Notes, musings, and observations from the New England Patriots’ 32-16 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars.
I can’t imagine that anyone who isn’t a Patriots or Jaguars fan tuned into yesterday’s matchup. But I can imagine that the Patriots fans who did tune in kind of wish they hadn’t.
1. If you’re like me, you thought that the Patriots were going to win this game. You thought that the Jaguars were a great chance to build on some good momentum from last week, and that maybe Drake Maye would be able to string four or five straight wins together as the team rounded into the soft part of their schedule. That obviously didn’t happen, and now if you’re like me you’re looking ahead at the remaining slate of games and trying to find where they might be able to pick up another two wins. Maybe the Colts, and I’m sure they’ll inexplicably beat a team they have no business beating… but five wins on the year is looking kind of like a pipe dream right now.
2. Joe Thomas is 100 percent on my list of my all-time favorite non-Patriots players, alongside Barry Sanders, Ed Reed, Larry Fitzgerald, Mike Alstott, and John Randle. And listening to him call the game, you can tell he’s just having a good time out there, which I appreciate. You’ll never hear me say a bad word about that guy.
3. There was once a time when getting up at 9:30 on a Sunday to watch a football game would have been a herculean effort by yours truly. But I’m old as hell now and yesterday saw me wake up, feed the dog, get some stuff done around the house, take a shower, and steal my neighbor’s paper with plenty of time to spare.
4. Just kidding about the stealing the paper part, that would be a dick move. I also couldn’t steal a paper even if I wanted to, because I don’t think anyone besides my parents still get a physical newspaper delivered to their house.
5. And for a while, things were really looking up, weren’t they? An 11-play, 68-yard touchdown drive to open up the game, followed by a 12-play drive that resulted in a field goal. Drake Maye was smart, decisive, extended plays with his legs, and for the first time since 2021, New England looked like an actual offense.
6. But what I’ve come to realize is that the 2024 Patriots are basically a game of Whac-A-Mole. Every time they focus on getting one aspect of their team locked up, something else pops up and they end up going backward. The offense looked better, so the defense gets worse. The defense starts to make plays, so the offense sputters. Both units start playing complementary football, so they give up a punt return touchdown. The 2024 Patriots only seem to have enough magic for one unit at a time.
7. I will say that there were some real positives from yesterday’s game. One is that Maye seems to have a wiser-than-his-years understanding of how beneficial tight ends can be to a quarterback. Hunter Henry was schemed open, thrown open, he and Maye saw the same things in coverage and adjusted together, and he’s still a solid chip blocker. Austin Hooper got in on the action as well. I can’t see that chemistry taking a turn for the worse.
8. Then again, I also didn’t see the freaking Jacksonville Jaguars putting 171 ground yards on this team either, so what do I know.
9. I think that an offense that features Mondre, Bourne, Douglas, Boutte, and Henry as their primary skill players is something you can legitimately build around. The offense is markedly better when Douglas is in the game and not vomiting everywhere, and at this point I don’t know what else Boutte has to do to prove that he’s a legitimate weapon. They have a nice change-of-pace back in Gibson, and Maye is getting better by the week. The bulk of the poor play continues to come from guys who aren’t going to be a part of the rebuild, and I don’t think anyone is looking at this team with no clue where to even start. Yes, the Patriots are more than just a few pieces away. But we know what those pieces are and where they’ll fit.
10. I’d also much rather be in New England’s position than pretty much any of the other 25 teams that have virtually no shot to win a Super Bowl this year. A promising QB with some young talent and a ton of cap space is where you want to be if you aren’t in a title window.
11. OK, that’s enough with the good. Let’s all acknowledge what really, really isn’t working.
12. The Patriots haven’t given up less than 130 rushing yards since Week 2. The last three weeks they have surrendered over 170 on the ground each time. Jacksonville went almost an entire quarter’s worth of football without throwing it once, and the Patriots were completely helpless to stop it.
13. There used to be a play in Madden ‘95 called X-Delay that was a guaranteed 5 yards every single time and nothing could stop it. The 2024 Patriots equivalent of that is anything that sees Jahlani Tavai in coverage. He’s very strong as an at-the-line ‘backer, but if I’m an offensive coordinator preparing for the Patriots, I’m always going to have a play I can audible to that will put Tavai up against a running back or tight end.
14. Joshua Uche is equally as likely to blow up a play and cause a fumble as he is to completely miss a tackle and run into his own player.
15. What’s incredibly frustrating about Ja’Lynn Polk is that he’s actually an excellent route runner and he’s consistently open. He just can’t catch the ball unless it’s a circus catch out of bounds.
16. I want to give Keion White a pass because I think he’s nursing an injury or something. He was only out there for 42 of 61 defensive snaps and has seen more limited action as of late. But after a wildly strong start to the season he seems to be fading off a bit.
17. I know that there are a lot of folks who are on the coaching staff for the way this team has been playing as of late, particularly on the defensive side, as they seem to be getting worse each and every week. And I don’t want to say that the coaches are without their share of blame. In fact, if you stick around for a few more notes, I have some blame of my own to pile on. But honestly, I think it’s also fair to say that there’s a talent issue. The Patriots have lost their best interior defensive lineman. They traded away their best pass rusher. Their best linebacker is on IR and their starting safety is dealing with some legal issues. It’s tough to get mad at the coaches when the defenders make contact with a runner in the backfield but he still manages to pick up four yards.
18. But Jerod Mayo is right when he said that this is a soft football team. There’s no teeth to this defense, and I can’t help but feel like that starts from the top with effective leadership. Bad playcalling, poor clock management, and an inability to address pre-snap penalties are difficult enough to deal with. But knowing this morning that my head coach got out-schemed and out-adjusted by Doug Freaking Pederson makes me feel like I have a hangover.
19. Which I do. But it still makes me feel like it.
20. I don’t think that Mayo needs to go or that this some kind of sinking ship or ego hire by Robert Kraft. I really don’t. Mayo has been on the coaching staff for years, he learned under the best, his players seem to love him, and it takes some time to come into your own in this league. He has a runway, and he deserves it. But I really, really wish that Mayo kept things a little more buttoned up internally.
21. I get that you don’t want to be another Bill Belichick and you want to carve out your own identity with the media. But at this point I don’t think he’s too many weeks away from bringing copies of players’ medical records to press conferences to pass out to everyone. Hopefully everyone on the Patriots who journals has a good hiding spot for it and their journal has one of those fun little locks that actually don’t lock anything but still looks cool. Otherwise we all might be getting a sneak peek into a dream Kayshon Boutte had where he was playing ping pong with an angry hippo and his elementary school principal was the ref.
22. In terms of where you go from here, I think it has to start up top. I don’t want players giving up on the season. I don’t want any infighting. I don’t want any drama. I was this group to be a bunch of young, talented, scrappy players that buy into the rebuild and lose close, hard-fought games. That’s the culture I’d love to see. And we seem to be getting away from that each and every week. The good news is that the season is only half over and there’s still time to do some good things with this roster.
23. This game will also likely factor in when we’re talking about the draft. I figured the Patriots would be picking Top 3 in 2025, but based on what we’re seeing I’m having a hard time envisioning a scenario where they don’t have the first overall selection.
24. The real win for me in this game? I was convinced that Mac Jones was going to take the field in garbage time and march the offense right down the field for one more F-You score. At least that didn’t happen.
I don’t know why the Patriots don’t get a bye next week, but what can you do. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to try and figure out how many weeks before Thanksgiving the Patriots will be mathematically eliminated from the playoffs.