Curran: How Maye ‘stepped up’ in Wednesday’s OTA practice originally appeared in NBC Sports Boston
Drake Maye is starting to find his feet with the New England Patriots a month after being drafted third overall.
Our Tom E. Curran and Phil Perry were present at Wednesday’s OTA session in Foxboro, where Maye ran the offense alongside veteran quarterback Jacoby Brissett and third-year signal-caller Bailey Zappe. Fellow rookie QB Joe Milton was absent.
Curran was impressed with how Maye improved last week.
“He looked at me like I had taken a step forward since last week,” Curran said Wednesday. Early Edition. “He got more reps overall because Joe Milton, the other rookie, wasn’t there. But I liked some of the pitches. The notion of him being robotic — which I defended — or him having a problem, really was not seeing that, I would give him an A-, B+ in terms of what I would expect from him.”
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Agreeing with Curran’s note, Perry was encouraged to see how Maye bounced back from some difficult times.
“I liked the fact that I got to see him fight a little, very briefly,” Perry said. “On two of his first three snaps in 11-on-11 periods, we saw him miss an open receiver downfield — JuJu Smith-Schuster seemed to be on a little wheel route — just dropped him for four or five yards incomplete.
“The next play, they kind of got together for their third 11-on-11 play, had to get together again because there was some kind of miscommunication, and then he started throwing a tight end screen to basically nobody, incomplete, but from there, he completed 14 of his next 16 passes, including what I considered the best throw of the day, which was a throw of about 40 yards to Tyquan Thornton down the sideline. better football.
“So I liked that he started slow and seemed to stay on his feet despite what happened at the beginning of practice to have a really strong day.”
As for how the reps were split in the session, Maye remained the apparent third QB on the Patriots’ depth chart.
“It was interesting. He got more 7-on-7 snaps than either of the two seniors. … He got more 7-on-7 work than the other two because he had the field to himself, while Bailey Zappe and Jacoby Brissett shared a field during that 7-on-7 period.
“But in terms of 11-on-11, what we saw was Jacoby Brissett always on first and Bailey Zappe typically on second and definitely getting more 11-on-11 reps than Drake Maye. Man, it’s pretty clear.”
The Patriots will continue OTAS on Thursday and Friday, followed by sessions June 3-4 and June 6-7. Mandatory minicamp is scheduled for June 11-13.
