Drake Maye’s rebound against the Bills came at the perfect time for the Patriots, and it also offered a reminder that the quarterback who looked like an MVP-caliber force last season is still in there somewhere.
That matters this week, because the Raiders are coming to Foxboro, and head coach Klint Kubiak is not walking into the matchup pretending Maye has been solved. Unlike Bills defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard, who openly hoped Maye’s turnaround would wait one more game, Kubiak struck a more measured tone.
“He’s a player that we have a ton of respect for. Very dangerous with his legs, with his ability to throw the ball down the field, and a player that has all of our respect and all of our attention.”
That’s the smarter approach. Maye’s rough stretch over the past month gave opponents plenty to latch onto, but last Sunday against Buffalo looked a lot more like the quarterback who came within one vote of winning MVP in 2025. He finished 22 of 37 for 269 yards, three touchdowns and one interception, and the confidence that had seemed to slip away showed back up with it.
The Patriots would love to keep that momentum rolling, especially with a softer part of the schedule ahead after a brutal opening stretch. The Raiders are hardly a pushover, though. They were undefeated until last week and gave the Chiefs a real fight, so this is no layup.
Still, this is the kind of game New England needs to handle if it wants to get its season moving in the right direction. A win over Buffalo last year sparked a 10-game run after the Patriots entered that Week 5 matchup at 2-2, and while nobody should expect a carbon copy of that surge, the path is at least there.
The 2025 season was supposed to be a development year for New England: a new head coach, a new staff, a second-year quarterback and a rebuilt roster. Instead, the Patriots caught fire, finished 14-3, won the AFC East and eventually reached the conference championship before making a Super Bowl appearance.
That success raised the bar going into 2026, and now Maye has another chance to show that last week’s performance wasn’t a one-off. The Patriots may still be viewed by many as a wild-card team at best, but if Maye keeps building off the Bills game, they can force a very different conversation.
In Other News...
Patriots Fans Are Starting To See Efton Chism Very Differently
Efton Chism has gone from an afterthought to a name Patriots fans are starting to track a lot more closely. The second-year slot receiver has shown enough in recent weeks to get noticed, including a memorable catch in Week 4, and his timing makes the interest feel even more relevant with injuries thinning out the receiver room. Around New England, that has naturally brought more attention to what kind of role he might be able to carve out in the offense.
Patriots insider Tom E. Curran has been part of that conversation, weighing Chisms style and how it might fit if the team needs another dependable option inside. Chism has already invited the easy comparisons, too, with some seeing shades of Julian Edelman and noting his friendly relationship with the former Patriots star. The bigger question now is whether what Chism has flashed can keep translating once the workload and the expectations both start to rise. [Read more 🡒]
Former Patriots Super Bowl Champions Death Left A Family Facing Heartbreak
Jordan Deveys death this summer has left a painful void around a family that had already built a life well beyond his NFL days. The former offensive lineman, who spent eight seasons in the league with teams including the Patriots, Chiefs and 49ers, won a Super Bowl in New England before moving into coaching high school football in Idaho. His wife, Linsey, chose their 15th wedding anniversary to publicly share the news, underscoring just how abruptly the familys world changed.
What she described next made the loss even harder to absorb, especially for their children and their 11-year-old son Cash. Linsey said the emotional toll has been overwhelming as the family tries to navigate grief in the open, with the story of Jordan Deveys death now carrying a deeply personal dimension that reaches far beyond football and into the private pain left behind. [Read more 🡒]
Patriots Have A Chance To End One Frustrating Home Trend Sunday
The Patriots got through a tough opening month of the 2026 season at 2-2, and the schedule now gives them a chance to turn a recent breakthrough into something steadier at home. After the win over the Bills, New England heads into Sunday with the kind of momentum it has been trying to build for a while, especially at Gillette Stadium, where consistency has been hard to come by since 2020.
A visit from the Raiders arrives with the kind of test that can say a lot about where this team is headed next. The Patriots have another shot to strengthen their home footing before the Jets come to town, and the focus will be on whether they can keep stacking wins against opponents that will demand more from Drake Maye and the rest of the offense. [Read more 🡒]