New England Patriots
Mike Vrabel’s arrival and Drake Maye’s ascension as an MVP candidate helped New England improve by 10 wins this year.
Hope was high at this point last January when New England — fresh off a miserable four-win season — brought in former linebacker and established NFL head coach Mike Vrabel to lead the franchise back to relevancy.
Fans had embers of optimism to huddle around, headlined by the promise put forth by rookie QB Drake Maye.
Still, it seemed rather evident that a Patriots roster marred by years of poor drafting, lackluster talent, and rudderless leadership was still years away from re-asserting itself as a contender.
So much for that.
New England is now gearing up for its first playoff game held at Gillette Stadium since the 2019 season, with Vrabel, Maye, and the Patriots looking to make good on one of the more improbable turnaround seasons in recent memory.
The Patriots enter the playoffs with a record of 14-3, holding onto the No. 2 seed in the AFC and the AFC East division title for the first time since 2019. New England is just the third team in NFL history to improve by 10 wins from one season to the next.
“We got the right guys in the building at the right time, and we got good quarterback play,” Vrabel said Sunday of New England’s response this season. “We figured out how to not beat ourselves. I think we play to an identity, and guys make plays. That’s what happens.
“I’m excited for all those guys that — again, when you chase wins, usually the production comes along with it, so we need to focus on winning and the efforts that are going to help us win, and in turn you end up with all the plays that you’re going to need, and I think you saw that.”
As New England prepares for a showdown with the Chargers in the wild-card round on Sunday night, here’s a look at how the Patriots managed to right the ship in record time.
Moving on from Jerod Mayo
The writing was on the wall that a change needed to be made after the 2024 Patriots closed out a woeful season with a 4-13 record.
Still, moving on from Jerod Mayo after just one season on the job required owner Robert Kraft to eat a lot of crow for the good of the organization.
Kraft’s decision to put a succession plan into Mayo’s contract before moving on from Bill Belichick, coupled with his braggadocious claims that he decided on hiring Mayo over years ago didn’t help the optics.
But it was clear that Mayo — who held no official coordinator title before replacing Belichick — was not ready for the gig. As flawed as New England’s roster was, a struggling franchise was oftentimes ill-prepared last year, while Mayo did himself no favors with several of his musings to the media.
Rather than give his hand-picked head coach another shot to right the ship, Kraft opted to fire Mayo just hours after New England’s season came to a close.
“In the important decisions in my life, I’ve always said that I measure nine times and cut once and this was one of those situations,” Kraft said the following afternoon. “I guess the main thing for me is, I felt that we regressed. The high point of everything for me was the Cincinnati game, and then mid-season I just think we started to regress.”
Bringing in Mike Vrabel
It didn’t take long for New England to find a new head coach, with three-time Super Bowl champion rabel accepting the job on Jan. 12, a week after Mayo’s ousting.
Beyond Vrabel’s familiarity with New England and his standing as a former player who could resonate with an NFL locker room, the 50-year-old Vrabel had a proven resume on the sidelines — winning NFL Coach of the Year in 2021 with the Titans.
In his opening address as Patriots head coach on Jan. 13, Vrabel didn’t mince words about what he was looking to build in Foxborough.
“I want to galvanize our football team,” Vrabel said. “I want to galvanize this building. I want to galvanize our fans. The most important thing is the players. … I want to provide a program that provides their ownership but also their accountability of each other and one that they’ll be proud to be a part of and that they’re going to fight for.”
“People ask what non-negotiables are,” he added. “Our effort and our finish is going to be the contract that we make with our teammates.”
Vrabel’s tone-setting approach and vision of a hard-nosed, accountable, and connected Patriots roster led to immediate buy-in from a team looking to right the wrongs of the last few seasons.
Hiring Josh McDaniels and an experienced coaching staff
Vrabel and the Patriots’ top brass put an emphasis on adding more experience to New England’s coaching staff, adding former head coaches to the organization like Doug Marrone (offensive line) and Thomas Brown (passing game coordinator/tight ends coach).
But, no offseason addition beyond Vrabel might have held as much sway over New England’s fortunes as the return of Josh McDaniels as the club’s offensive coordinator.
For all of his struggles as an NFL head coach, McDaniels’ track record as an offensive maestro and QB guru has been well-established over his various stints working in Foxborough.
From fostering Maye’s development as a franchise QB to overhauling New England’s offense from a West Coast system to more of the thorough Erhardt-Perkins structure previously put in place by the Patriots, the results have been evident.
After ranking 30th in the NFL with just 17.0 points per game in 2024, New England ranked second this season in the same category this year, averaging 28.8 points per contest.
Drake Maye’s ascension as an MVP candidate
Vrabel’s efforts of resetting the culture and getting New England’s players to buy-in has been key. McDaniels’ influence over what had been a dysfunctional offensive operation helped set the foundation for a resurgent season on that side of the ball.
But, the players on the field still need to execute.
And the reason why the Patriots are viewed as a viable Super Bowl contender is rooted in Maye’s evolution from promising rookie into legitimate MVP candidate in the span of a year.
The numbers speak for themselves.
Entering the postseason, Maye led the NFL in completion percentage (72.0), QBR (77.2), and expected points added (113.2), throwing for 4,393 yards and 31 touchdowns to go along with just eight interceptions. He also scrambled for 450 yards and another four touchdowns.
Maye’s ability to extend plays with his legs, shred secondaries with deep balls down the field, and knack for limiting turnovers turned New England’s listless offense into a well-oiled and explosive operation this fall.
Just five years after Tom Brady left New England, the Patriots have a new franchise signal in place under center.
“He’s extremely accurate. He’s made the most of every passing opportunity,” Vrabel said of Maye earlier this week.. “We’ve created a lot of [explosive] plays, and to create X plays it’s about 30 percent scheme, it’s about 70 percent of the players making a play, and part of that is the quarterback putting it in a great location for run after catch. I think you continue to see that.”
“His ability to extend, use his legs to gain first downs, critical first downs,” he added. “His ability to score when we’ve asked him to score and run it in. He’s been everything that we’ve asked and he continues to get better. He’s not satisfied. So, I know that our success of where we are right now, today, has a lot to do with Drake Maye.”
Upgrading the defense in free agency
One of the top disappointments from the 2024 season was a porous defense led by Mayo and defensive coordinator DeMarcus Covington, with New England ranked 22nd in points allowed per game (24.5).
This season, New England ranks fourth in points allowed per game at just 18.8.
Returning players like Marcus Jones, Christian Gonzalez, Jaylinn Hawkins, and Christian Barmore have all risen to the occasion. But New England — who entered the offseason with more than $100 million in cap space — also placed a premium on adding talent out on the open market.
Defensive tackle Milton Williams — handed the largest contract in Patriots history per average annual value (four years, $104 million) — has been a force in the trenches, generating pressure and clogging up running lanes.
The additions of linebacker Robert Spillane and defensive tackle Khyiris Tonga have also bolstered New England’s run defense. It took until Week 10 of the regular season for an opposing running back to generate 50 or more rushing yards against New England’s defense.
After finishing dead-last in the NFL last season with 28 sacks last year, New England added a few more pass-rushers in veteran Harold Landry and K’Lavon Chaisson, with the latter putting together a breakout campaign with 7.5 sacks and two forced fumbles.
Relying on free agency to shift the fortunes of a franchise can sometimes be a fruitless venture. But, New England’s overhauled defense has been anchored by a bevy of new pickups.
Adding Stefon Diggs and other weapons on offense
As elite as Maye has been this season, the second-year QB needed some help this year when it came to his targets.
In 2024, DeMario Douglas finished with the most receiving yards among Patriots wideouts with 621 — while Kayshon Boutte’s 117 receiving yards in New England’s season finale against Buffalo was the first time a Patriots WR recorded 100-plus yards in a game since Kendrick Bourne in Week 16 of the 2022 NFL season.
Reinforcements were a necessity.
After years spent coming up short for top wideouts like Calvin Ridley, DeAndre Hopkins, and Chris Godwin, New England finally found its man in veteran Stefon Diggs.
Coming off a torn ACL in October 2024, there were plenty of question marks over whether a former All-Pro standout like Diggs was still the same player that torched New England during his days as Josh Allen’s No. 1 target.
Diggs more than lived up to the billing, becoming the first Patriots receiver to post a 1,000-yard season since Julian Edelman in 2019. While his recent criminal charges loom over the team going into the playoffs, Diggs has received plenty of praise from Maye and his teammates as a veteran leader in a reworked locker room.
Without Diggs in place as a shifty target in crunch-time situations, several of New England’s more memorable comeback wins likely would have died on the vine this season.
Diggs stood as a major upgrade for New England’s receiver corps, but a fellow veteran free-agent pickup in Mack Hollins was also a strong signing. Beyond his eccentric pregame outfits, Hollins has been a force as a run blocker while adding 46 catches for 550 yards and two touchdowns.
A strong draft
After years of brutal whiffs, Eliot Wolf, Ryan Cowden, and New England’s front office shored up several critical areas of their roster during the 2025 NFL Draft.
New England addressed a sizable flaw across their offensive line with several draft picks, headlined by their first-round selection in LSU left tackle Will Campbell (No. 4 overall).
For all of the concerns over Campbell’s arm length, the 22-year-old lineman has been as advertised as a physical and competitive scrapper who should continue to grow as New England’s franchise left tackle and the defender of Maye’s blind side.
New England also added Georgia center Jared Wilson in the third round (No. 95 overall). While Wilson could eventually shift over to center later in his NFL career, it’s a good sign that the former Bulldog established himself as an immediate starter at left guard in 2025.
A Patriots offense in need of explosive talent also received a shot in the arm via running back TreVeyon Henderson (second round, No. 38 overall) and wide receiver Kyle Williams (third round, No. 69 overall).
After some initial growing pains, Henderson has emerged as a legitimate offensive weapon and home-run hitter for New England, generating four touchdown runs of 50-plus yards this season. Williams averaged 20.9 yards per catch and posted three touchdowns as a deep threat for Maye.
New England also reworked their special-teams unit by taking kicker Andy Borregales in the sixth round (No. 182 overall) and long snapper Julian Ashby in the seventh round (No. 251 overall).
One of the more underrated draft pickups for New England was safety Craig Woodson — taken in the fourth round at No. 106 overall. With New England moving on from several veterans at the safety position in Jabrill Peppers and Kyle Dugger, the onus fell on Woodson to take on a heavy workload — ranking 31st out of 179 total NFL safeties in snap count, per PFF.
As New England looks to build a sustainable contender moving forward, there’s a lot to like about this current crop of young talent in Foxborough.
Bolstering the offensive line
A porous O-line had New England’s offense floundering for a majority of the 2024 season.
The Patriots allowed 52 sacks in 2024, the fifth-most in the NFL, and the most sacks allowed in New England over one year since 1999. As noted by ESPN’s Mike Reiss, the Patriots ranked last in the NFL in pass block win rate (50.8%) last year, according to ESPN Analytics.
Something had to change.
After trudging through most of the 2024 campaign with Vederian Lowe and Demontrey Jacobs at the tackle position, New England upgraded the position — using their first-round pick on Campbell while also signing veteran right tackle Morgan Moses to a three-year, $24 million contract.
Investing in the tackle position allowed New England to keep Mike Onwenu at right guard this year, while Wilson started his NFL career earning a spot at left guard for the Patriots.
Free-agent pickup Garrett Bradbury replaced David Andrews as the team’s starting center, while both Lowe and Ben Brown did an admirable job as New England’s top backups.
New England’s efforts to upgrade the offensive line paid dividends. According to ESPN, the Patriots’ pass-block win rate of 63 percent ranks 13th in the NFL this season, while their run block win rate of 72 percent ranks 12th overall.
Vrabel’s trust pays off
New England had plenty of tough sledding out of the gate, with the Patriots dropping to 1-2 to start the season.
Some of the initial woes plaguing the Patriots were turnovers, with running back Rhamondre Stevenson in particular knocked for three fumbles across his first five games of the year. Rookie kicker Andy Borregales also had an up-and-down preseason before whiffing on two extra points in the team’s Week 2 matchup against the Dolphins in Miami.
Vrabel and the Patriots could have reached a major inflection point with Stevenson amid his early fumbling issue — potentially benching him in favor of the more-explosive Henderson. The case also could have been made that Borregales should have been cut before the start of the regular season after fellow kicker John Parker Romo had a stronger showing in the summer.
Instead, Vrabel stuck by his players, keeping Stevenson in a regular role on the depth chart despite being hindered for some time with a toe injury. Even after missing those XPs, Vrabel still awarded Borregales with one of the team’s game balls after that Week 2 win following a successful 53-yard field goal against Miami.
Since then, Borregales has gone 52-for-52 on PATs and has delivered on some clutch kicks, including a last-second, game-winner in Buffalo and a 59-yard boot against Miami in Week 18.
Stevenson’s uneven season is also looking up just before the playoffs. Amid those trials and tribulations, he’s playing his best football down the stretch — accounting for 410 total yards and seven touchdowns in his last four games.
If the Patriots want to go on a long playoff run, a strong ground game and a few clutch kicks will be required. Both Stevenson and Borregales stand as two key examples of Vrabel pushing all of the right buttons amid the hurdles of a long NFL season.
A lighter schedule
Make no mistake about it, New England’s 14-win campaign was made a bit easier by getting a favorable schedule in 2025.
Entering the playoffs, New England sports just a .391 strength of schedule — with the next-closest team being Denver at .422.
In total, New England played just three opponents currently in the postseason — and two teams that finished above .500 on the season.
Still, as Maye noted last week, the Patriots’ lighter schedule is out of their control.
“We play in the National Football League. Every team’s got great players. They get paid a lot of money,” Maye said. “So, it’s not like we’re playing, shoot, Foxborough High School down the road. We play who’s on our schedule. We can’t control that. Just trying to go out there and try to win. A lot of these teams that we do play are good, and they’re in the National Football League for a reason.”
New England may not have had an imposing slate of games during the regular season. But as evidenced by fourth-quarter triumphs over the Bills and Ravens in primetime matchups, this Patriots team has developed a knack for responding to adversity and executing in crunch time.
Maye and the Patriots will look to post another victory on the national stage Sunday against the Chargers.
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