Sunday’s matchup between the New England Patriots and Chicago Bears was not a good game. It was a beautiful successor to the morning’s Giants-Panthers showdown, both physically and spiritually. It was a showcase of poorly coached teams executing flawed plans at about a 60 percent success rate.
Ultimately, the Patriots came away with a 19-3 win as much as a treatise on the hopelessness of Bears football as it was about anything New England did. Maye, in the midst of this chaos, wasn’t incredible. He threw for only 184 yards. He had as many touchdowns (one) as interceptions and the interception he threw was (sucks air over teeth, grimacing):
But one drive showcased why Maye has a better chance to be Tom Brady’s eventual successor than Mac Jones did in New England. It all came down to three plays in a 54-yard field goal drive that staked the Patriots a 3-0 lead they wouldn’t give up.
First, a perfectly placed deep strike through a tight window to tight end Austin Hooper for 28 yards:
With his pocket shrinking, Maye failed to panic. With limited room to run, he trusted in his arm instead. He stood tall, set his feet and delivered a perfect deep strike through tight coverage for a big gain. Eight plays later, after Rhamondre Stevenson picked up fourth-and-short, Maye finds himself in trouble again. He escapes pressure only to wind up in more trouble. Tremaine Edmunds has him wrapped up for a sack except, nope!
Maye, outside the tackle box, flipped a left-handed pass out of bounds. It’s an incompletion but a net gain of four yards by avoiding the tackle.
Two plays later, he almost created a third-and-six touchdown out of thin air. What looks like another throw away instead got to K.J. Osborn with inches to spare in the end zone:
Osborn stepped out of bounds before hauling in the catch, making it illegal touching and reducing Maye’s effort into a simple “incompletion.” But this drive showcased all the inherent qualities for which the Patriots are looking in a quarterback. He’s capable of finishing plays through contact. He can escape pressure and take the right risks downfield. He understands when to scuttle a play and how to maximize yardage behind a troublesome offensive line.
None of this manifested into an impressive stat line. Maye’s only deep completion was the one above to Hooper. He recorded a negative expected points added (EPA) for the fourth time in six NFL games to date.
Even so, it resulted in a win and some well-earned confidence from Patriots fans subjected to Sunday’s terrible game. New England doesn’t have much to cheer for this season. The best it can hope for are silver linings in a grey cloud.
But Maye is shiny as hell at the moment. He’s capable of finding his spots even with terrible blocking and a cache of receivers who top out at “average.” There are going to be plenty of bad moments like the interception above waiting to ambush the rookie quarterback this winter. As long as he cantilevers those with low-key moments of brilliance he’ll be fine — even if they don’t show up on the box score.
This article originally appeared on For The Win: Why Drake Maye looks like the Patriots’ franchise quarterback, in three plays