The New England Patriots got the response Mike Vrabel wanted.
After an uneven showing in the first joint practice with the Philadelphia Eagles on Wednesday, the second-year head coach pushed his team - and especially the defense - to come back with more bite on Thursday. The message landed. New England’s defense looked sharper, played with more energy and turned in a much more convincing outing.
Linebacker K.J. Britt said the tone was set before practice even got rolling.
“We had energy today. It didn’t matter who we played against today on defense,” Britt explained.
“We can win a lot of games with the energy we played [with] today. That started from Vrabel just challenging us earlier this morning, challenging us last night.
Just the culture here, how everybody wants to play football. It’s a football team.”
Britt wasn’t about to spell out exactly what Vrabel said.
“I’d rather keep it in-house,” he added. “But Vrabel, he does a good job just keeping us on our toes, making sure that we get the best out of us.
And we’ve got a defense that wants to respond to it. We’re not going to take it.
We just want to build off of it and have fun with it. At the end of the day, we just want to have fun with it.”
The Patriots’ defense clearly took that challenge personally. The unit picked off two more passes Thursday, pushing its two-day total to seven interceptions.
It also showed better work up front, with more effective pass rush and a cleaner answer against the run after the Eagles had found success on Wednesday, especially by attacking the edge. Saquon Barkley and the Eagles offense didn’t have the same kind of room to work with this time around.
New England still has a long way to go, and nobody inside the building is pretending otherwise. But Thursday was a noticeable step forward, and Britt said the key was settling in once the competitive juices started flowing.
“Once you come out here, your competitive nature is going to take over. And once your competitive nature takes over, you just play your game,” Britt said. “We got our eyes in the right spots today, and made sure that we were able to fly around and play ball.”
In Other News...
Patriots Just Sent A Clear Message About Greg Van Roten
The Patriots added a veteran solution to the interior offensive line after the preseason opener left them thinner than they wanted to be. Greg Van Roten arrives on a deal built around a modest base salary, a signing bonus and incentives, with the team clearly valuing the kind of steady depth he can bring behind starting left guard Alijah Vera-Tucker.
At 36, Van Roten is being brought in for more than just insurance, even if that is the immediate need after injuries to Ben Brown and Andrew Rupcich. The structure of the contract suggests New England sees a useful stopgap now, with some upside if he handles a bigger role than expected, and that is a pretty direct message about how the Patriots want the offensive line handled heading into the season. [Read more 🡒]
Drake Maye Is Already Saying What Patriots Fans Need To Hear
Drake Maye spent part of the week around the Eagles, and the interaction gave the Patriots a useful glimpse into how their young quarterback is approaching the next stage of his development. After joint practices, Maye spoke with clear admiration for Jalen Hurts, pointing to Hurts work ethic and the path he has carved out in the league. He also noted how close the two came to overlapping at Alabama, a small detail that underscored just how long Maye has been tracking the kind of quarterback standard he wants to reach.
For New England, the bigger takeaway is less about the comparison itself and more about where Mayes head is as he heads into his third NFL season. He has been candid about focusing on the mental side of his game, and that matters for a team still trying to stabilize the most important position on the field. Hurts rise, resilience and Super Bowl-level success offer a clear model, and Maye seems intent on learning from it while continuing to build his own path. [Read more 🡒]
Patriots Face A New Doubt About Mike Vrabel And Drake Maye
The conversation around Mike Vrabels first months in New England has taken on another layer, this one coming from the media rather than the field. Colin Cowherd weighed in on the reported affair allegation involving Vrabel and NFL reporter Dianna Russini, separating the ethics question from the morals debate while using the moment to revisit how the Patriots are viewed heading into the season.
Cowherd was skeptical that New England can simply roll last years success forward and suggested the team looks more like a wild-card outfit than a Super Bowl contender. Even so, he had high regard for the Vrabel-Drake Maye partnership, ranking it among the leagues better coach-quarterback pairings and putting it sixth overall, which is part of what makes the Patriots next step such an intriguing one. [Read more 🡒]