Drake Maye Hits Back at People Undermining Patriots’ Season With “Easy Schedule” Talk

The New England Patriots are 13-3 with one game left, but have defeated just two .500 teams all year.

Drake Maye Hits Back at People Undermining Patriots’ Season With “Easy Schedule” Talk

Drake Maye reacts to the Patriots easy schedule argument (Image via IMAGO/X)

🔍 Explore this post with:

ChatGPTPerplexityGrok AIGoogle AI

Drake Maye and the New England Patriots are 13-3 after sixteen games and stand a chance to clinch the AFC top seed with another win on the final day of the season. On a personal note, Maye is also among the front-runners to become a first-time NFL MVP.

Maye leads the league with a 71.7% pass completion rate, the fourth-best 4203 passing yards, 34 total touchdowns, and 8 interceptions. In the Patriots’ last game, he completed 91% of his passes, threw five touchdowns, and had zero interceptions in a 42-10 blowout victory over the New York Jets.

With the win against the Jets, the Patriots secured the AFC East crown after a five-year hiatus and are currently the second seed, just below the 13-3 Denver Broncos. A win against the Miami Dolphins in week 18 and a Broncos defeat will guarantee the Patriots the top seed and a bye in the playoffs.

Drake Maye opens up about the Patriots benefiting from an easy schedule

Maye has quickly revitalized his career with the help of Mike Vrabel and Josh McDaniels’ coaching. The Patriots are on the doorstep of a first fourteen-win season since 2016 (won the Super Bowl that year).

Drake Maye Hits Back at People Undermining Patriots' Season With "Easy Schedule" Talk
Drake Maye (Image via IMAGO)

However, there’s a silver lining that’s stopping fans from naming the Patriots the best team in football. They played the easiest schedule this year and boast just two wins against teams with a .500 record (the same as the 3-13 New York Giants). Those came against a 9-7 Pittsburgh Steelers team, which had lost to the 4-12 Cleveland Browns in their last game, and an 8-8 Carolina Panthers team.

Even if the Patriots clinch major honors this season, people will still point to the toughness of their schedule, irrespective of the outcome. Maye prefers to stay away from the negative chatter because he has a job to do. He believes that there’s no such thing as an easy NFL game. Every team gives its all on the gridiron, and the Patriots must do the same to stack victories. At the end of the day, the number in the win column matters the most to him.

We play in the National Football League. Every [NFL] team’s got great players [on their roster]. They get paid a lot of money. So, it’s not like we’re playing, Foxborough High School down the road [in Boston]. We play who’s on our schedule. We can’t control that. Just trying to go out there and try to win. A lot of these teams that we do play are good, and they’re in the National Football League for a reason.

Drake Maye said

Maye has the backing of Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner. The Super Bowl champ tweeted that it’s disrespectful to downplay the Patriots’ success and Maye’s MVP case by constantly harping on the strength of their schedule.

People who are using ANY NFL schedule as a means of discrediting a phenomenal season & an MVP case is ridiculous to me!! They are all NFL players… you play the teams on your schedule, when & where they tell you… each game has its own story… and the player who’s had the best season should win the MVP, period!!

Kurt Warner tweeted

The Patriots play the 7-9 Dolphins to wrap up the season. In the earlier fixture, Maye threw for 230 yards (82.6% pass completion) and two touchdowns as the Patriots won 33-27.

Also Read: