Even though the New England Patriots appear to lack talent at wide receiver and on their offensive line, former NFL quarterback and current analyst Robert Griffin III argued ahead of this past weekend that the team should abandon their original plans and name rookie Drake Maye their Week 1 QB1 over veteran Jacoby Brissett.
In a column that was released on Monday, Chad Graff of The Athletic proposed that Maye should start for New England partly due to such problems.
Brissett was comfortably at the top of the depth chart from the beginning of New England’s spring practice until the beginning of last Thursday’s exhibition game against the Philadelphia Eagles, while Maye found it difficult to establish himself as the team’s full-time quarterback two. The team’s struggle for the starting position will continue through this next Sunday’s preseason finale at the Washington Commanders, thanks to Maye’s outstanding performance against Philadelphia.
On Monday, however, Karen Guregian of MassLive noted that teammates, including wide receiver K.J. Osborn, had seen Maye’s progress “in recent weeks.” As for the 21-year-old, Osborn told reporters on Sunday that he “has a different type of confidence and leadership” and that he is “definitely progressing” from his first training camp performance. Players in the Patriots locker room are aware that outsiders believe the team is “tanking” after standout pass-rusher Matthew Judon was traded to the Atlanta Falcons, so those remarks shouldn’t be disregarded.
Both Joe Burrow of the Cincinnati Bengals and Eli Manning of the New York Giants recently advocated for teams to start rookie quarterbacks selected with high draft picks right away. Graff feels Brissett will “have less leeway” than believed as of last Thursday morning, even if he believes Maye, the third overall pick of this year’s player-selection process, will start New England’s Week 1 game versus the Bengals on the bench. After their Week 4 matchup against the San Francisco 49ers on September 29, the Patriots will have more time to prepare following their game against the New York Jets on Thursday, September 19. Even if first-year head coach Jerod Mayo might not be in favour of Maye making his formal debut against potentially could be the best overall team in the NFL, history shows that clubs often use gaps in schedules to make quarterback changes.
The Patriots’ bye doesn’t arrive until Week 14 in December.
