Previewing the New Era Mike Vrabel Patriots Against the Raiders in Week 1 | New England Patriots

Previewing the New Era Mike Vrabel Patriots Against the Raiders in Week 1 | New England Patriots

At long last, week one is finally here and we’re here to break down the Patriots and the Raiders for the season opener. He’s sacked by his into the end zone. Touchdown Patriots. Welcome everybody. Excited to be here with you for week one. The excitement around here palpable at Gillette Stadium as we get ready for the Raiders and Evan and I are here to break the game down for you and have the first thing I want to start with is Drake May. I think for the Patriots, that’s the biggest piece, his development this season, Josh McDaniels offense. Just catch us up. What have we seen from him this summer as he’s assimilated into this new attack? Well, that’s the biggest question right there is him assimilating into this offense and how quickly can him and Josh McDaniels get on the same page now that we turn to game planning opponents and play calling specifically against defenses that run certain schemes. So, uh, this is a different chapter of the same book of Drake May and Josh McDaniels here in this early, uh, going of that relationship. And what we’ve seen so far is some ups and downs, but I think you have to remember that the development is not going to be linear for Drake May. And it’s not going to just be every game gets better, better, better. It’s probably going to be some ups, some downs, and then hopefully we get to that consistency eventually. Week one, there’s always a bunch of unknowns. And this year going against the Raiders, Pete Carroll back as head coach for the Raiders. Uh Patrick Graham, a Patriots guy, kind of a holdover, was there with Josh still. When you look at this defense though, the Pete Carol cover three. I know it’s evolved a little bit over time. Patriots did have some success back in the Tom Brady days. I know Drake May said this week he’s going back to 2020 looking at Cam Newton film. One of his favorite quarterbacks, one of all our favorites. Uh but what do you expect? How do you think the Patriots are going to try to attack them? I know in the Super Bowl 49, Josh talked a lot about getting guys horizontally trying to attack that way. Do you think that might be part of what they’re going to do? Yeah, absolutely. When you play cover three, you usually have a good amount of inbreing routes, whether they be crossers or even just little option routes out of the backfield to the running backs that have always been really effective. But you look at this Raiders defense, and I I think this is one of those week one things of Patrick Graham and Mike Vrabel talked about this on Wednesday. Patrick Graham and Pete Carroll are pretty different in terms of how they approach defense schematically. So, how much Pete Carol is in this defense and how much Patrick Graham is in this defense remains to be seen. Based off the preseason, it’s just preeason, very vanilla. They played almost 60% of their coverage snaps in cover three. So, they were definitely playing the Seattle 3 system during the preseason, but once you get into the regular season, Graham’s the play caller, so maybe there’ll be a little bit more uh fingerprints of his into this scheme. But to me, it looks like almost like they put it in a blender of we’re going to run Patrick Graham’s blitz and front packages with cover three behind it and have the Pete Carol stuff. So, they should have a pretty good feel for the Patriots perspective of cover three and what Seattle likes to do from that standpoint. We got to talk about Max Crosby, of course, just a prolific pass rusher, has seen it all, can do it all, can get to the quarterback anyway. Uh, possible, but Malcolm Coun also talented player. Tyrie Wilson, maybe guy didn’t quite live up to expectations. and old friend Adam Butler. You know, those four guys I look at as part of that pass rush front like you talked about with Patrick Graham where maybe he does move some guys around. But either way, Patriots look like they’ll have two rookies on the left side of their line potentially, maybe even Marcus Bryant working in a little bit at right tackle. We don’t know exactly how it’s going to look. But is keeping Drake May the biggest key to this game and keeping those pass rushers away from him? Oh yeah. And and to me, this this is more about the coaching staff than it is about the offensive line because the coaching staff has to go into this game into this season knowing that they might have to protect certain areas of the line, especially in pass protection. And that might mean chips that with the running backs that the tight end staying in an extra beat to block uh Max Crosby and give him a little forearm before he goes out into the pattern or a straight up double teams at times if it’s really obvious pass like a third and long or something like that. But all you want to do against a a rusher like Crosby is you want to change the pitches as much as you possibly can. You don’t want him to just be able to sit there and tee off on the same pass set or the same look every single time. So in the run game, you can do that as well. Like maybe sometimes you leave him unblocked and then you ear hole him with a puller or a fullback leading up through the hole or then you have a different play where now all of a sudden he’s getting kicked out and like you just have many different pitches as you can throw at him and get him to start playing through multiple blockers, but also processing the game and having to think, okay, what are they doing to me next? That’s how you start to slow those guys down. when they know that it’s a pass and they know that they can just tee off on the tackles, that’s when Max Crosby takes over. All right, one more for you have on the offensive side of the ball. Just, you know, look at one offensive player that you’re looking for. Not Drake, but you know, for me, and I’m going to go with the obvious one. Sorry if I’m stealing it on you, but Stefon Diggs just seems like he’s amping up, ready to go. I think he’s going to be really productive this year. We saw some chemistry between him and Drake. You know, it was a little bit of a preview at times and I know you were with the offense when we were in Minnesota, but I kept glancing over, especially early on where it was like Stefon Diggs putting on a little clinic out there. I’m just excited to see him get back out there in the game. You can see this week how focused he is. He’s excited to get back out there after the injury, but if there’s another player, and I I guess I’m taking digs from you, too. Is there someone else you want to watch? And is it Trayvon Henderson? It is Trayvon Henderson because I I think more so than just the talent is how they’re going to use Trayvon Henderson is one of the more fascinating aspects of this entire game. Uh schematically and usage wise, snap count wise. You know, are they going to limit some of his snap counts to keep him healthy for the duration of 17 games? That’s a big conversation. He’s not a Derk Henry type running back where he’s a huge bowling ball. He is really more of that speed back and uh you know 510 190 195. So you want to be careful with a player like that and they do have good running back depth. But along with that like do they flex him out wide? Do they move him around the formation? How do they find matchups for him? Because he is the biggest mismatch in this offense right now. His speed and his playmaking ability is the biggest mismatch Tuesday player problem that defenses are going to have facing the Patriots. So, how can they get him matched up on those linebackers specifically and how does Josh McDaniels move him around is going to be fun to watch. Yeah, flipping it over to the Raiders offensive side of the ball. Again, kind of like the coaching staff, little bit of a blender. You got a little bit of all a sudden Gino Smith, their quarterback now, who had a great game last year for Seattle here in Gillette Stadium. Jacobe Myers, of course, we’re all familiar with him, continues to just be reliable year in year out, no matter who’s throwing him the ball. Brock Bowers, I mean, absolutely prolific rookie season last year. He’s a huge problem as at tight end. Although I think we’re all kind of calling him a wide receiver now with the way he moves. And you know, lastly, Ashton Genty, high round first round draft pick, my guy a little bit. I mean, he’s, you know, running around like a little bowling ball back there. But, you know, just to kind of kick this off, I would say we saw a lot of the screen passes this year could carve the Patriots up at certain times. Granted, limited sample size, but if there was one thing that came out of the preseason where I was a little concerned, it was what TJ Hawinson did in Minnesota with some of the screen game as well. Two elements that it seems like the Raiders could throw at the Patriots. Yeah, it’s a it’s a good first matchup for the Patriots in that aspect because I don’t think the Raiders have Super Bowl aspirations. It’s not like they’re coming out and facing a team that’s going to overwhelm them with talent, but between Crosby on the defensive side and then offensively with Bowers, it’s two question marks that we have. Can they block big-time pass rushers and can they cover big-time tight ends? And right out of the gate, you’re going to face both those guys. So, it’s a good first test for this Patriots staff, how they’re going to game plan these things. Uh, but specifically with the Raiders offense, I I just look at Chip Kelly and who has been in the NFL for a decade. It’s since 2016, the last time he called plays in the NFL. Vael talking about how he used to call it on like a note card, he had seven plays. Now that has definitely expanded and he runs a more pro style system. Uh he did go under center some at Ohio State. They slowed down the pace a little bit compared to what he did at like Oregon and in Philadelphia with the Eagles. So this is a definitely more uh ready, you know, his system is more ready for the pro game than it was maybe 10 years ago. So I’m interested to see what they do. Uh but obviously with Bowowers and Genty, but just in general like are they a tempo team anymore? Are they a gun run team or are they going to incorporate more under center looks? So all those types of things are going to declare at some point and then the Patriots are going to have to adjust. Big question, how do you deal with Bowers? Christian Gonzalez hasn’t practiced this week not looking like he’s going to go in week one. We’ve talked a lot about on Patriots unfiltered putting a corner on him maybe makes sense. Colton Davis got some good size, but without Gonzalez there’s a trickle down effect and you still got to deal with, you know, guys like Thornton and Trey Turner who have some speed on the outside. So what’s your plan for Dino Bowers? Yeah, that that was my biggest thing with Gonzalez is that it’s not necessarily that they have like a Jamar Chase level receiver on the outside that you don’t have Gonzalez to cover. It’s more the trickle down effect of all the attention in the passing game is going to be going to Bower. So now Jacobe Meyers and Dante Thor and Turner like those guys are going to be seeing lesser players lining up across from them. So if they had Gonzalez, it’s easy. you just double Bowers out of the game and then you put Gonzalez probably on Jacobe Myers and now you’ve taken away their two best receivers. But without him, it’s probably going to be a combination of Alex Austin and Carlton Davis. I still think you’re going to see some brackets on Bowowers maybe on third down specifically. You know, he’s one of those guys that’s more going to break away from you than he’s going to run by you. So you can see those inside out brackets where they have guys sitting on either hip and just kind of I’ll take the outside, you take the inside, like that sort of thing. Uh so I’m sure we’ll see plenty of that. But I would like to see the Patriots put Carlton Davis on him. I think Davis got the physicality, he’s got the length as well to disrupt the catch point. And oftent times when you see corners cover tight ends, it’s almost easier for them because they’re not moving as fast. So I do think that that could be an advantage for the Patriots. All right, one last part I’m going to bring up. And you know, look, we don’t talk a lot of special teams all the time, but let’s face it, the Raiders have a really good kicker and Daniel Carlson. And the Patriots are going to roll out not only rookie kicker Andy Borgalis, but also a rookie long snapper. If this game comes down to the very end, might the Raiders have a little bit of advantage just at least on paper with the experience that Carlson has. Yeah, Carlson’s great and and he’s got a huge leg. So, you have that ability to uh really score points almost when you cross the 50 yardd line if you’re the Raiders, which is a huge advantage. But I’m also looking at the kickoffs on special teams. The rules have been tweaked a little bit now. It’s really incentivizing you to put the ball in play. If you fly the end zone, it’s the 35 is the touchback. That’s a pretty big difference between the 20 or the 25 in years past. So, I think there going to be a lot more kickoffs where they’re going to land it right short of the end zone and it’s going to be returnable. And the Patriots, we saw in the preseason with Trayvon Henderson 100 yards to the house. That could be an area where when you start to talk about winning on the margins and finding those hidden yards for New England, a team that might not score a ton of points every single week. Can they get some advantages? Because they do have good returners. They have both running backs had big returns in the preseason with Gibson and Henderson. You could throw Marcus Jones back there if you wanted to. Uh so I’m interested to see how this kickoff thing goes because you’re putting the ball in play a lot and I do think they’re going to be some big returns in the NFL. All right, that’s going to do it for Evan and I. Big week one matchup coming up for the Patriots. Be sure to tune in to the Patriots pregame show presented by Duncan. That starts at 11:45 on Sunday morning. So, let’s get ready, folks. We’re going to kick off that 2025 season. We’ll see you Sunday.

Patriots.com writers Mike Dussault and Evan Lazar break down the first matchup of the 2025 season against the Las Vegas Raiders, how the team will do under new head coach Mike Vrabel, and much more.

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