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After one season as the Patriots’ head coach, Jerrod Mayo’s time in New England is over.
The Patriots didn’t bother to wait until Monday to fire him. They announced Mayo’s dismissal with a statement from team owner Robert Kraft on Sunday afternoon, just hours after a season-ending victory over a Bills team that was resting key players ahead of the playoffs.
A former Patriots linebacker who spent his entire eight seasons playing with New England, Mayo was a member of Bill Belichick’s coaching staff for five seasons before becoming Belichick’s successor last January.
Expectations were low in 2024 on a talent-depleted roster built around a rookie quarterback.
So what went wrong for Mayo that prompted the Patriots to release one of their own after just one season, hand-picked by Kraft?
Was Mayo doomed from the start?
According to a report from Jeff Howe of The Athletic, there was skepticism about the appointment from the beginning among Patriots insiders. According to the report, members of the Belichick regime were skeptical from the beginning that Mayo was ready for the job when he was hired at the age of 37.
According to the report, skeptics believed Mayo needed “more experience in game planning, involvement in play calling, handling big situational decisions” and that New England’s 4–13 season was “not as good as we thought.” Played.
Public mistakes have piled up
Mayo’s inexperience came to the fore early in the season due to his most important decision: who would start at quarterback?
Drake Mays was the QB of the future when the Patriots drafted him last spring. There was debate in the preseason over whether it made sense to play Mays as a rookie on a roster lacking talent at the skill positions and on the offensive line.
Before Mayes took over in Week 6, Mayo initially decided that Mayes should learn off the bench and named veteran Jacoby Brissett as New England’s starter. No one raised eyebrows at the decision. It made sense to start Mays on the bench rather than risk his health and development behind a shaky offensive line. But how Mayo reached his decision remains to be found out for sure.
Before announcing Brissett as the starter, Mayo declared that Mayo had outmatched Brissett on the field, an assessment that was supported by preseason statistics.
Mayo said on August 26, “It’s true competition, and I would say that at this current point, Drake has Jacoby overtaken.”
The proclamation suggested Mayes could end up as New England’s starter. Two days later, Mayo named Brissett as the starter, leading Mayo to retract his previous comments.
There was no point in public explanation, even though there was an unspoken feeling that Mays was better off on the bench. Of course, it wasn’t a fireable offense, but it was a public mistake that helped set the tone for Mayo’s lone season of work.
And it was a blow to the New England system after the Belichick regime played its cards too close to the vest for more than two decades. Then came an early-season statement from Mayo that was directly criticized by Belichick himself.
The Patriots traveled to London to face the Jaguars in Week 6, which was Mays’ first game as a starter. They blew a 10-0 lead and lost 25 straight points, losing 32-16. After the game, Mayo criticized the Patriots players as “soft”.
“We’re a soft football team across the board,” Mayo told reporters after the game. “We talk about what makes a tough football team, and that’s being able to run the ball, that’s being able to stop the run, and that being able to cover the kick. And we had those today. Didn’t do anything.”
Belichick took issue with those comments regarding the roster, many of which were made up of the same players he coached last season. He expressed his views on the “Pat McAfee Show” the following Monday.
“I feel very hurt for those guys, because to call them soft, they’re not soft,” Belichick said. “They were the best team in the league last year against the run. … I feel bad for the defensive players on that because those guys, that’s a tough group. … Those guys are all tough players. Like, they I’ll tie it and leave.”
Calling one’s players soft in public was also not an unpardonable offence. But it was a sign of continuing unrest in New England. And as the season progressed, play on the field suffered and losses mounted. The loss was accompanied by game management decisions that were repeatedly criticized in the Patriots media.
New England entered Sunday’s final ranked 31st in the league in yards per game, just ahead of the similarly disappointing Bears. Its defense was ranked 21st in yards allowed and 23rd in points allowed per game. The Patriots finished the season with a minus-128 point differential, good for 28th in the league.
Other than Maye’s advantage, there was nothing positive to take from a 4-13 campaign that finished last in the AFC East. Ultimately, public sentiment turned against Mayo. He faced “Fire Mayo” chants at Gillette Stadium during a 40–7 home loss to the Chargers in Week 17, which dropped the Patriots to 3–13.
A week later, the Patriots did the same.
Did Mayo get a fair shake?
Is it fair for the Patriots to fire Mayo after his first year as head coach? Mayo’s roster was one of the worst in the league, and expectations of winning this season were not high. Does it make sense to give him another year to learn from his mistakes and grow?
The decision in New England was ultimately no. And it was built amid the urgency to fix things around Mays and the hope that he would eventually bring the franchise back into contention. Sunday’s decision gives the Patriots a jump on the coaching carousel as they search for Mayo’s successor.
Will they look for another former Patriot in free-agent head coach Mike Vrabel? He is a coveted candidate who is expected to attract widespread interest a year after his last season as the Titans head coach. Will they look for an offensive-minded coach to enhance Maye’s development?
Whoever they appoint, the Patriots want the candidate of their choice, and starting the process early gives them a chance to get ahead.
Well or not, mayo’s time in New England is up. And the old adage is true. When following a legend, it is better to replace the person who died rather than replace the person who replaced that person.