Week 15 Result: Lost at Arizona 30-13
The Patriots are one of the worst teams in the NFL, and they will likely be in the market for a new head coach next spring.
Jerod Mayo’s disastrous first year in charge took another turn for the worse Sunday, when Mayo effectively threw offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt under the bus for not calling a Drake May sneak on a fourth-down play in the third quarter, For Tom Curran of NESN, it was just the latest example of the fact that Mayo is out of his depth running the Pats.
“We should have been talking about the football game and the things the Patriots didn’t do well to start their four-game stretch, and instead we’re gonna talk about a situation that Jerod Mayo made worse,” Curran said. “He should be talking about those aspects, and if he’s gonna say continually, ‘These are my decisions, I’m gonna make these decisions, they all start and end with me,’ to take a question and then infer that, ‘Yeah, you’re right, we should have run Drake Maye,’ that undercuts the entire thing and undercuts Alex Van Pelt. And to then circle back and later say, ‘Yeah, it’s all on me,’ it is again another rake stepped on.”
Oddly, the Patriots offense came out of a bye week with a conservative approach instead of allowing rookie quarterback Drake Maye to sling the ball and make mistakes. He completed 19 out of 23 passes for 202 yards, a touchdown and an interception. The coaching staff may want Maye to focus on avoiding turnovers, which could also minimize his playmaking ability. — Moton
