{"id":663528,"date":"2026-01-08T10:28:24","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T10:28:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/663528\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T10:28:24","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T10:28:24","slug":"what-drake-maye-hopes-to-prove-to-patriots-teammates-in-playoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/663528\/","title":{"rendered":"What Drake Maye hopes to prove to Patriots teammates in playoffs"},"content":{"rendered":"

FOXBORO \u2014 Drake Maye and the Patriots are in the midst of a storybook season they hope doesn\u2019t reach its conclusion Sunday night<\/a> against the Chargers.<\/p>\n

Any first-round playoff exit is at least somewhat disappointing, especially for a team like the Patriots, which earned the No. 2 seed in the AFC with a 14-3 record, but the team has already far exceeded any reasonable expectations set upon them this season.<\/p>\n

One of the Patriots\u2019 goals back in the spring was to host home playoff games. That seemed lofty, coming off back-to-back<\/a> 4-13 seasons, but fast forward nine months, and they\u2019re already there. Head coach Mike Vrabel doesn\u2019t want his team to be content with what they\u2019ve accomplished.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m happy, I\u2019m excited, but also, we\u2019re not here just to get here,\u201d Vrabel said Wednesday. \u201cWe have to be able to host games and compete for championships. So, there\u2019s not going to be any consolation prize for anybody. We understand what we have to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Maye is having an MVP-caliber season as the Patriots\u2019 starting quarterback, taking a considerable second-year leap after a promising rookie campaign.<\/p>\n

The 23-year-old signal caller was asked about his emotions ahead of Sunday night\u2019s wild-card round matchup.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s obviously a little bit of mixed emotions,\u201d Maye said. \u201cI think the biggest thing is excited. Excited to get the opportunity to play home playoff games. That\u2019s what you star at the beginning of the season of things we want to do here, and goals we want to accomplish, and we got our chance and opportunity right here.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, take advantage of playing in front of a crowd that\u2019s been great all year, a crowd that we expect to be loud, and a night game against an opponent that has had some playoff experience and has a great offense and a great defense. So we got our hands full, but looking forward to play in front of this crowd.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Patriots have been dogged for their \u201ceasy\u201d schedule on their path to the playoffs. At .391, they have the NFL\u2019s lowest strength of schedule so far this season. At .370, they also have the lowest strength of victory out of any team in the postseason.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s also been a strike against Maye\u2019s MVP candidacy from some. Now, the Patriots face a significant test against an 11-6 Chargers team whose defense has played among the best in the NFL over the second half of the season.<\/p>\n

So, does Maye, playing in his first postseason game, feel like he has something to prove on Sunday night?<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, I wouldn\u2019t say that. I think just prove to my teammates, try to be the same player in the regular season as hopefully I am in the postseason,\u201d Maye said. \u201cAnd that starts with me playing well, and knowing that every week my job is, it\u2019s huge. It\u2019s big. I got to play well for us to win. And I know that\u2019s the nature of this league and the nature of this position. I wouldn\u2019t want to have it any other way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Maye has the full support of his teammates. Both wide receiver Stefon Diggs and left tackle Will Campbell both said Wednesday that Maye is their MVP.<\/p>\n

Diggs did say he wished Maye was a little bit \u201cmeaner\u201d as a leader, however.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe has great delivery, because he\u2019ll be like \u2018what you see right here?’\u201d Diggs said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s more like an open line of communication with the guys, not even just me. I seen how he interacts with other guys, and getting on the same page is big for him. I think at the quarterback position, how you deliver stuff is always important, and he does a great job at that.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish he was a little bit more meaner at times. I think that\u2019s just being young. He\u2019s been playing extremely well. So hopefully he comes into his own as far as, like, his mean side. But he\u2019s a great guy, man. His communication is always there. He\u2019s been a great quarterback. He\u2019s our star. I feel like it\u2019s never too demanding. It\u2019s more so like, \u2018What you saw right here?\u2019 You know, I know what you saw. He know what I saw, but it\u2019s like, \u2018What you saw right here?’\u201d<\/p>\n

Maye acknowledged that he\u2019ll probably start getting more demanding as he grows older as a player.<\/p>\n

For now, he\u2019s more understand, especially when it comes to younger receivers.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecoming harder on them comes with learning them and then respecting our relationship together,\u201d Maye said. \u201cI think that\u2019s the biggest thing that I\u2019ve learned is get to know them and have some success with them, have some failure with them and learn, \u2018Hey, what do you like here? Hey, how\u2019d you feel like I threw this ball to you,\u2019 and these guys have responded to me great all year. They want the ball. Every receiver does, but they take criticism well, and they don\u2019t take it personally, and they just want to help the team. And they\u2019re blocking downfield. They\u2019re doing all the little things. \u201d<\/p>\n

I think as I get older, I\u2019ll probably start getting more mad when they don\u2019t line up correctly, but I think I try to know what kind of position they\u2019re in it, especially if they\u2019re young, and we got a young group for the most part, but the older guys like Stef, they like when I get fired up a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whatever Maye is doing right now is working. He\u2019s getting the most out of his offensive playmakers.<\/p>\n

And if the Patriots beat the Chargers, they\u2019ll get to host another playoff game in the divisional round.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FOXBORO \u2014 Drake Maye and the Patriots are in the midst of a storybook season they hope doesn\u2019t…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":663529,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2050],"tags":[80,833,839,7,838,1167,249,2326,2094,6,15,835,61050,208,836,19972,834,61051,61052,724,837],"class_list":{"0":"post-663528","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-england-patriots","8":"tag-2025-nfl-draft","9":"tag-drake-maye","10":"tag-eliot-wolf","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-mike-vrabel","13":"tag-new-england","14":"tag-new-england-patriots","15":"tag-newengland","16":"tag-newenglandpatriots","17":"tag-nfl","18":"tag-nfl-draft","19":"tag-nfl-news","20":"tag-nfl-patriots","21":"tag-patriots","22":"tag-patriots-2025","23":"tag-patriots-game","24":"tag-patriots-news","25":"tag-patriots-schedule","26":"tag-patriots-stats","27":"tag-pats","28":"tag-robert-kraft"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115859010846469717","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=663528"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663528\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/663529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=663528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=663528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=663528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}