How long should the Patriots wait before making Drake Maye their starting QB? (2024)

Editor’s note: This is the third piece in our five-part series looking at the biggest questions facing the New England Patriots before training camp. Previously, we exploredwho will be the starting left tackle and how the Patriots’ receivers stack up.

So far, Jerod Mayo has been careful to straddle the line. He has expressed optimism about how rookie quarterback Drake Maye has done in his first few sessions with the Patriots while also being careful not to oversell him.

Mayo said he’s seen progress in Maye over the last month. When he walks past the quarterback meeting room during long days at the facility, he sees Maye in there watching video by himself. But Mayo has also been quick to praise veteran Jacoby Brissett and point out that Maye isn’t being given the starting quarterback job like the Bears with Caleb Williams.

The organization is aware that everything Maye does — every good practice and every bad interception thrown during those sessions — will be highly scrutinized. Such is life as the highest-drafted Patriots quarterback since Drew Bledsoe.

It will culminate with the most important decision Mayo will make in the next few months: Who will be the team’s starting quarterback in Week 1? And if it’s not Maye, then when will the rookie get his chance? Let’s explore the pros and cons of Mayo’s options.

Set, hut…@DrakeMaye2 | #NEPats pic.twitter.com/utrjh40ipi

— New England Patriots (@Patriots) May 21, 2024

1. Maye starts in Week 1

Pros: The days when it was commonplace for rookie quarterbacks to sit out a full season are mostly over. Generally, quarterbacks drafted in the top five become the starter right out of the gate. So this would follow recent trends.

It would also give the Patriots a full year to coach and work with Maye as the starter, the player who gets most of the practice reps during the week, and it would give them a large sample of film to help their young quarterback grow.

Cons: The Patriots’ schedule to start the season is brutal. Three of their first four games are on the road, and five of their first six opponents have Super Bowl aspirations. Their easiest game is the home opener against the Seattle Seahawks, and the Pats are already early underdogs in that one, too.

So starting Maye out of the gate could risk hurting his confidence if he struggles. Plus, there are lots of questions about the offensive line, and New England faces top-tier pass rushers early in the season, lining up against Trey Hendrickson (Week 1), Quinnen Williams (Week 3) and Nick Bosa (Week 4).

If you start Maye from the jump, you better be sure his confidence won’t be rattled by some tough early matchups.

2. Maye starts after London

Pros: The Patriots chose not to take their bye in Week 8 after their trip to London, hoping it might fall in Week 10 or 11 instead. That means they’ll be coming home a bit jetlagged for a home game against the New York Jets in Week 8. They would likely benefit from a jolt of energy that week.

Enter Maye.

This would give the 21-year-old a chance to miss the toughest part of the schedule, learn under Brissett for a couple of months and take the reins at a time when the team might need a boost. Plus, it would mean his first NFL start would be at home, which could lead to a great October atmosphere at Gillette Stadium.

Cons: The Jets defense is really good and would be a tough matchup for a first-time starter. Plus you could argue the inverse of the above regarding rest. Maybe it’s not such a good idea to give Maye a jetlagged team for his premiere.

3. Maye starts after the bye

Pros: If you’re going to keep a rookie quarterback on the bench before letting him take over midseason, you generally want to make that switch during the bye when you have extra time to prepare him. Unfortunately for the Pats, after turning down the Week 8 bye, they were given their week off in Week 14, the latest possible bye.

Still, if you think Maye needs additional time to develop (remember, he was the second-youngest quarterback drafted), this would give him nearly a full season to learn under Brissett. But it still would give him a few games at the end of the season to get his feet wet and have something to build on for 2025.

Cons: It’s awfully late in the season. Sometimes, it does make sense to wait for the bye, but would the Patriots only give Maye four games to show his stuff?

Plus, the Patriots come back after their bye with a long trip to Arizona, and then they have to fly all the way back east for another road game in Buffalo. That’s not an easy stretch of travel for a rookie.

4. Maye sits all season

Pros: Eliot Wolf came up with the Green Bay Packers, and no team has been better at developing quarterbacks. They’ve been unconventional, using first-round selections on quarterbacks only to let them sit. But it worked for Aaron Rodgers and now it has seemingly worked for Jordan Love.

So maybe Wolf encourages Mayo to do the same with Maye, and maybe it leads to a more polished quarterback in Year 2.

Cons: The sooner you know what you have in your quarterback, the better. It’s why teams have been increasingly quick to part ways with quarterbacks who haven’t worked (see: Jones, Mac). The best competitive advantage in the NFL is to have a productive quarterback on a rookie contract.

So the sooner you know if Maye is the guy, the better. And it’s hard to find that out if Maye sits on the bench all year.

(Photo: Eric Canha / USA Today)

Chad Graff is a staff writer for The Athletic covering the New England Patriots since 2022 after five years on the Minnesota Vikings beat. Graff joined The Athletic in January 2018 after covering a bit of everything for the St. Paul Pioneer Press. He won the Pro Football Writers of America’s 2022 Bob Oates Award for beat writing. He's a New Hampshire native and an adjunct professor of journalism at the University of New Hampshire. Follow Chad on Twitter @ChadGraff