They won’t hang this one in the Louvre.
Hell, I’m not sure it will get a spot on Mike Vrabel’s refrigerator. But after sleepwalking through the first half in rainy Miami, the Patriots offense found its stride in the second, escaping South Florida with a 24-19 come-from-behind win and improving to 3-0 in the AFC East (and 5-3 overall).
Phew.
“Chip away at it, little by little,’ Vrabel said of the comeback. “Get connected and figure out a way to complement each other. Get some points. Get some stops. Get a turnover. Put ourselves back into it. It’s a good opportunity for us not to be frontrunners and to have that, we can rely that. That’s going to be huge as we move forward.”
“It shows the team’s grit,” added DeMario Douglas (3 catches, 76 yards, TD). “We didn’t start off well in the beginning, but I love the way we came out there in the second half. Heads up, heads high, playing complementary football.”
Drake Maye had 53 yards passing at the half and was pressured on 60% of his dropbacks (per SumerSports). As a team, the Pats had their fewest yards (59) since that Week 17 beatdown the Chargers gave them near the end of the Belichick era. That carried over to the opening series of the third quarter. So what changed? Well, the feeling-out process had to be thrown out the window, down 13-3.
“Coach McDaniels is one of the best at it, and adjusting to it. … the Denver game was like that, back in the playoffs,” Maye observed. “You just got to see how the weather is and how we're doing.”
Not well enough, so Maye put on the Superman cape a day after Halloween, making big plays with his arm, his feet, and his head. He completed 8 in a row and 9 out of 10 to close the game, including two 40-plus-yard touchdown passes. There are probably a handful of guys at the position who could do what Maye did, and I’m probably being generous.
“Kind of the same message we’ve had all year: go be the answer,” Maye said of Vrabel's halftime speech. “Don't wait around for anybody else. Go make it - you go make it. And I think that was kind of the message everybody took in…”
“(You’re) gonna be a great quarterback in the National Football League, there's not a whole lot of excuses,” Vrabel said. “You go out there and you find ways to win for your football team, and I know that that's who he is, and that's what he wants to continue to be.
“He throws to the open guy and controls our offense and gets guys in the right spot. That's being one of the best quarterbacks in the league. That's what the job description requires.”
The coaching staff also leaned on