Jerod Mayo has started to publicly declare what’s been obvious since free agency: the New England Patriots are in a full-on rebuild.
But that shouldn’t let them off the hook from expectations.
When Mayo took a question from a (presumably – based on the accent) U.K. reporter about why British fans should embrace the Patriots as their American football team ahead of the London game between New England and Jacksonville, his answer was brutally honest.
“One thing I would say is, look, we’re hitting the reset button and looking forward to building something special,” he said.
Mayo might as well have advertised the opportunity to get in on this exciting new opportunity on the ground floor. Losing five straight games has clearly worn on the young head coach, who, last January, went on the Greg Hill Show on WEEI and said the team would improve on last year’s 4-13 record.
The opportunity to win four more games remains somewhat realistic for the Patriots, but a higher standard for the team has to start against the tragic Jaguars, a team who’s been wandering the streets of Piccadilly Square since a 35-16 drubbing from the Bears in London last week.
Acknowledging a rebuild and starting a rookie quarterback doesn’t buy more leeway for a Patriots team racking up penalties like this one has over the past two weeks, or leading the local newscasts for all the wrong reasons.
If anything, starting Drake Maye for the second week raises the stakes of the team and should raise the standard. Maye popping up on the injury report this week with a vague knee concern should be a warning shot, just as much as DeMario Douglas and Kayshon Boutte’s touchdowns should be a tease of what could come with him under center or in shotgun.
New England is -5.5 against Jacksonville at the time of this column’s publishing, which shows just how low the outside expectations for the team are. They’re facing a Jaguars team led by a coach hanging on by a thread, as evidenced by Doug Pederson’s postgame comments last week:
“We're not, listen, there's another game coming,” he said. “Whether we like it or not, there's still -- what have we played six games. And we play 17 game schedule. So we got a few more games left. So nobody's going to feel sorry for us. Nobody's going to say, ‘okay.’ But we've got to change. I mean, I say we, it's all of us, coaches, players, everybody. We have got to change right now, that culture."
Yikes.
This London game isn’t against an ascending, playoff-bound team like the Texans last week. The Jaguars are a walking cautionary tale in the NFL: getting a physically gifted quarterback in the draft is not a direct line to Super Bowls, or even functionality. Both teams are 1-5, but records don't tell the whole story about a franchise. New England should want to assert themselves as a team on the way up, against a team clearly imploding.
So fine, the Patriots are at the start of a rebuild, and they’re telling everyone who’s listening. Nobody expected them to get to the playoffs this season. That doesn’t mean there aren’t high standards the team has to maintain week-to-week, and they’ve been slipping in the other direction all fall.
Sunday presents an opportunity to differentiate themselves from the truly dysfunctional operations in the league. If they’re can’t make a statement there, they’re in real trouble before Thanksgiving.