Drake Maye and Patriots Offense Meet Their Match in the Seattle Defense; Losing Super Bowl LX 29-13

Well, the NFL season is now at a close, and unfortunately for the Patriots, it did not end with a seventh Lombardi Trophy coming back to New England. Far from it, in fact. A monster defensive performance from Mike Macdonald and the Seattle Seahawks defense held the Patriots scoreless through three quarters, leading to a 29-13 final that was really never close, even after the Patriots led 9-0 at halftime.

A very dissapointing way to end the year, especially given that the Patriots own defense certainly played at a Championship level, but the Patriots offensive line picked the worst time to have the kind of game they did, and with Drake Maye's internal clock sped up from the jump and with some very uninspiring play calling out of Josh McDaniels, that was more or less you're ball game.

Give credit where it's due to Seattle, who didn't make mistakes despite a just-okay performance from Sam Darnold, but the surprising part of their win was how successful their ground game was, with Kenneth Walker having a ton of success with the outside zone. A worthy Super Bowl MVP for sure, but you feel for guys like Christian Gonzalez, Milton Williams, and even Craig Woodson, who left it all out there for nothing. Here are a few quick thoughts on the season-ending loss.

Pass Protection Collapses

I figured the Pats OLine would certainly take lumps against the Seattle DLine, but never like this. The 28 pressures Drake Maye faced, per NextGenStats, ranked fourth among quarterbacks all year, and this was the third game of the year in which he was sacked six times (surprisingly, it's the only one they lost). At the end of the day, though, if you're getting beat up front like the Patriots were, and especially struggling with some of the DB blitzes Seattle dialed up with Devon Witherspoon, you're losing 9.9 times out of 10.

Will Campbell became an immediate scapegoat, which isn't entirely unwarranted, given NGS credited him with 14 of those pressures, which is historically bad (PFF had him for eigth which is also not good), but I can at least give him a modicum of grace, given the knee injury he suffered back in Cincinnati. I don't believe this was touched on post-game, but I would've loved to know if there was any real conversation about swapping him out for Vederian Lowe after the half.

It'll be a long offseason for the LSU product, dealing with the talk about whether he should move to guard or not. While I don't love the idea of just completely giving up on him at tackle this quickly, especially given his health status down the stretch, it's certainly something to consider. Bumping him in at left guard, getting Jared Wilson in at his natural spot at center, and moving on a year early from Garrett Bradbury, who has legs financially, saving the Patriots about two million dollars at the cost of restarting the search for a new left tackle.

McDaniels Gets Pantsed

As bad as the protection offensively was, and even Maye for the most part, the real problem, to me, in this game was Josh McDaniels. For all the talk going into this game about the "two weeks to prepare" stuff, I thought he kick-started getting everything into a bad spot by being unprepared for the pressure Seattle was bringing, not giving Maye a ton of chances to get some early rhythm throws, and sticking with longer developing stuff when he knew his QB was internally sped up and wasn't going to have time to let those kind of plays work themselves out to begin with. Probably the Mona Lisa-esque performance of why I've never really been a fan of him, and it came in the worst possible spot.

Defense Did Their Part

What I'm about to say is ultimately moot since they lost the game, but I thought Christian Gonzalez was the best player on the field in Santa Clara, and it wasn't even close. The two PBUs he came up with in the first half were a gigantic reason this game was as close as it was for a long time, and a big part of the reason Jaxon Smith-Njigba wasn't a huge part of this game with just 27 yards. A huge shoutout to Craig Woodson as well, who unquestionably played his best game of the year last night, with 10 tackles, six stops, and zero catches allowed. He was the one pick in this draft class that I didn't really buy into, but you saw him get better as the year went on, and his two best games were his last two. Patriots fans should be very excited about his future outlook.

Then there's Milton Williams, who definitely lost out on a few sacks thanks to Sam Darnold's great spot-pocket management, but he wasn't missing out on bringing him down for a lack of effort with six pressures and a lone sack. The fact that he and this DLine struggle with Kenneth Walker and the zone runs Seattle brings to the table was probably the most shocking part of this game, but to the Patriots' credit, I don't think you can get on them, or DC Zak Kuhr for waving the white flag. This group was everything you'd hoped for and more in a playoff run like this, and it's disappointing for the wide majority of those guys that they couldn't bring this one home.

Disappointment but Gratitude

This goes without saying, but losing the Super Bowl is never fun. It's also fair to say this doesn't feel like the Brady losses (won't speak on the two losses in New Orleans since we weren't...well...alive for them). Ultimately, if you lose the turnover battle, ground game battle, and give up the first TD in the game, plus a defensive TD in a game, you're losing 100 percent of the time. Give them credit where it's due. Seattle was excellent and was a more than deserving Super Bowl Champion, but the fact that the Patriots were this close this quickly with Maye has to leave you feeling at least somewhat optimistic.

I don't subscribe to the theory that they'll immediately "be back" or "get there", because you could say that was the feeling with teams like the '21 Bengals, or even two AFC teams who are still waiting to get to a Super Bowl in their current forms, the Ravens and Bills over the last several years and that hasn't happened yet. There's no guarantee you'll get back to this spot, but the key takeaway is that the Patriots will absolutely have opportunities to get back with this Drake Maye-Mike Vrabel tandem, which is the best you can hope for. The schedule will certainly be tougher next year, and some of your vets are another year older, but assuming the Patriots can make any number of moves, big or small, to help them out in what could probably be another "arms race" type offseason and hit on the draft again, I like their chances of contending in the AFC.

Final Score: Seattle Seahawks 29, New England Patriots 13

Gaffney's Three Stars from Patriots-Seahawks (Super Bowl LX)

1st Star: Christian Gonzalez (3 Reception Allowed on 8 Targets for 36 Yards, 2 PBUs)

2nd Star: Craig Woodson (0 Receptions Allowed on 3 Targets, 10 Tackles, 6 Stops)

3rd Star: Mack Hollins (4 Receptions for 78 Yards and TD)

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