Two Drake Maye stories ran together this week, and only one of them is actually funny. The serious one: New England added its quarterback to the injury report with a right shoulder issue that surfaced during Sunday’s 35-6 loss at Jacksonville. The other one involves a bloody football, and Maye has been vindicated on that.
Start with the shoulder, because that is the part that could decide the Patriots’ season. Maye was a full participant in all three practices this week and carried his complete workload. Asked about it Wednesday, he indicated the shoulder is not affecting how he throws or how he makes decisions. Offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels said it is not significant enough to change anything about the play-calling.
Mike Vrabel framed the listing as pure procedure. “We’re just trying to follow the protocol exactly how it’s given to us, as it relates to the injury report,” he said, before adding the part everyone noticed: “The fact that it’s a quarterback, I think those things get looked at very closely.”
Why This Shoulder Is Not A New Story
Maye’s right shoulder has a file. He landed on the injury report before Super Bowl LX last February, and he later revealed he took a pain-killing injection before that game against Seattle. “My shoulder feels, they shot it up, so not much feeling. It was good to go, and felt alright,” he said at the time. New England lost that game.
So this is the same shoulder, flaring again, on a quarterback who has already had it numbed to play through a championship. That is the reason to care, and nobody from the team has publicly connected the shoulder to his play.
The Bloody Football, Explained
On a play against Jacksonville, Maye cocked his arm to throw to Kyle Williams and his hand came forward without the ball. It went viral immediately, and it looked indefensible. His explanation sounded like an alibi: “Got the football and was trying to put one to Kyle Williams. Slipped out of my hand,” he said, blaming blood on the ball from center Jared Wilson’s cut hand.
Then the photo surfaced. NBC Sports Boston posted an image captured by photographer Daelyn Waters showing blood on the football, with the caption “Oh yeah, there’s blood. Do we owe Drake Maye an apology?” Wilson confirmed the cut himself: “I just got cut up. I have no idea when it happened.” The photo does not prove when the blood got there or that it caused the fumble, but Maye was telling the truth about the blood, and he deserves the credit for it.
Should New England Be Worried?
Yes, though not primarily about the shoulder. Maye has thrown one touchdown and six interceptions through three games, completing 63.8 percent at 7.3 yards per attempt for a 58.6 passer rating. Last season he went 31 touchdowns to eight interceptions, completed 72 percent at 8.9 yards per attempt with a 113.5 rating, and took New England to the Super Bowl. A drop that steep goes past a slump and into a different player wearing the same number.
There is real context around him. His pressure rate sits at 43.5 percent, fourth-highest among starting quarterbacks, and the help has thinned out: A.J. Brown is out with the ankle injury from his Patriots debut and guard Mike Onwenu is sidelined. Even so, the NFL’s Week 4 power rankings dropped New England to 31st and wrote that Maye “looks completely lost.”
Maye’s own words are the tell. “I can’t get out of my own way,” he said. A 1-2 team heading to 3-0 Buffalo with a quarterback saying that about himself is in trouble, and a sore throwing shoulder is the last thing that situation needed.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.