Throughout Bill Belichick’s historic reign as head coach of the Patriots, two hallmarks of his tenure were having his teams play their best football down the homestretch of the season, as well as looking prepared and locked in coming out of their bye week.
In Week 15 at State Farm Stadium, neither one of those things were true.
New England’s bad season under first-year head coach Jerod Mayo continued on Sunday, as the Patriots looked sloppy and asleep in a 30-17 loss.
That makes four losses in a row for a team that already had a losing streak of six-in-a-row earlier this season.
Here are your “Ups & Downs” for Week 15. Let’s start positive:
Ups:
- Drake Maye: Right out of the gate, the rookie QB picked up right where he left off before hitting the bye.
On the opening drive of the game, Maye was 4 for 4 passing for 36 yards. If not for a holding call on 3rd and 5 that would’ve seen running back Antonio Gibson pick up a first down, Maye and the offense looked poised to at least make a red zone trip on possession No. 1.
Tucked away within that first drive was a heads-up play by Maye that you’d normally see from a seasoned veteran. Center Ben Brown flubbed his shotgun snap to Maye, forcing the rookie to bend over and make the correct snap-decision to get the ball right to an open Rhamondre Stevenson in the flats. The running back ended up picking up 16 on what could’ve easily been a broken play for New England.
Maye remained perfect passing on his first 10 pass attempts of the game, but the offense could not get anything going. The offensive line struggled (for the 14th straight game), and the receivers continued to show a lack of ability to get separation.
Let’s fast-forward to the fourth quarter, when Maye decided to take matters into his own hands.
On 2nd and 6 from the Arizona 43, Maye heaved a ball up the right sideline to veteran receiver Kendrick Bourne. Bourne, with little-to-no separation from Cardinals cornerback Starling Thomas, was going to need the ball to be thrown perfectly for him to make a catch in stride, blanketed by a defender.
Maye did just that, completing the incredible ball for a gain of 37 yards.
Two plays later, on 2nd and goal from the Arizona 3, Maye was flushed out of the pocket on what looked like an upcoming scramble for the fleet-of-foot rookie. But at the very last second, Maye made his requisite Mahomes-ian play of the day, tossing a shovel pass to DeMario Douglas at the front left pylon for the offense’s first touchdown of the day.
An extra point later, and it was a 23-10 Arizona lead with 8:14 remaining.
If you used the Undertaker gif in your group chat after that score, you can thank Maye’s flick of the wrist.
Sure, he missed a couple open receivers in the second half. And yes, Mayo had to burn a timeout in the third quarter on what would have been a delay of game on Maye. And OK, there was the pick (which we’ll get to in “Downs”).
But when Maye starts the game 10 for 10, and then has a sequence like this in the fourth quarter, it’s hard to put much of this dumpster fire on him in any way.
This franchise is incredibly lucky to have this bright spot on offense to continue focusing on down the stretch. Because outside of Maye, it’s pretty bleak.
- Christian Gonzalez: Throughout the day, the standout second-year corner kept stud rookie receiver Marvin Harrison Jr. relatively quiet, routinely making his life difficult as Cardinals QB Kyler Murray continued trying to work the ball to him.
The exclamation point for Gonzalez’s matchup with Harrison started on Arizona’s last possession of the first half. With 25 seconds left in the half on 3rd and 6, Harrison had Gonzalez beat on a fade route to the corner of the end zone. Murray lofted the ball to the Ohio State product, and it looked like it was about to be 6 for the Cardinals. But Gonzalez timed the ball perfectly, getting his outside arm right into Harrison’s bread basket. What would’ve been 6 became 3 for Arizona, making it a much more manageable 13-3 score heading into halftime.
It was déjà vu on the first possession of the second half, as the Cardinals, again, had a 3rd and 6 from the Patriots 21. Murray attempted to make the same throw to the same player being guarded by the same cornerback. And in keeping with form, it was the same result.
Gonzalez made a play on the underthrown ball, and Arizona was forced into yet another field goal attempt instead of coming away with a touchdown for the rookie.
Gonzalez and Maye have truly emerged as the leaders of this team on both sides of the football, which is exactly what you want to see as a Patriot fan from your 2023 and 2024 first round picks.
It will be on Mayo, Eliot Wolf, and the rest of the Patriots front office to surround their two studs with more talent moving forward.
Don’t waste the rookie contract years of your No. 1 corner and franchise QB. The bill for both will come sooner than you think, and both will be hefty. You have to take advantage of roster building around those smaller contracts while you still have the chance.
Otherwise, this rebuild will continue to drag along.
Downs:
- Wide Receivers: As my boss Scott McLaughlin astutely put in our team’s Slack channel towards the end of the third quarter:
“This WR group is so bad. Extra week of prep and they couldn't find a way to use any of them. The only guys with catches over 10 yards are a TE, a RB, and a DB”
At that point in the game, that was true.
And even though that didn’t remain the case with the Patriots playing semi-garbage time offense for most of the fourth quarter, the point still remains true.
This receiving core was unable to get any separation throughout most of the ballgame, which exasperated the offensive line’s continued struggles on Sunday.
On top of it all, Maye’s only turnover of the day can directly be attributed to receiver Kayshon Boutte, who basically handed the ball to Arizona on a 2nd and 10 from the Patriots 44 yard line on a ball that hit him in the hands that would have been a Patriots first down.
Please get Maye some real help at receiver. Don’t care if it’s the draft. Don’t care if it’s free agency. Don’t care if it’s a combination of both.
Get it done, Wolf/Mayo/Kraft.
- Undisciplined: On the opening drive of the game with the offense clicking, left guard Layden Robinson was called for holding on a 3rd and 5 run from Gibson that would have picked up the first down.
Two plays later (Arizona flagged for offsides), kicker Joey Slye went wide left from 53, giving the Patriots no points to show for on their first possession of the game.
On Arizona’s first possession of the second half, Patriots defensive end Deatrich Wise Jr. sacked Murray for a loss of 14 on 2nd and 6, which would have set up Arizona for 3rd and long, staring at a failed attempt at the double-whammy score. Unfortunately for Wise, his sack was flagged as a horse collar tackle, and the drive stayed alive for the Cardinals. Five plays later, Arizona was kicking another field goal to go up 16-3.
On Arizona’s next possession, the Patriots had the Cardinals in a 3rd and 6 from their own 8 yard line. The Patriots secondary bottled up the Arizona pass catchers, and Murray was put in a situation where he should’ve taken a sack or thrown the ball away. Instead, he threw a terrible interception to corner Jonathan Jones. This would have set the Patriots up from the Arizona 18 yard line with a chance to wash away an embarrassing fourth down stop from the series prior (more on that coming up).
Instead, the pick was washed away, as linebacker Anfernee Jennings was called for roughing the passer, as his missed lunge towards a possible tip ended with him making contact with Murray’s helmet in front of the ref. With Jennings unable to change his flight path, a huge opportunity for the Patriots evaporated.
It wasn’t their most penalized game of the season by any means, but sometimes that’s not what it’s about. Playing smart football and avoiding flags in moments that should be momentum-shifters is what good teams do.
This is not a good team.
- Offensive Line: As we mentioned earlier - on the second passing play of the game, Brown botched his shotgun snap to Maye. Luckily for Brown, Maye picked the ball up without skipping a beat and completed a pass out to the flats.
Three plays later, as we mentioned at the top of “undisciplined,” Robinson was called for holding on a 3rd and 5 that would’ve kept the chains moving. That didn’t happen, and two plays later Slye was missing a 53-yard field goal to open the ballgame.
On two consecutive plays on the second possession of the game for New England, CBS color commentator Ross Tucker specifically called out left tackle Vederian Lowe’s sloppy play. In both instances, Lowe was late out of his stance, and the player he was supposed to block made the impact defensive play - one leading to Rhamondre Stevenson being tackled for a loss of 2, and one leading to Maye taking a sack for 7 yards to set up 3rd and 19.
On the third possession of the game on 3rd and 7 from the Patriots 33, Brown flubbed yet another shotgun snap. Maye did what he could, picking up the ball under duress and scrambling a half a yard on what would have been a sack had he been a second slower.
On the fourth possession of the game on 3rd and 1, Maye was sacked on a play action play as his pocket collapsed around. Luckily for the O-line, Stevenson was able to pick-up the first down on 4th and short on a toss play out of the gun.
Two consecutive plays after Stevenson picked up the first down, Gibson was tackled in the backfield for losses of 1 and 5 yards, forcing the Patriots into a 3rd and 16 from the Cardinals 40. One play later, they fell 8 yards short of the first down and were forced to kick a field goal. It was yet another drive with potential stifled by bad offensive line play.
On New England’s first possession of the second half, they looked like they were finally going to put together a drive that would end in 6. With the legs of Maye, Stevenson and Gibson carrying them all the way down to the 4 yard line, it was only natural for the offensive line to start getting in the way of the momentum.
On 3rd and 1, Gibson was met in the backfield by Cardinals defensive tackle Krys Barnes, after Robinson kept his head down and just missed his assignment. Had Gibson not forced his fall forward, he would’ve lost yards on the play. Instead, it was 4th and 1, and Mayo opted to keep his offense on the field. They needed to capitalize on this momentum and keep the drive moving.
But the offensive line was unable to get the push needed, and Stevenson was bottled up at the line of scrimmage for a turnover on downs.
Another bad showing from one of the worst units on any side of the ball in the NFL.
- Joey Slye: I feel like I keep writing this same sentence over and over again for Slye - for a guy that hit the fourth longest field goal in NFL history earlier this season, the guy is incredibly inconsistent.
Slye’s miss from 53 marked his sixth missed field goal of the season. Some of them have been from 50+, some of them have been shorter than extra points.
For a bad team that needs everything to go right to get a win, they need their kicker capable of hitting from 60+ to hit field goals in key spots.
The Patriots opted to receive the opening kickoff - they clearly wanted to come out of the gate with points. The hold from Robinson combined with Slye’s miss from 53 kept New England from accomplishing that goal.
- Run Defense: In the first half alone, the Patriots defense allowed 92 rushing yards on 11 carries for an average of 8.4 yards per carry.
On the day, the Cardinals rushed for 164 yards, helping to both control the pace of the game and give Arizona a true balanced attack.
Poor tackling, poor angles, and another poor showing from the Patriots front seven.
It doesn’t get any easier for New England (3-11) in Week 16, as they’ll head to Buffalo to take on the first place Bills.
Since the start of the 2020 season, the Patriots are 2-7 against the ruling kings of the AFC East.