FOXBOROUGH – Jerod Mayo wants to establish a culture. He wants to mold an identity for his Patriots football team.
That’s exactly what a first-year head coach should be doing, especially one who’s following a legend.
Mayo has started to make an imprint, but he’s had a few missteps along the way. He readily admits that’s the case. He also vows to make a Year 2 leap as a coach.
With six games left in Year 1, starting with Sunday’s game in Miami, there’s still time to get a start, especially with rookie quarterback Drake Maye already exciting the masses.
Based on how Mayo has handled in-game decisions alone, however, it seems as if he’s still trying to figure out what he wants to be as a head coach, and what his football philosophy is going to be.
Because right now, it remains a bit of a jumble.
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He wouldn’t go fourth-and-goal from the two trailing by 11 in the third quarter of the Rams 28-22 loss Sunday. That triggered a legion of second-guessers – present company included – criticizing him for being too cautious.
With a losing team, and a rookie quarterback who is growing and improving by the minute, there was no need to play it safe.
Didn’t Maye pull off a miracle a few weeks back in Tennessee, pulling a rabbit out of his hat on a fourth-and-goal from the four with no time on the clock?
That was another opportunity to see what Maye could do in a tight spot. It was another chance to give Maye and the offense a boost in a nothing to lose scenario. Only Mayo opted for a field goal.
On the flip side, Mayo and defensive coordinator DeMarcus Covington gambled and sent the house on third down against a Super Bowl-winning quarterback in the same game. On one hand, with little to no pass rush to speak of, the Patriots have to pick their spots to blitz. But this wasn’t Matthew Stafford’s first rodeo.
That turned into an easy pitch-and-catch between Stafford and Cooper Kupp for a touchdown on their first possession in the third quarter.
So what is Mayo?
A coach who tries to win going the conservative route? Or one who tries to pull out victories by pushing the envelope with aggressive moves?
The answer is likely that he’s still trying to work that out as he goes.
“Knowing his personality, I think he’s always going to do what’s best for the situation,” veteran cornerback Jonathan Jones said Wednesday. “I don’t think he’ll always try to be aggressive, or he’ll always be conservative. I think he’ll try to take into account and calculate how the team’s going, momentum, various different things to formulate his decision on whether to go for it, or not.”
It’s certainly possible Mayo is more aggressive with the defensive side of the ball since that’s his wheelhouse. Offense, meanwhile, isn’t his cup of tea just yet. He’s still learning that side, which would probably lead him to being more cautious.
Earlier in the week, Mayo said he makes those decisions on a case-by-case basis. He factors in how the game is going, and what the flow of the game is like, much like Jones said.
“In the moment, I always feel like I’m making the right decision. It’s very easy to look back and say, ‘Well, I wish I would have done X, Y, and Z,’ and that would be multiple situations,” Mayo said Monday. “You can go back to the London game and then some of the same situations showed up (Sunday). If you execute, we’re not having this conversation. But as I sit here today, look, it’s 100% on me, and I have to be better.”
He says he has no regrets with the decisions he’s made, but he’s making sure to learn from those decisions.
Perhaps he’ll discover consistency is as important for him from week to week, as it is with his players.
Bottom line, he needs to pick a lane and make it his lane.
Asked Wednesday about the inevitable trial and error process being a rookie coach, and if that element has lessoned over time, Mayo said he still had “so much more” to learn. Eleven games into the season, that hasn’t changed.
“I had a conversation – who was I talking to? I was talking to someone, and they have a good relationship with (Chiefs coach) Andy Reid. He asked him what he did in the offseason,” Mayo began. “This is after he’s a seasoned coach, all these Super Bowls, and he just watched like a thousand plays of just red-area offense and defense. To me, you have to stay growing. You can’t be stagnant in this world.”
At this stage, he’s still trying to work out the kinks.
