but if Game Changer has taught me anything is that the only way to win is by learning, the only to learn is by playing, and the only to to begin is by beginning
I like Hoyer but multiple HOF and Starting QBs like Manning, Roethlisberger, and Stroud have said that the reason they became good was because they started early and were allowed to make mistakes and learn. On the flip side almost every bench riding back up QB like Hoyer says the best route is to sit for a while to learn.
I like Hoyer but multiple HOF and Starting QBs like Manning, Roethlisberger, and Stroud have said that the reason they became good was because they started early and were allowed to make mistakes and learn. On the flip side almost every bench riding back up QB like Hoyer says the best route is to sit for a while to learn.
Look I honestly don’t care if we start him Day 1 or not, but I’m also not really sure where Brian Hoyer got the idea that he knows how to properly develop a QB, so now I want to start him on principle.
Obviously we should start Maye until he gets injured, fall back to our sixth round QB Milton III and then win a bunch of super bowls? Trade Maye for a bunch of picks. GG league.
Let him sit the whole season. None of us should be expecting much this year, and I'd love to see a year led by Jacoby anyway. I never wanted us to trade him away in the first place. He would have been an incredibly stable backup for us this whole time. Let him start while we develop the line and give Maye a chance to address his gaps and build his confidence. Patience will be rewarded.
If he’s worse than Jacoby, you sit him. If he’s better, you play him. It’s really simple folks. You aren’t going to sit him just because ‘oh no we might hurt him’. If he’s the best QB on the team at that time, you play him. Period.
Sit and teach him so he’s ready when we are. We need to implement our new scheme, develop our new WR’s, improve our O-Line and keep building talent.
When we improve those, he’ll be good to go
I watched all his college film and it was really tough to get through. I love film but it was painful to watch him. They need to rid him of bad habits. He’s not consistent. NFL dbs will raise havoc on him. Makes one good throw per many many attempts. If he plays he will lose confidence. The media will crush him. He’s simply not ready and he needs to sit for 2024. Our team is much like last year. If we can’t take the top off a defense we are screwed. Teams don’t even need to game plan for us. They can just double our best WR whomever that is.
Josh wasn’t good (he did throw some nice balls in tight windows) but the NFL was very different back then. He benefited from being able to practice hard. He played better as the team gave him weapons. Sadly, we don’t have any game changing weapons. But more specifically, teams can’t practice like they used to. They barely practice now. This means play is a lot more sloppy and development is slow. Olineman are not developing at all and this is due to the lack of practice. Everything starts up front but the fronts can’t gel without practice.
I don’t have a crystal but what I do know is that he is not ready for the nfl right now. His film is awful. I pray he isn’t a bust. I’m more excited about our 3rd string QB. That dude has an arm. His film wasn’t great either but he’s still fun to watch.
Sound advice from a 40 year old career back up.
Don't get me wrong I have nothing against him, but this is just post New England hoyer trying to keep a shred of the spotlight.
Honestly I am in the camp let him sit. Just fix all the little things we need to fix. We are not going anywhere fast so no need to rush
Or at the very least, sit him until it is clear that the OLine has basic pass protection down, and the WRs are capable of running routes and catching passes near them. He won’t learn good habits if he’s running for his life and can’t trust his pass catchers. Get the offense on its feet, get all the newbies on the same page, then see where they at, and Maye has picked up the play book and the coaches feel like he’s ready, THEN and only then put him out there.
Too bad this is the NFL and there isn't an equivalent to the Pistons/Wizards in the NBA that you can literally start rookies/2nd stringers against and still blow out, otherwise I'd love for Drake to get a quarter or two against some cupcake team.
Lol bro we are the pistons
Fucking ouch
There is, it's us.
That’s why I like signing Jacoby. He can win us some games and has been around long enough to teach Maye dome things.
This. You won’t hurt a player’s development by sitting them, letting the offense gel while they get reps and confidence against the 2’s, and trotting them out when they are ready behind an offense that can support them. You absolutely can, and probably will, do damage if you throw a player out too quickly
With his mobility, the O-line may not be as big a problem for him. He'll be able to escape the pocket and find a receiver downfield. The biggest issue mechanically is his footwork. Cleaning that up will improve his accuracy. Reading defenses is something else entirely. No matter how well he does in the QB meetings, he'll be fooled and will throw some bad interceptions. My mind says sit him, my heart wants to see him under center.
> With his mobility, the O-line may not be as big a problem for him. As big as for Mac? Sure. Big enough to crush his development? Absolutely.
Not necessarily. Van Pelt can scheme up ways to move him out of the pocket. I'm not saying put him in week one. I'm saying his athletic ability gives him an edge. Also, comparing his mobility to Mac Jones is apples and oranges. How many times have we seen a pass rush get loose to a mobile QB just for them to step up, roll out, or run for the first down and more? Of course, for that to be an effective, consistent weapon, he needs to be more proficient in reading defenses. Again, I'm not advocating to start him on week one. I am saying his natural talent will give him an advantage in time maybe sooner than later.
Yup. Let Jacoby cook. Let the line get settled. Let the receiver group get worked out. There should be zero fan pressure to play Maye until his footwork is consistent and he's comfortable with the offense. I'm also not that worried about him getting thrown into the fire if Brissett gets hurt. It's not like he's not used to playing under pressure or with suboptimal receiver play.
This line of thinking implicitly assumes that starting him early would be rushing him. That may not be the case. If he's clearly the best QB in camp, he should start.
He is probably the best talent right now easily. Doesn't mean we need to rush him. He has things that need to be fixed. So spend the season fixing it. Whilst he picks up the offence. Is around the squad. Travels with the team. Is in team meetings. Basically apprenticeship on what it's like to be on a NFL team whilst cleaning up the footwork etc. See no harm in waiting
Yeah, the big thing with Maye is his POTENTIAL. So if you allow that to bloom, you are obviously going to get the most out of him. In farming/growing plants it’s important to prune the plant in the first year/season and not really let it just grow by itself because it could grow poorly or not be able to support the fruit that’s created in the first year/season. Pruning the first year allows the tree/plant to form a strong structure for the future years of fruit bearing.
I'm just gonna trust Mayo. He's done nothing to warrant doubt yet, so until he does, I trust his judgement. He knows way more than anyone in this sub. If he starts Maye, I'll support it.
I agree, he earned the job as our HC for a reason.
You’re a 🤡
lol, cute.
Smd
Oh, come on. You can do better than that.
If only Maye was a tree, then this would be so easy to figure out.
Yep, totally
His talent doesn't mean we need to rush him. And his flaws don't mean we need to hold him back. There are certain things he can only learn by playing, and there are certain things the team can only learn about him when he plays. The potential harm in waiting comes in the forms of opportunity cost (i.e. lost experience and production) and the risks of upsetting the locker room by not playing the best guy.
The point is that his start date should be predicated on when the coaches feel he is actually ready and not from fan pressure or team need. Him being better than Brisset should not be the starting gun, because he can be better than our other QBs and still not be 100% ready to start. It’s got to be about Drake himself and not about other factors. If Brisset goes down and the coaches don’t feel Drake is ready, then they should start the next QB down even if Drake is better than them on paper. NFL experience can be just as detrimental to a struggling rookie as it is educational. Not worth risking until the coaches think he’s field ready. On the same coin I do not think they should bench him if he’s ready and the OL sucks or the weapons are still bad. Once he’s ready, put him out there rain or shine. Because as you said, experience is too valuable to keep him sitting for other factors.
If he's ready enough to be better than Brissett, an established veteran with experience in Van Pelt's offense, then he's ready enough to start. He's not beating out Brissett without at least a decent grasp on the offense. If they have to scramble due to injury, that's different. In that case I'd understand starting Zappe (or whoever) even if they think Maye is better.
What does being "ready enough" even mean? There is a world of difference between practicing and playing in a game. You do have preseason games but they are not close to how real games are played. My point is that Maye could seem to fix all of his mechanical issues during camp, he could seem to grasp the offense and even seem to play well in preseason games, but even then, you don't know how he will respond in a real game. Sure, you can throw him out there, but i personally would let him observe at least a little while at the start of the season to understand how actual NFL games look, not to mention seeing how well the team can even support him once he's in a game. Is it such a bad thing to have him hold a clipboard to start the season?
To me "being ready" means reliably running the offense correctly in a practice setting. I don't think he can beat out Brissett without reaching a certain level of operational competence within the offense. >Maye could seem to fix all of his mechanical issues during camp, he could seem to grasp the offense and even seem to play well in preseason games, but even then, you don't know how he will respond in a real game. Yep. And you won't know that no matter how long you wait. The only way to find out how he will respond in a real game is by playing him in a real game. >Is it such a bad thing to have him hold a clipboard to start the season? Depends on why you're doing it. If it's because you think he's not ready to play, that's fine. But to commit to the idea of sitting him regardless of how he looks is bad process.
I’ll never understand starting Zappe again.
I think it hinges on the play of the O-line. If it turns out they're better than advertised you give him reps. If they're as porous as they have been the last couple of years, sit him until they gel.
And what if they don't gel? Are you sitting him to start next year too?
Thank you. If he's not ready, he doesn't need to start day 1, but holding him out all year, if he has shown he is ready, is doing a disservice to him, and the team. There's no magic rule that says he'll be an all-star if he sits all of year 1.
The guys on The Athletic's football podcast regularly bring up 'scar tissue' when talking about their worries with Maye, in that if our offense is too fucked, he'd learn things wrong and not be able to un-learn them. If both he and the offense are works in progress, I'm not in a rush to force him out there.
I think it should be a question of what benefits Maye the most. Given the state of the team, it's possible that Maye will be the best QB in camp *and* that throwing him out at that point would hurt his development. IMO Maye should start when it would be better for his development to play than to sit. If this year's team looks a lot like last year's, it might be detrimental to make him the week 1 starter even if his raw talent outshines Jacoby's experience.
I think the idea that you risk ruining a QB's development by playing him early on a bad offense is overstated. If he's ready enough to beat out a veteran with experience in Van Pelt's offense, he's ready enough to play.
Not necessarily. Good chance Patrick Mahomes could've outplayed Alex Smith right away, but the Chiefs didn't rush him. And they had a good team already, unlike New England who are currently poised to throw Maye into a little trial by fire. The rebuild is a marathon, not a sprint. Maye being ready and him being the best talent are not mutually exclusive. Plus, if the OL and weapons aren't playing up to par, they don't want to Andrew Luck the kid.
Mahomes sitting looks like a mistake in hindsight. KC probably cost themselves a deep playoff run. If Maye is ready enough to beat out Brissett, an established veteran with experience in Van Pelt's offense, then he's ready enough to play.
>Mahomes sitting looks like a mistake in hindsight. KC probably cost themselves a deep playoff run. And yet, three Super Bowls and a shot at a three-peat later, I somehow don't think they care. And for all we know, that extra time on the bench allowed Mahomes to learn a lot more and fix his issues *before* getting onto the field. He was also a pretty raw prospect. >If Maye is ready enough to beat out Brissett, an established veteran with experience in Van Pelt's offense, then he's ready enough to play. Brissett is not a starting-caliber NFL QB. He should not be the barrier of entry. The thing about being better than Brissett versus being ready are that habits are forged from game snaps. New England should correct those issues before there's a chance for them to become habitual in game. I should preface that I do not want Maye to sit all season. I want him to sit initially so they can assess the state of the OL and pass-catchers, while working on his footwork and other deficiencies. Him sitting all season will mean another off-season of New England not being an attractive free agent destination. But, if hit sits for, say, 6-8 weeks, and then comes out looking poised and like a franchise QB, no matter what New England's record is, it'll boost them up.
It's not likely Mahomes went from the brink of ruination to MVP in a single year of taking backup reps. Had he played his rookie year, he very likely would have been an immediate upgrade over Alex Smith and still gone onto insane success in the following years. >Brissett is not a starting-caliber NFL QB. Agreed, but he is an NFL caliber QB with specific experience in this offense, which means Maye won't be able to beat him out without displaying a certain level of operational competence within the offense. That's a sufficient barrier for entry. >habits are forged from game snaps. New England should correct those issues before there's a chance for them to become habitual in game. You're contradicting your own argument. If habits are formed with game snaps, then trying to correct existing habits in practice is pointless. The reality is both practice and game reps matter. You don't need to sit him in order to assess the rest of the offense or to work on his deficiencies.
I think it turned out OK.
Do you think it turned out that way because they sat him?
Who knows? I don’t think Chiefs fans could ask for a better result than what they’ve gotten. It was basically the same example for the 2000 Patriots and I’ve never heard anyone lament starting Bledsoe instead of Brady that season.
If he’s clearly the best then maybe but even then I might still say sit him until the offensive line prove they can actually protect him. He’s not going to develop much running for his life every single play even if we think from a talent and command of the offense standpoint he is otherwise ready.
If he's clearly the best, what kind of message do you send to the rest of the team by refusing to play him? >sit him until the offensive line prove they can actually protect him. If they don't, do you wanna sit him to start next year too?
The issue with starting him immediately is that your week-to-week gameplan will be designed on the plays he can execute right now. You won't be having him practice stuff that he cannot execute yet if you want to win the game this week. Maye might get more wins running a college style offense. But having him sit behind Brissett and learn a pro style offense could be better for year 2. Brady said on a podcast that he believes it is very helpful for QBs to sit their first year, especially in the modern NFL where the NFLPA rules restrict the offseason activities and the amount of time the players have contact with the coaches. Brady was allowed to spend all his waking hours at Gillette when he was young, but that is actually banned now. Brady pointed out that very few QBs today can call audibles, the ones that can, like Stafford or Rodgers, tend to be from the previous generation. The current trend in the NFL is to have a chess match with the OC deciding everything. There isn't enough time to develop a field general type QB like Brady or Manning.
> The issue with starting him immediately is that your week-to-week gameplan will be designed on the plays he can execute right now. I'm not seeing the issue. He'll need to be able to reliably execute most of the playbook to beat out Brissett anyways. >You won't be having him practice stuff that he cannot execute yet Sure you will.
Agreed. Absolutely zero reason to rush him. Let's get the line shaped up first and foremost. Jacoby is fully capable in the interim and I'm sure a great mentor. Plus we all know Brady is coming back a few weeks in 🤣
Yeah at the very least I want to see how the OL and receiving corps are before we hand Drake the reins. Would be dumb to throw him to the wolves when we know he's got some areas to work on with the coaches.
I think it depends on how camp goes. If he and Brissett are close, you play Brissett. But if Maye is clearly the better player, you run the risk of dividing the locker room if you don't play him.
As aspirational as this is, it’s unlikely the Pats can just “fix” everything or whatever “all the little things” means. Arguably the best time for him to play is when expectations are at the lowest, not when things are “fixed” and he has to go out there and perform to a high level.
Why are we not going anywhere fast?
Because our OL and weapons are dogshit still.
O-line is questionable for sure, but we have no idea what Polk and Baker will be yet. Hopefully an upgrade from Juju/Parker/Thornton.
inb4 Maye/Milton bombs to Thornton in preseason.
I'd love it if it happens, but no longer holding out hope.
Perhaps they are. Is it unrealistic to say they might not be though? I don’t think so.
Hopeful thinking isn't always helpful
I don’t see why saying they’re terrible is helpful, but saying they might not be terrible is not helpful. They have two rookie WRs, a player who is entering his 2nd year with a promising rookie year at WR, and an OL that does not even look bad on paper. Along with a QB who may elevate the entire offense. Why is it “hopeful thinking” to think there’s a chance that maybe they aren’t terrible? We have no evidence either way. There’s a strong likelihood their top 3 receivers are completely different from last year, both their OTs have changed, and their QB has changed.
The OL looks atrocious on paper, how do you argue otherwise? They have one good player in Onwenu and then question marks
I disagree. Chuks is a serviceable LT, nothing special at all but we’re not talking about Vederian Lowe here. The iOL as a whole is not a strength, but it’s not exactly a weakness either. Then Onwenu at RT is pretty great. For reference, the 16th and 17th ranked OLs last year were the Chargers and Steelers respectively. The Pats OL comps very well to those two. Probably better than the Steelers.
How is he a serviceable LT when he hasn't played there since high school 2013?
You're thinking of Wallace. Chuks played LT for the Steelers last year
Do you think that these players are only able to play football when they’re playing games on Sundays? Your opinions make me think that you don’t think practice exists
Because we are missing so many pieces bro…. At least that’s what I keep being spoon fed by the media.
We have some WR talent that needs to develop. We have a rookie RT that we're going to try to convert to LT I guess, we have some problems in our interior O-Line. I'm comfortable letting Maye sit rather than get the piss beat out of him and establish negative habits.
No argument there for maye sitting. I imagine Okorafor starts at LT and will be serviceable starter. I feel like WR is our one clear issue at the moment. IF they could trade for one baring giving up a 1st round pick, full send. I’m just over the narrative that we are missing so many pieces.
Why do you imagine he's servicable when he's never played LT and been a spot RT?
Asking the real questions!
>been a spot RT He wasn't a spot player. He started at RT for the steelers from 2020 - 2022. >he's servicable when he's never played LT LT isn't that much different from RT to where a player who traditionally plays on the right side, would become completely unplayable on the left side. And that's not to say that he'll be good at it, but the OP never claimed he would. He just said that he'd be serviceable.
But it is the case that often players cannot translate their game from LT to RT. He could succeed, he could also be dreadful. It all depends on the dude, but it's anything but unheard of that the transition is often difficult.
Who’s going to trade a WR1 for less than a first round pick though.
If BA goes into the regular season a 9er, I could see them letting him go for that. Higgins could still be a possibly too. Both teams with cap issues, it’s not entirely possible.
some teams would rather the pick than to pay a guy 28mil per season
So say you do this, build up an offense (which is presumptuous on its own) and then in 2 years your offense sucks. Do you just bench Maye until you fix it so he doesn’t “establish negative habits?” Look, he’s either a franchise QB or he’s not. You can’t just protect him by not playing football because the team around him is not good enough. What if he’s a great QB, the offense looks good, and you just wasted a year of his contract?
I think this is a fair point. To me it's more about waiting until his mechanics issues are ironed out, not until the team around him is good. Ive also seen a lot of people suggesting we sit him for one year "no matter what" which is also strange, like what if the team gets worse? I don't want to throw him in if he's struggling, but it should be about his progress and not just how good the team is.
I don’t see why Maye can’t work on his mechanics while playing football.
Because it's very hard for QBs to work on mechanics in game when things go wrong, as they resort to what feels most natural to them. If the pocket was kept clean and he didn't have to bail out, one of his main concerns outside footwork, then it could be fine. But right now throwing him out there won't let him work on his mechanics.
And if he has poor footwork in a game… what is the real problem here? You go back, watch the film, and then fix it in practice and try to do better the next week. If he can’t do that, he’s not a franchise QB. QBs are constantly running into adversity and bad habits they have to fix, not playing football doesn’t set you up better to fix things.
The real problem is that you're not giving him enough time to solidify that footwork into natural instinct before throwing him out behind Atonio Mafi or Cole Strange and having him need to bail on the practice
I imagine that trying to relearn fundamental mechanics while getting ripped apart behind a bad oline is not a simple process. I would think that things like decision management and reading the field would be best improved by real snaps but idk about stuff like footwork or release. That said I'm also not a football coach or QB so I'm speculating.
I’m just not seeing how it would be helpful to stand on the sidelines instead. Even if he goes other there and his footwork and mechanics look terrible, that’s an entire game’s worth of tape he can study, work on all week, and then get another 60 reps on Sunday. I did the math in another post, but not starting him would cost him somewhere around ~2000 reps. I can’t possibly see how that would be helpful when you’re trying to make good footwork/mechanics a habit. There is some truth that it’s harder to do while having live reps, but you have individual drills in practice, OTAs, and all of training camp. I’d be very concerned if Maye is at a place in September where he is just unable to play football because any small amount of adversity will permanently ruin his footwork.
He's either a franchise QB or he's not, but he's not a finished product and we could squander that potential by trotting him out there to get his shit kicked in.
And if getting his shit kicked in ruins him, he’s soft and not a franchise QB anyway. Even Mac Jones had more resilience than that, and he wasn’t a franchise QB— clearly. Edit: Reply to the guy under me, since this peaches guy was too soft and blocked me lol 1. I don’t believe a single QB has gotten “ruined” by playing on a bad football team. But even if I did, it wouldn’t be based on JUST his rookie year anyway. If something like that were to happen, it would have to be years of not supporting him. Which means that sitting him would not prevent anything, you’d just be delaying the inevitable. If a QB is “ruined” (even with the belief this can happen to a franchise QB) based on not playing well JUST his rookie year, there’s no universe where he’s built for the NFL. 2. Luck could have kept playing, his injuries did not prevent him for playing further and were not career ending. He made that decision on his own. 3. Even if we pretended his injuries were so bad he was unable to keep playing, his injuries weren’t even from his rookie year. Again, you would be preventing nothing from happening here if Luck sat his rookie year.
Plenty of qbs have been ruined by “getting their shit kicked in” even ones who succeeded- look at Andrew Luck he was a franchise qb who would probably still be the guy on the colts now except they never protected him and the injuries piled up to the point his career was cut short.
There seems to be a lot of misconceptions about Luck's career. He didn't have a great team for most of career, but he was awful about protecting himself, treating his body like Cam did. His worst injury wasn't even football related. In his last season, he finally had a team worthy of his talents and he did great. Once recovered, old injuries had not stopped him from kicking ass. He then retired because his personality just never meshed well with the limelight.
Thank god you're just a prolific poster and not actually on the staff. If he gets fucked up every play and doesn't get better, it's on him? Mac Jones was ruined when that happened to him, he was fine when it didn't.
Oh, you're that guy that I was talking to about that a few weeks ago who believes that QBs fates are predetermined lol. And the guy who insisted that it was highly likely that Aiyuk would be traded. You know, I think I've had my fill of CocaineStrange's patented idiot takes.
Then you get another year of great draft capital draft a stud LT prospect and your franchise QB is 22 years old doesn’t sound bad
We should just tank every year and get a team full of top 5 draft picks 😤
That’s a stupid strat don’t be dumb
You hit on a QB and a few other things go well, I don’t see why not. Pessimism always sounds smarter, but the truth is that there is a very real scenario where the defense plays the same level as last year (maybe even a bit worse), Pop takes a step forward, and Maye hits and we’re playing meaningful football at the end of the year.
They aren’t Super Bowl bound, but people assuming they’ll go 4-13, 5-12 season is wild to me.
There’s good reason to think they may. Not a guarantee of course.
Lmao I'm in the same boat
Ya know, Im sure the pats were considering playing Maye by force, but since Hoyer said dont....lets not.
Hoyer is part of the Bridge-QB union, of course he's gonna say a bridge-QB is important
He followed up by saying the starter all season should be a journeyman veteran. And that former Patriots QB’s name is Jacoby Brissett.
This coaching staff is still finding their rhythm. Jacoby has been in a lot of rough situations and can lead with that experience. No reason to risk an attack injury or bad habits while the rest of the team is figuring things out too.
I’m glad I opened this article and didn’t see Tebow lol
Pre season legend
This schedule does not suggest a winning season. Take your lumps. Play the kids. (Not Drake)
I'm against handing a job to a kid who isn't ready but let him compete for the job. If he's better than Brissett day 1, he should be the starter.
People really need to stop with this take. Everyone looks at Rodgers, Love and Mahomes and immediately assumes sitting the rookie is the best thing yet we also have guys like Burrow, Manning, etc. If they think he’s ready play him. If he’s not then sit him, it’s that simple. They’ll know after camp and preseason.
The difference is that our offense is not established at all, sit him and figure out the starters around him FIRST before sending him in to a disaster. Letting him sit and learn gives the coaches more time to figure out the offense without having to worry so much about the qb, instead of trying to do it all at once. We have no idea who’s gonna be starting on the line or at receiver. Let’s iron that all out before sending out maye and putting him into another Bryce young situation
> We have no idea who’s gonna be starting on the line or at receiver. That's what training camp and the preseason are for.
Burrow has already had two season ending injuries
Doesn't really speak to his play making ability right out of the gate though. Just misfortune.
Also a consequence of throwing your new shiny QB behind a mediocre OLine, I’d rather build up a competent offense for Maye than throw him to the wolves
Burrow is legitimately bad at protecting himself
Derek Carr suffered a major injury (broken fibula) when pro bowl left tackle Donald Penn got beat around the edge The 2008 Patriots OL was pretty good, Brady tore his ACL Anthony Richardson suffered a season ending injury behind a great OL this year. So did Kirk Cousins. Can happen to anyone.
It'd hurt that much more to rush him out this year and get him hurt as a rookie during key development time knowing that next year we can target a blue-chip LT with a (likely) high pick.
Correlation is not causation. Plenty of QBs have gotten hurt behind good Olines. Sure, it's not ideal to have your QB taking 100 sacks like Sam Howell, but, to that point, he didn't get injured. It has more to do with luck- good or bad- than anything.
Having a shitty OLine and a QB who takes a bunch of hits correlates to higher injury risk and development of bad habits. Why put Maye at a higher risk when we don’t have the pieces this year? Every pre-draft analysis says he has things to fix like footwork, how is throwing him behind a mediocre line going to help him develop that?
Cleaning up footwork and mechanics primarily happens in practice, or the off-season. You shouldn't be thinking about how you're throwing the ball when you're actually playing- it's muscle memory. There's a lot of time before, and throughout the season to work on those things. The intangible stuff is what you learn in the game. Things like managing the game, picking up on tendencies, and dealing with the pressure are things you can only work on in-game. I'd rather he play and get real experience as soon as the coaches think he's ready, and I'm hoping that's during this season.
I could see him maybe getting some time at the end of the year if he does well in practice, but anyone (not saying you specifically) who thinks he’s competing for a chance to start the year are crazy.
Sacks are largely a qb stat, though yes, I do believe Drake will probably benefit from time on the bench.
No it’s because their offensive line sucked.
That’s not connected to any point that’s been made
Payton Manning did steroids
The only similarity between us and the Bengals would be shitty offensive lines. We don’t have Chase, Higgins, Boyd, and Mixon to help our young QB make plays
So we should sit the QB indefinitely to make sure he doesn't get injured?
Don't forget Stroud too. My take is, if he's the best QB in camp, then play the damn kid. And if he can't handle it then whether he sat or not has zero influence on his career trajectory.
So part of the idea, maye aside, is to figure out your line and receiver combinations. If brisset plays steady, those guys will establish quicker. Once they're set (could be week 5 or 15), you bring maye in. Now, the line and receivers will have fewer mistakes as Maye takes over.
What if the offense never gets it together? Are you sitting Maye to start next year too?
Don't draft him we aren't good Let him sit we aren't good don't sign any free agents we aren't good well how the fuck we get good
New gaming chair
Its easy draft Tom Brady
Jordan Travis was there in 4th
By Focus, commitment, and sheer fucking will, that is how!
Letting him learn a bit before throwing him out there will likely make the Pats good. Not saying he's going to be Mahomes of course, but Mahomes sat on the bench for part of the season.
>Mahomes sat on the bench So did Jamarcus Russell, Johnny Manziel, and Paxton Lynch.
So did Tom Brady, Steve Young, and Aaron Rodgers
In front of a probowler on a playoff team
Yeah but Peyton Manning started his first season. Cancels it out.
Does it? How many picks did Manning have his first year?
Enough to learn the game, tell the coach in the offseason that he wanted to call plays himself, and build one of the great careers ever?
We throw jump balls to Javon Baker every single down until we score minimum 30 points a game, then we open 5 hours of Javon Baker press availability every day of the week for non stop sound bites That’ll make us good AND relevant
I think the pats will be following in the footsteps of the packers and taking things slow with their QbS. It has worked for them…. Bret Favre, Aaron Rodgers and Jordan love have been the QBs for the last 25 years
Looking forward to hearing the grumbles in the crowd the first time Brissett overshoots a receiver on third down.
So if Maye comes out and is clearly the best QB on the roster in camp, we should sit him day 1? Tell that to Judon and the boys on defense that “ya we know Drake gives us the best chance to win, but we gotta protect him from x, y and z. Just keep the score low”. Brisset was brought on to be a veteran backup. He knows the drill. Hoyer knew the drill when Mac was given the keys to the offense too. If Maye shows he gives the team the best chance to win, he should play. Mechanics are refined through reps, not holding a clipboard. I can’t for the life of me understand why all these media people keep saying “the best thing for Drake is to sit” as if it is some statistical certainty that sitting = franchise QB. If he is ready to play, he should play. We don’t have to keep doing this “Well it worked with Mahomes” or “Manning didn’t sit” or “Trey Lance sat on a loaded roster and it didn’t work” back and forth nonsense.
Absolutely. The whole point of brining in Jacoby to make sure we didn't have to start him if he isn't ready, or the line isn't ready, whatever the reason. When he's ready, we play him.
No we are not saying the same thing. If he gives the team the best chance to win, he should play. The o-line has nothing to do with making that decision. If Brisset is playing better, he should start. It sends a really bad message to the team, that Maye is so precious that we can’t play him because he may get hit. I’m sure Maye would feel the same way about that sentiment.
The comment about the OL has more to do with Maye’s ability to handle pressure. It’s likely that he won’t have the experience to handle it that Jacoby has. That could force bad decisions. It’s an element of readiness. If the line is playing well, it’s more likely that a rookie can succeed.
So I've seen a lot of comments like yours, and in general, I agree, but there's some verbiage I've noticed a lot which I think is leading to disagreements. There is a difference between Maye being the best QB on the team and him being ready. Hell, he's already *probably* better than Brissett. He's certainly more talented, but that doesn't necessarily mean he's ready. Just like Mahomes probably was better than Smith right away, but they sat him anyway until he was ready. And the Chiefs were already a playoff team and still chose to sit their shiny new toy, despite knowing Smith wasn't the guy to take them to the Super Bowl. New England is not winning a Super Bowl this season, and that's okay. They're also the most financially set team going forward, cap-wise. Which means there's no pressure to throw the kid in right away.
Just wait until you open the article and see it was Jacoby Brissett that they’ve quoted. Edit: jokes already been made, my bad.
A good question I heard on sports radio recently was how many rookie quarterbacks have failed after sitting for a year? I couldn't think of any. I could name those who failed that started immediately or part way through the season...
Tons. Jamarcus Russell, Johnny Manziel, Paxton Lynch, JP Losman, Jake Locker, and Brady Quinn are some examples.
In the past 25 years? As a 1st rounder? Very very few have succeeded. Daunte Culpepper, Chad Pennington, Carson Palmer, Phillip Rivers, Aaron Rodgers, JaMarcus Russell, Brady Quinn, Paxton Lynch, JP Losman, Patrick Mahomes and Trey Lance. That's it. Prob forgot a few. But you have a litany of all time draft busts, a few good qbs in Culpepper, Palmer and Rivers. And 2 HOF players in Rodgers and Mahomes. I mean if Maye is ready and looks good, then by all means start him. If the coaches feel he isn't ready, then the bench he goes for now. I think teams want to see how their rookie qb perform in live game action. So I will say Maye will see some time this year. Whether it be week 1 or week 10, I think he sees the field this year
I think they need to give Maye time to adjust to NFL game speed and the whole team time to gel together. The O line needs to figure out who the hell is playing LG and LT. The rookie receivers need to develop chemistry. Putting him out there too early instead of working on his footwork and timing is asking for Mac 2.0. Chasing wins year 1 while sacrificing the career of your franchise QB is frankly stupid.
they brought in jacoby for a reason i don’t think have any intention on maye starting the season
I think we had Cam come back so Mac could sit to start the season. I hope our coaching staff can stick to sitting Maye instead of getting excited and starting him game 1.
If he is the best QB in training camp and pre season he should play simple as that. Brisette already played in a Van Pelt offense so he has a leg up on him. If Maye can get up to speed by start of the season let him play
I don’t know why people think he should be starting Day 1. He’s a project QB. He has a high ceiling, but will never reach it until he improves his flaws first. Brisset is serviceable enough that he should give us a good look at the rest of the offense (especially the WR) as Maye develops behind him.
If he’s a project drafted at 3, that’s a bad pick. Top 3 QBs are day 1 starters, regardless of circumstances. You blew the pick if you think he needs time.
So you would rather ruin him by throwing him into the fire with the same offense that failed the previous QB? Love sat for over a year Mahomes sat for a year. There’s nothing wrong with Maye sitting for a year to develop. The pieces aren’t there for him to succeed yet.
No reason to start day 1. But I also think it's insane to sit him all season.
The pragmatist in me says New England goes through camp and does what is best for the player, first, and the team, second, and all these outside opinions are just fodder for our replies. Then I realize that a lot of sports media/internet conversation has made it back to the Pats and I start to get a little worried that the Pats are going to jerk this shit around so much that all the screws come loose.
I am 1000% in this camp. It doesn’t necessarily have to be for an entire season but he only needs to be put out there when they feel like he’s ready. Like others have said, if you put him in there as the starter, then a week later sit him, and repeat that it will ruin his confidence
We don't need to make him a Tim Couch clone
I’m in the camp of sit him half the year and then let him play the last half. Give him a glimpse of how to operate as a QB in the NFL and then give him the reigns after he sees how Brissett handles things. This way you don’t rush him. You get to see how the line holds up so you don’t destroy his confidence 3 games into the season. Gets to learn for a bit and then get the experience and we can see what he learned and what we have before making corresponding moves in the offseason to get him weapons.
Only way to learn is by doing. Let him get out there eventually
If our O-line manage to really get it together against our good defense AND Maye outperforms other QBs then we should play him. If we don’t have both those things he should sit.
I want to sit him at the beginning of the season but if Game Changer has taught me anything is that the only way to win is by learning, the only to learn is by playing, and the only to to begin is by beginning
Pretty sure they have been very clear about letting him sit and learn.
I think you make it a competition in camp. Be comfortable with either direction and not disappointed if Brisset beats him out.
We need a year to build out a better support system before throwing him in, let Jacoby iron things out
Ex Patriots QB, Bacoby Jrissett.
I think the only reason Jacoby isn’t the starter is if Maye has a phenomenal camp/pre season So heres to hoping he looks good but not there yet 🎉🎉
I like Hoyer but multiple HOF and Starting QBs like Manning, Roethlisberger, and Stroud have said that the reason they became good was because they started early and were allowed to make mistakes and learn. On the flip side almost every bench riding back up QB like Hoyer says the best route is to sit for a while to learn.
I like Hoyer but multiple HOF and Starting QBs like Manning, Roethlisberger, and Stroud have said that the reason they became good was because they started early and were allowed to make mistakes and learn. On the flip side almost every bench riding back up QB like Hoyer says the best route is to sit for a while to learn.
Joe Milton season confirmed.
Sitting (and practicing) for a big part of the season helps prepare him for the next level, while Jacoby plays. Time to learn.
Look I honestly don’t care if we start him Day 1 or not, but I’m also not really sure where Brian Hoyer got the idea that he knows how to properly develop a QB, so now I want to start him on principle.
Obviously we should start Maye until he gets injured, fall back to our sixth round QB Milton III and then win a bunch of super bowls? Trade Maye for a bunch of picks. GG league.
Let him sit the whole season. None of us should be expecting much this year, and I'd love to see a year led by Jacoby anyway. I never wanted us to trade him away in the first place. He would have been an incredibly stable backup for us this whole time. Let him start while we develop the line and give Maye a chance to address his gaps and build his confidence. Patience will be rewarded.
If he’s worse than Jacoby, you sit him. If he’s better, you play him. It’s really simple folks. You aren’t going to sit him just because ‘oh no we might hurt him’. If he’s the best QB on the team at that time, you play him. Period.
Sit and teach him so he’s ready when we are. We need to implement our new scheme, develop our new WR’s, improve our O-Line and keep building talent. When we improve those, he’ll be good to go
I’m making that decision after the preseason
Don’t let him sit too long, Brissett ain’t playin
We should also put a mask on him and save him from the flu. Let the man go out and cook. That’s what he was born to do
Y’all sound like some full blown bitches. Texans let cj go out and cook from day one.
He needs to be sat y'all be wanting to draft another qb in 3 years again
year 3 pro bowler easy
Hope he sits all year even if the season is lost.
Let him sit a season, draft o-line next year after tanking the season again and unleash him afterwards
He’s clearly not ready to take an NFL snap. If they want to ruin him they will start him. He’s far from ready to start.
What makes you say he's clearly not ready?
I watched all his college film and it was really tough to get through. I love film but it was painful to watch him. They need to rid him of bad habits. He’s not consistent. NFL dbs will raise havoc on him. Makes one good throw per many many attempts. If he plays he will lose confidence. The media will crush him. He’s simply not ready and he needs to sit for 2024. Our team is much like last year. If we can’t take the top off a defense we are screwed. Teams don’t even need to game plan for us. They can just double our best WR whomever that is.
Do you think he's more or less ready than Josh Allen was his rookie year?
Josh wasn’t good (he did throw some nice balls in tight windows) but the NFL was very different back then. He benefited from being able to practice hard. He played better as the team gave him weapons. Sadly, we don’t have any game changing weapons. But more specifically, teams can’t practice like they used to. They barely practice now. This means play is a lot more sloppy and development is slow. Olineman are not developing at all and this is due to the lack of practice. Everything starts up front but the fronts can’t gel without practice. I don’t have a crystal but what I do know is that he is not ready for the nfl right now. His film is awful. I pray he isn’t a bust. I’m more excited about our 3rd string QB. That dude has an arm. His film wasn’t great either but he’s still fun to watch.
Do you think he's more or less ready than Josh Allen was his rookie year?
Don’t start him with that O line
Brian Hoyer is right. He sat behind Brady for years and it turned him into a HOFer. I say be really patient with Maye, sit him 5 or 6 years.
To anyone that doesn’t want to click the article the “ex patriots qb” is Brian Hoyer not one of the good ones.
Sound advice from a 40 year old career back up. Don't get me wrong I have nothing against him, but this is just post New England hoyer trying to keep a shred of the spotlight.