The Miami Dolphins host the New England Patriots this afternoon, with both teams looking to put Week 1 losses behind them and start a push for the playoffs in 2025. Both teams had flaws exposed during their respective season debuts, leaving many questions to be answered starting this week.
Who are the 2025 Patriots? To get a better idea, I turned to Taylor Kyles from SB Nation’s Patriots team site, Pats Pulpit. You can check out my side of the discussion, giving him some insight into the Dolphins, on their site.
How has the change from Jerod Mayo to Mike Vrabel been year? What changes have you seen?
It’s tough to give Mike Vrabel too much credit after an opening day loss, but this Patriots team is vastly more functional and better coached. Vrabel’s hands-on approach may seem like a gimmick, but he wants things done to his standard and puts his fingerprint on the entire team.
The Patriots just show they can get off to a faster start and finish strong, but last week’s loss felt less like a poorly prepared team (their defense was dominant for most of the game) and more like one in the infancy of its development.
What is the next step for Drake Maye? What will make Patriots fans feel like they have the right guy?
Drake Maye was more good than bad in the opener, but summer struggles with accuracy and early-game nerves reared their ugly heads. While Maye settled into Josh McDaniels’ offense after a rough first quarter, bad misses were a common theme throughout.
The sophomore quarterback is also still growing as a leader, which is to be expected. He’s a young pup surrounded by veterans, but the Patriots have provided him much better structure than last season.
For Patriots fans to be secure with Maye he really just needs to continue at his current trajectory, take to coaching, play a 60 minute game more consistently, and tighten up the accuracy.
Geno Smith seemed to carve up the Patriots’ secondary last week, throwing for 362 yards with a 10.6 yards per attempt average. What is going on in the secondary and can the Dolphins exploit any issues there?
The Dolphins’ downfield in-breakers always give the Patriots trouble, and the Raiders had multiple big plays off similar routes in Week 1. Defensive backs were put in tough positions on some bad blitz calls, but struggles in off coverage and poor tackling also contributed to Las Vegas’ offensive explosion.
While softer coverage proved to be a liability, particularly in single-high coverages, New England dominated in its staple Cover 1, even without Christian Gonzalez. The All-Pro’s absence will be felt more this week, and I worry about anyone not named Marcus Jones against Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle’s speed.
Not counting the four scrambles from Maye, the Patriots ran the ball just 14 times in a rainstorm. I would have expected New England to go heavy on running the ball with Rhamondre Stevenson and TreVeyon Henderson more than trying to rely on Maye to carry the load. Neither Stevenson nor Henderson had a carry in the second half. What happened? Do you think this is a one-off game where they strayed from the game plan of running the ball, or could the Dolphins see New England revert to a nearly pass-only offense?
Mike Vrabel admitted the Patriots abandoned the run due to ineffectiveness. New England couldn’t pick up the Raiders’ stunts and blitzes, giving up backside penetration on the interior and failing to pick up second-level defenders. Growing pains are to be expected with rookies Will Campbell and Jared Wilson manning the left side, but veterans Mike Onwenu and Garrett Bradbury were also inconsistent.
Vrabel and McDaniels know Maye dropping back over 50 times isn’t sustainable, and they’ve emphasized the need for more balance in Miami. But to keep the playbook open, New England must execute. Whether they can do that consistently in the ground game has yet to be determined.
There has been a lot of speculation this offseason that the Patriots are going to be a playoff contender this season, with many outlets predicting them to finish second in the AFC East division. What are realistic goals for this team this season?
The Patriots’ opener was disappointing, but most of their issues were correctable upon further review. I could see them catching stride mid-season if they remain relatively healthy, but 8-10 feels like the most realistic range for this team.
Their defense should be one of the league’s better units (assuming Christian Gonzalez returns for significant action), and the offense is well-coached with an underrated arsenal of weapons, even if they lack a true WR1.
