Karen Guregian’s football analysis is sponsored by Jeffrey Glassman Injury Lawyers, a Leading Boston Personal Injury Firm.
Drake Maye was emotional, teary-eyed and still very much in the moment of losing the Super Bowl when he spoke with the media after the Patriots got trounced 29-13 by the Seattle Seahawks.
He tried to stay positive, but the weight of his struggles was written all over his face. He didn’t play anywhere near what he had hoped or dreamed.
Maye, who was pressured 19 times and sacked on 6 occasions, was unsettled from the start. The Seattle Seahawks were blitzing much more than their custom. The Patriots weren’t picking it up, and the offensive line in general looked helpless to protect him.
The end result wasn’t pretty for Maye. The second-year quarterback committed three turnovers – including a pick-six – in the blowout loss.
Maye has to find a way to step back, compartmentalize it, and move on.
He also can’t get to a place where he returns next season, and tries to do too much to make up for his mistake-filled Super Bowl performance.
Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner, an analyst for NFL Network, knows the feeling having gone 1-3 in the Super Bowl, and offered some words of wisdom.
“You hate to get to this moment, and not play your best game. That’s just what it is,” Warner told MassLive not long after Sunday’s game. “You have to be able to step back and go, ‘Look what we did. We were four wins a year ago, 14 wins this year. And the Super Bowl. I almost won an MVP.’ Just to put it into perspective.
“He’s young, and there’s a long way to go,” Warner went on. ”You can’t let moments like this shape how you move forward. You can’t move forward trying to do too much, trying to make up for it.”
Warner won his first Super Bowl in 1999 with the St. Louis Rams, then lost the next two (2002, 2009).
“I remember when we lost our first Super Bowl (to the Patriots), I felt like the next year we were trying to make up for it. We didn’t play well in the Super Bowl and we started out 0-6 the following year. We started to go in the opposite direction. That’s the biggest thing,” Warner said. “You’re going to feel the pain. It’s going to be tough for a while. Then you step back and you’re able to celebrate what you were able to accomplish.”
There will be some who will question whether Maye is truly a great quarterback given how his play declined during the post-season.
There were different factors (cold, wintry conditions, injured throwing shoulder) contributing to Maye’s playoff troubles, but those don’t necessarily excuse his performances.
Warner said his feelings about Maye, and his abilities wouldn’t change based off the postseason and the Super Bowl in particular.
“He’s in his second year. There’s a lot of growing to go on. I think that’s the thing you have to realize,” Warner said. “The regular season was great. The postseason wasn’t. There’s room to grow. You’ve got to accept that, and you have to figure out where those things are, and make sure you’re moving forward, and not settling for ‘Hey, I had a great season.’
“I don’t think Coach Vrabel is going to allow that. I think he has perspective of, ‘Hey, they’re only a year into this thing.’ It still hurts, and it’s okay for it to hurt. But they’re just in the beginning part of that building process and Drake has to know the same thing.”
