Morning Sports Update
“I think the level of play we’ve seen over the last few weeks from Drake Maye has really given you a hint of what he can become.”
Albert Breer’s take on the Patriots: The Patriots are now 2-2 following the resounding 42-13 win over the Panthers on Sunday. Though a win over Carolina is not necessarily seen as a landmark win — the Panthers are 1-3 — one NFL observer sees the New England victory as an early sign of greater potential.
Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer sounded an optimistic note while recapping the result in a recent episode of “The Breer Report.”
“Look out for the New England Patriots,” said Breer. “They looked feisty. I know it’s Carolina, and Carolina’s been one of the worst teams in the league — maybe the worst team in the league — over the last five years. But this is a New England team that was 4-13 in 2023, 4-13 in 2024, has looked at times like a dead franchise over the last couple of the years.
“Having an afternoon like this where they were able to win 42-13 over a bad team, where they’re able to not only get another team down, but keep them down, I think is a big step for Mike Vrabel and his program,” Breer explained.
Walking through the win from a few angles, Beer noted that the big picture takeaway was a triumph for the philosophical approach of Vrabel, New England’s head coach.
“There is a global piece of this that’s about play-style,” he said, “and I think you saw the play-style from the Patriots going back to the preseason, just how violently they’re playing, how hard they’re playing. That’s been there for a while.
“I think you’re now seeing that in different phases of the game,” Breer added. “I think you’ve seen it with how they run the ball on offense. I think you’ve seen it in how, of late, they’ve started to get after the passer on defense. And on special teams, it really showed up. To me, this is a big thing, and it’s one thing I picked up from Mike Vrabel’s postgame speech. He said that they have talked about running harder than the guy who has the ball, and that was what you saw on the punt return from Marcus Jones that turned this game.
In his opinion, the longtime analyst thinks New England won its one-on-one battles across the board against Carolina.
“The Panthers could’ve had 14 guys on the field and it wouldn’t have mattered,” Breer posited.
Turning his eye to Drake Maye, Breer discussed the second-year QB’s evolution.
“As for the quarterback, I would say [Maye] is playing at a higher level through a month than any of the quarterbacks in this draft class. And I’m saying that with the caveat now that Jayden Daniels has been injured, and Jayden Daniels is still clearly the No. 1 quarterback in the class.
“But I think the level of play we’ve seen over the last few weeks from Drake Maye has really given you a hint of what he can become,” Breer said, “and why when the Patriots took him third overall it was a real swing for the fences. I think you’re starting to see him develop in a very real way under Josh McDaniels.”
Trivia: The 2003 Patriots (a team that went on to win Super Bowl XXXVIII) also started the year 2-2 before winning 15 in a row to close out the season as champions. Can you name the last head coach to defeat New England that season?
(Answer at the bottom).
Hint: After winning a Heisman Trophy in college, he went on to coach in the USFL, NFL, and even the short-lived AAF. However, he is most known for his success as a college head coach.
Scores and schedules:
The Red Sox rallied to defeat the Yankees 3-1 on Tuesday night in the first of a best-of-three wild-card series.
The two teams play again this evening at Yankee Stadium. First pitch is set for 6:08 p.m. in what is now a must-win game for New York.
This Sunday, the Patriots will travel to Buffalo to play the Bills on Sunday night at 8:20 p.m.
More from Boston.com:
Some mic’d up sounds from Sunday: Enjoy some behind-the-scenes moments from the Patriots’ Sunday win over the Panthers.
On this day: In 1903, the then-Boston Americans dropped the first ever World Series game 7-3 against the Pittsburgh Pirates. More than 16,000 were on-hand at the Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds to watch the spectacle.
Despite the defeat, Boston would go on to win the series in eight games.
Daily highlight: Here’s a look at Garrett Crochet’s glittering postseason debut, which included 11 strikeouts. It culminated with a crucial strikeout in which Crochet reached 100.2 mph on his 117th pitch of the night, tying his fastest velocity of the season.
Trivia answer: Steve Spurrier
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