Don’t look now, but the New England Patriots, the defending AFC champions, have started looking a lot more like themselves lately. After a rocky first three weeks of the 2026 season that felt like a major hangover from their success last year, they have totally stabilized in the last two games. They’re sitting at 3-2 on the year, and honestly, they’re looking primed to contend for the conference crown and make a Super Bowl run again.
Maye’s Numbers Tell The Story: The Flip Is Real
The biggest reason for this turnaround, without a doubt, is Drake Maye. The guy was at the heart of their early-season struggles, but he’s been night-and-day different over the past couple of weeks, especially with how he’s handling turnovers. He’s fresh off his first career back-to-back games with three or more passing touchdowns. It’s wild to see the stats laid out like this:
- Week 1-3: Team averaged just 12.0 PPG, Maye passed for 195.0 YPG, had 1 total TD, and racked up 7 turnovers. Yikes.
- Week 4-5: BOOM. Team is averaging 37.0 PPG, Maye’s passing for 321.5 YPG, has 8 total TDs, and only 2 turnovers.
Talk about a transformation, right? The team’s scoring output more than doubled, his passing yards jumped, and those turnovers? He cleaned them up big time.
The Deep Ball Is Back, And The League Noticed
If you really dig into what’s changed for Maye in these last two games, it’s the return of his deep ball. Last year, the dude was arguably the best deep-ball thrower in the NFL, but that literally disappeared at the start of this season. It felt like an extension of the offense’s struggles from last postseason. From Week 1 to 3, Maye was only 9-of-23 passing (39%) on throws of 15-plus air yards. He had zero touchdowns and four interceptions on those throws. Ouch.
But guess what? In Week 4 and 5, Maye is 11-of-18 (61%) on those deep throws, with three touchdowns and no interceptions. That’s a huge shift in efficiency, putting him right back where he was last regular season, when he completed 58% of those throws. Remember, he finished second in MVP voting last year largely because of that prolific play downfield. If he’s truly back to that level, his current odds to win MVP this season at +1700 are looking really tempting.
While Maye is clearly the engine for that whole organization, the Patriots’ climb back to their ceiling goes beyond his improved play. Coming into the year, they faced an absolute gauntlet, with the hardest Week 1-4 strength of schedule of any team entering a season in the last 40 years. Looking at it from a high level, the fact they emerged from that stretch at 2-2 is actually pretty solid. Of course, how they played in some of those games, and losing to *our* Seattle team, even after we lost Sam Darnold on the opening drive, did raise some red flags. But from a record standpoint, it could have been way worse. They also snagged a crucial divisional win in Buffalo during that stretch, which is a valuable feather in their cap as they look at a schedule that softens up considerably moving forward.
Our Seahawks proved how tough we are, even against a team that’s now rolling. Next up for the Patriots is a home game against the New York Jets in Week 6, followed by a Thursday night road game against the Chicago Bears in Week 7. If Maye keeps this up, the AFC better take notice. We already did!
This article was created with AI assistance and published under Seattle On Tap’s editorial standards. See our Editorial Policy.
Originally reported by CBS Sports.
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