When a team’s eked out just two wins, it’s natural to turn attention to draft boards in November. But when mapping out the Patriots’ future, rooting against a win on Sunday doesn’t make sense for this team.
So shut down tank talk.
First, New England appears to have a real quarterback in Drake Maye. They lost enough last year to land a kid with a super high ceiling and a surprising amount of composure. The Krafts and Eliot Wolf should thank their lucky stars they don’t have to elbow out Carolina and Tennessee for Cam Ward, Jalen Milroe, or Shedeur Sanders.
The Patriots look positioned to finish around the four-win mark most experts projected head of the season, and that will keep them in a very high draft position. But because it looks like they hit on quarterback already, they don’t need to fret over a first or second pick, even if it offers the possibility of trading down the board to accumulate more draft capital.
They’ll be smart to target a tackle or receiver with their highest pick. There appears to be blue chippers at both positions in the upcoming draft.
Second, the 2025 offseason will be all about supporting Maye, but the Patriots have to continue to develop him through the 2024 season.
The best way to develop a young quarterback is to provide a non-chaotic environment around him.
And nothing breeds dysfunction in a locker room like losing.
Sure, as noted before, the Patriots are probably going to lose a lot more games by the end of the season. They’re just not as good as most of the other teams in the NFL. Still, not all losses are created equal in a rebuild. The young coaching staff can’t be error repeaters. They have to learn from their mistakes. Players like DeMario Douglas and Christian Gonzalez have to further grow in their game experiences. Above all, the team has to establish a new culture and identity to build on in the coming years.
Third, tank nuts also conveniently ignore one of the biggest hurdles of the last Patriots’ offseason: attracting outside talent to come to Foxboro. Whether it was Brandon Aiyuk turning his nose up at New England, or any number of rumored offensive coordinator candidates, the Patriots found themselves awkwardly siloed off from talent that didn’t have preexisting New England, Cleveland, or Green Bay connections.
Coach Jerod Mayo said the Patriots have a goal of developing into “one of those teams that no one wants to play at the end of the year.” In doing so, they would also signal to the rest of the league that their arrow is pointing up rather than spinning like the wheel of misfortune. New England is poised to have the most space against the salary cap in the next offseason. They’ll still have to overpay guys to come to a rebuilding team, but flashing real talent in the second half of the season might get guys to actually sign here instead of using the Krafts as leverage for other destinations.
It would be nice if there was a golden ticket to success in the NFL. The overall number one pick isn’t it. The Patriots will be in a nice position to continue their rebuild in the Spring regardless of whether they beat a fellow cellar-dweller in Nashville Sunday.