Patriots' Drake Maye Lands Ominous Potential Outlook

By now, you surely know that New England Patriots quarterback Drake Maye did not look too hot in an OTA practice this past week, throwing four interceptions.

While it was just an arbitrary practice in May, it was enough to sound alarm bells given that Maye is still a generally unproven quarterback heading into his sophomore campaign.

During a recent mailbag, a fan asked Brian Hines of Pats Pulpit if there was reason to be concerned about Maye, and while Hines wasn't ready to hit the panic button, he did outline some potentially worrisome scenarios heading into 2025.

"First off, turnovers were the main issue for Maye last season. Besides fumbling nine times and losing six, Maye tossed 10 interceptions in 12 starts," Hines wrote. "That helped result in 16 turnover worthy plays and a 3.5 percent turnover worthy play rate, which both ranked in the top half of all qualified quarterbacks. Protecting the football is key for Maye in year two and Tuesday’s session looked more like last season."

Hines makes a terrific point. While Maye certainly displayed flashes of brilliance during his rookie season, he certainly wasn't flawless, and you do have to wonder if those missteps will carry on over into his second year.

Not only that, but the former number three overall pick is learning an entirely new offense.

"Secondly, this could be a sign of the expected learning curve that comes when learning Josh McDaniels’ offense," Hines continued. "Instead of hitting the ground running with a similar offense in year two, the language and responsibilities for Maye pre-snap are completely different. That’s one of the risks when it comes to changing offenses on a young quarterback (and Maye now has four coordinators in his last four years dating back to college)."

It's never easy for any signal-caller to change offenses, let alone a young, inexperienced one like Maye. So while it's probably a bit too knee-jerky to react strongly to Maye's poor showing in practice, it's also something worth monitoring as the offseason program progresses.