Mike Vrabel Talks Drake Maye’s Improvement & Relationship with Receivers on WEEI | Patriots

Mike Vrabel Talks Drake Maye’s Improvement & Relationship with Receivers on WEEI | Patriots

Good morning, coach. Good morning. Nice win on the road. Thank you. Back-to-back wins on the road and uh three in a row. First time in a while here. Well, it was um it was a good win. It was um you know the the es and the flows of the game and I and it was I was proud of the way we finished it. Um and uh we made the we made some big plays when we had to. No victory shot formation on this show this morning. Uh well, we didn’t do it last week, but were we on the radio last week? We were, but you called in. I called in. Yeah. I tried to get that this morning and Stacy said, “I can’t do that.” Oh, he did. Okay. Well, actually, it’s probably the right way to go, though, because we didn’t do it last week and you end up winning that game. So, we I know. I actually walked down here. I started walking down. He’s like, “It’s on. It’s on your phone.” I was like, “Well, I don’t know. I just was assuming I was going to come down and see you guys last week. I didn’t see it.” Yeah. Well, we’re delighted to see you in person today. Uh last Monday I asked you about coming off such a high uh Sunday night football a win over the Bills, how you keep the guys head in the game going into now another road game against the Saints. You said we won’t have an issue and you didn’t. Listening to guys all week, Steph Diggs being one of them, Pop Douglas saying, you know, this week is just as important if not than last week. Is that something that you have to put in those guys heads or are they just that type of player? Well, I try to, you know, I try to. I think just you have to validate everything you do in this league and next week becomes bigger and that’s kind of how it has to be there. There’s another team waiting. It it’s it’s tough in this league. You can see that if you don’t play well, uh, that you that you have no chance to win. And it it’s difficult. And people just assume that it’s not. And it’s, you know, you have to go out there and play well. And we did it times yesterday that we did it more times probably uh than not. But I think the good thing is is there’s a lot of things that we can improve on. There’s a lot of things that we can clean up. Mike, the one thing that I really liked is the never being satisfied. And like how do you make sure that the guys actually believe it, buy into it, so where it becomes part of every day that they come to this building, they’re always looking to improve on something and never be satisfied even when they see good results, right? And I think that there’s uh just by staying consistent and not allowing for the complacency. We have to have great urgency when we come in here. It’s a new challenge. Try to give them things to work on. try to look, you know, show them the good, the bad, and the stuff that gets us beat. Uh, and continue to, uh, stay consistent after a win or a loss and just make sure that the urgency and the way that we prepare, you know, each and every week is is is the same. Mike, Drake May has been spectacular. Uh, absolutely almost, you could say, relatively perfect game yesterday. I’m sure there were some mistakes that I missed, but what do you, who do you credit the most for that, and how would you describe his relationship with Josh McDaniels? Well, I would say that the credit goes to to Drake. That’s that’s what it’ll always go to. It’s not going to go to anybody other than the the player that’s that’s doing that and improving and understanding and making the plays. Uh his ability to throw um off platform and extend and keep his eyes down field. You know, there was some things that we asked him to work on that that Josh and Ashton asked them to work on coming out of um Buffalo. I felt like he tried to do that. And then when he had to extend, have the ability to extend, but you know, I think that that’s um when when quarterbacks can feel the rush, but also see downfield and see things develop, uh that that’s that that can be deadly. Just it’s hard to defend that. Uh as opposed to guys that they’re you see them when they’re they drop down, their eyes go down to the rush now, they can’t see guys open up and come free uh on the third level. So, uh, I I think his receivers, uh, I think he trusts those guys. I think he tries to spread it around. I think he, you know, doesn’t mind, you know, giving them a chance and putting it in some place to where they can they be the ones the only they can get it. And so, I think that that’s a great combination between Drake’s personal development and and trust in the receivers. When you were thinking about taking this job, obviously, and sorry, and and I think the relationship I you talked about Josh, I think the relationship is great. I think, you know, we have a young quarterback coach that we feel very uh strongly about and Ashton Grant and I think he serves a different purpose than than Josh. Josh has one relationship with the quarterbacks and I think Ashton has another and I think that’s a good dynamic. I think Josh continues to put things on their plate and especially Drake and give him things to look for, look at and and continue to develop. uh when you were thinking about taking this job, obviously you look at the quarterback among other things. Has he exceeded your expectation so far? Uh I don’t know um you know if I had any expectations coming in. I just think that I was excited to be able to work with a very good young dynamic quarterback with with a great attitude and a great spirit and and a great energy about him. You talk about your conf his confidence and comfortability with his receivers. Obviously, that’s the case with Booty. Uh, yesterday, great game for him. He already has half the yards that he had last season. What do you think plays into the confidence that Drake now has with Booty and vice versa? Well, I think it goes back to training camp. I think it goes back to those those reps that they put in in training camp where they can draw on and they can say this is, you know, how we did this versus this uh specific coverage or this specific look. And I think that’s where any of the things that we do as a football team would would come back to hopefully to the practice field where we we gained some confidence or we corrected some things uh and then we were able to to go out there and do it during the game. And I would say shout out my boy Todd Downer because he’s doing a great job the wide receiver coach with those guys and and the one thing I love about the wide receiver position. Does he admit to coaching you or Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. To Todd’s my guy. Listen, I got number great things to say. I was with him in Minnesota. That’s funny that I I’ve uh heard you mention Todd Downing’s name more than I’ve heard Todd Downey mentioned your name. Well, you know, we got maybe give him a little nudge. He’ll let you know. But the the the one I’ll have to pull your picture up. This guy right here. Hopefully you won’t have to do that. Hopefully you remember. But the one thing I will say about this wide receiver group, we get a chance to talk to Paul Douglas on Fridays and there’s no like selfishness from this wide receiver group. So when Courtney brings up booty or we talk about digs and one guy having a great game one week and then maybe doesn’t get as many targets, I think a lot of that has to do with a coach getting guys to buy into that and especially if they’re wide receiver position, you know how those guys can be. How can they be when sometimes they can be like, “Damn, when am I getting the damn ball? Give me the ball.” I understand that and I do appreciate that and I I I try to tell them that that their efforts don’t go unnoticed. uh whether that’s how they play without the football, uh whether that’s running a route that may clear somebody out and open up a second window or their ability to to extend a play and block somebody or their ability to to get open and catch the ball and make a a critical play. So, I think that they have understood the fact that if they keep working and they keep getting open, their quarterback’s going to be able to find them. And then uh you know, it’s kind of been a different guy each week. I I’m not trying to get you in a position where you say something that cost you money, but the the takeaway from me outside of the brilliant performance by your players was the absolute inept performance by that refereeing crew. It was an abomination. It was horrible to watch. And I mean, the touchdown that was no longer that was negated by a penalty that was called 5 minutes late at a position on the field that had nothing to do with the catch that negated the touchdown that Pop Douglas had was one of the worst calls I’ve ever seen. How can they fix this? How can they they you know I can I I got tough enough job to coach this football team. Yeah. Could you go fix that in the offseason? What do they say to you on the sideline when that happens? There’s not much. It it’s it becomes comical at at a point. They send these videos out every week and they do a great job. Uh Walt Anderson does a great job. Uh Raone George does a great job and they send these videos out. And of course me and Stretch, we hang on to every word. And then I’ll see something during the game. I’m like, “Did they even watch the video?” Like, stretch you guys are just like, we’re just like, we’re like pausing it, rewinding, and we’re like, I saw these videos. And then I’m like, hey, did you did you watch the video last week? Like they talked about this exact thing. It’s like they just send them out without watching them. That’s just me and Stretch watch them. After your second challenge, you had like an extended conversation with the refs on the sideline. What was going on there? just to make sure that it would go down, you know, I mean that they would start the clock, they would put it at 40 and that they would wind it so that we could get to the two. Mike, one of the things that we’ve been able to to glean from your coaching style is the fact that you want these guys to be themselves, to have fun when it comes to winning, to enjoy the winning. Where does that come from from from you as a coach? probably because uh there sometimes you lose sight of uh how hard it is to win and the the effort that we put in and I want them to have a good time and we talk about that uh enthusiasm or discipline can’t be the barrier to to enthusiasm. We have to be disciplined, but we can still have fun and we can still enjoy it. We still have to show up on time. We have to be where we’re supposed to be. We have to do the little things. We have to hold people accountable. Uh we have to try to pra we have to practice hard. We have to condition all these things. But I mean I think that there’s a sense of having fun and enjoying what you do where you do it and who you get to do it with. Steph Diggs had his personal chef cook a meal for the O line last week. Has he had him cook for you yet? Uh no no not not yet. But it sounded like it was a heck of a heck of a dinner. Yeah. Well pick whatever they wanted. Are you asking me? Wiggy ain’t been missing too many. Same over here. Apparently we got our own Same over here. My chef called take out. I know you never like to make it about yourself, but obviously with Tennessee up next, is this week any different for you at all? Does it feel any different? Well, I think it’s going to feel different. It It can’t be different. It has to be um you know, the way we uh prepare, the the way that we try to put together a game plan. Um, but I mean I think it’s gonna we have to recognize the obvious and we haven’t spent time there and so a lot of people on the other side that I know that coached or worked with. Mike, one of the things there was another thing I saw and at, you know, obviously I’m an offensive guy and so getting in the mind of a defensive player when they’re punching out the ball, tackling a guy, you had two opportunities yesterday where you where where you guys did that. How how do you coach a guy to be able to do that and still focus on the tackle? Well, it’s I think understanding where those opportunities are and we’ve gotten better at it. We’ve coached it. I think the players have started to really recognize it and embrace it and say, you know, I we showed Anthony and Harold coming in on Josh Allen and and Anony’s within inches as Josh is switching the ball and we said, “This is just keep doing this.” And trust me, it’s going to come out. And you know, it starts with Woodsy uh on the catch. And that could have been another one. Uh that could have easily been a a catch fumble and just probably looking at where the game was and the riskreward of what are they going to do? We’re going to get the football and I I just know how critical those timeouts are and those challenges are down the stretch. So, we decided not to challenge even though it was I think one, two, three, hammer, ball out, clear recovery. But they’re starting to get excited about it. They’re starting to recognize it. Christian Ellis, you know, he hammer, he’s like that ball’s out, you know, and so you want to try to continue to um just sensationalize those efforts of the attempts, man. If you can just keep logging attempts that the ball is going to come out. And that was a critical one, the Ellis one, because even though you guys weren’t able to take advantage and score points, you eliminated a possession for New Orleans. Absolutely. every turnover is going to be huge and you know whether we capitalize on it which hopefully we do but it’s also not giving them the chance to to go down and move the football. Mike, the the moment that a lot of us thought of you potentially having the job you have with the Patriots came at halftime when you were inducted into the Patriots Hall of Fame. Uh you made comments about how people here need to know how good they have it with the crafts and with the coaches and with everybody. Did that cause issues when you were with Tennessee? Was that something that irked the people you worked for? I I don’t know. You’d have to ask the owner. Uh I know losing irked the owner or losing irked me. So uh like John Cooper used to say at Ohio State, winning takes care of everything. And we didn’t win enough games in Tennessee. Have you learned the uh celebration dance yet? The celebration dance is kind of taking off for your players. You’d have to show me. It’s like it’s this whole Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We got that one easy. That one. No, it’s taking off. You don’t need much rhythm to do that. That’s what somebody in the Uber was doing when Greg ate dinner. Uh, these guys have been making fun of me on my travel over the weekend. Um, did you have a good time at the wedding? Yeah, it was great. It was a great You know, John Douly? That’s uh John Douly got married. Remember John Douly from Echo Store? John Dy? Yeah. Back in the day got married. Beautiful. Yeah. Beautiful. Second second wedding. No, first one. He’s like 50, whatever. I mean, you know, you find love. You find love. You know how that goes. And age is just a number. Would you have gotten married at 50? Uh, no. I mean, I might, in case anybody’s listening, but you never know. Uh, all right. It’s great. Great. Great to see you. Go get him. Go get him this week. All right. That is Mike Rabel, head coach of the New England Patriots. All right. Good. All right. See, all right. So, now we can do our our victory shot, victory formation. All right. Uh, this is Peppa. You love these. We lose weight. So, this is Pure Green. We should have them sponsor your segment. So, Pure Green wake up. It’s a wake me up shot. All right. Congratulations on a win. Pleasure, brother. All right. Go get him, coach. Snow Corvis, but it’s like that. It’s like that Hennessy used to make me do. Oh, yeah. You know what they say, once you go brown, you about to get down. Did we used to make you do? I didn’t make a do anything, but lead. Hey. Oh, he right now. Don’t let him fool you. All right, that’s that’s Mike Rabel.

Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel joins The Greg Hill Show on Monday, October 13, 2025.

Subscribe to the New England Patriots YouTube channel: http://bit.ly/2IOD2e9
For More Patriots NFL Action: https://bit.ly/2Y1e9zz

#NewEnglandPatriots #Patriots #NFL

For more Patriots content: pillar.io/patriots
Stay up-to-date on Patriots news: https://www.patriots.com/
Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/newenglandpatriots/
Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/patriots
Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/patriots
Follow us on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@patriots
Get the app: https://apple.co/2vvd8mU