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FOXBOROUGH – There was no 28-3 comeback. There was no Brady magic. There was no Gronk spikes in the end zone.
Only an embarrassing performance in one of the bigger regular season games at Gillette Stadium in a long time on Sunday.
With the world watching, Tom Brady in the booth, Rob Gronkowski donning his new red jacket as a Pats Hall of Famer and the 2016 team being honored, the Patriots were humiliated 45-27 by the Packers.
New England gave up 478 yards, Drake Maye reverted back to his September self and threw three ugly interceptions and to make matters worse, the injuries continued to mount. Green Bay’s star receiver duo of Matthew Golden (10 targets, 10 catches, 164 yards, 1 TD) and Christian Watson (8 targets, 7 catches, 171 yards, 1 TD) abused the secondary, particularly Christian Gonzalez.
The Pats are now 5-4 and have to head out to Germany this week to face the Lions next Sunday.
“We’ll just, we’ll have to try to practice and maybe change,” Mike Vrabel said postgame when asked about another slow start. “There’s a lot of things that we’ll have to think about and try to do, focus on how we start practice. Making sure that we’re ready to go. It’s tough to spot good teams any sort of lead, and we’ve done that. So that was something that we talked about going to Miami, and that didn’t happen. Then something that we continue to talk about this week, and we just have to realize that what we’re going to get early in the game is we’re getting everybody’s best, and certainly whatever they feel like their scheme plays are or things that they feel like are going to help.
“We just weren’t able to get off the field, and then certainly the turnover there early kind of derailed us.”
Just two plays into the game with the crowd as electric as it’s been yet this season at home, Maye was picked off. Two snaps after that, Green Bay had a 7-0 lead on a 13-yard touchdown run for Jordan Love. After a three-and-out from the offense, a 49-yard bomb to Golden quickly set up a five-yard TD on a slant to Golden moments later.
Kyle Williams dropped a deep ball on the next possession, leading to a punt and a Green Bay field goal early in the second to make it 17-0. On that drive, Golden reached 120 yards receiving in just the first quarter.
“Again, when your best players don’t play good, you don’t have much of a chance in this league,” Vrabel said when asked specifically about Gonzalez struggling in coverage. “So, we expect a lot more. He expects a lot more. We need more from him and everybody else. It wasn’t just him. Again, we got to be able to coach and be prepared, and then we have to execute. Just like it is every single week when we don’t win, it’s all of us, and it starts with me.
Two plays after the field goal, Maye was picked off on a tip drill INT along the left sideline. The defense finally got a stop and forced a punt thanks to a Christian Barmore sack on second down.
The offense finally showed some life with a six-play drive, ending with a 30-yard TD toss from Maye (21-38, 299 yards, 3 TD) to Rhamondre Stevenson to cut it to 17-7 early in the second.
Another punt for Green Bay was quickly negated when Maye threw an ugly, forced interception looking for Hunter Henry. Three plays later, the Packers went up by 17 on a two-yard TD run from Kaleb Johnson.
It appeared we might get a shootout when the Pats scored four plays later on an eight-yard TD catch for Efton Chism, cutting it to 24-14 with 2:37 left in the half. The Packers turned it over on downs at the Pats 43 on the ensuing drive, but New England couldn’t capitalize, punting just before the half down by 10.
“I’m disappointed in myself for, you can’t put the team in the hole straight off the bat, first possession, first half. I feel like in the times we had chances to get back into the game, I messed them up, and we had chances to put us back within three points multiple times, and just frustrating,” said Maye. “I got to do a better job from a whole perspective, communication, doing the little things right, and I just, I wasn’t good. I wasn’t good today.
“And we got to bounce back, and we’re on a far flight, but we got to bounce back and know that there’s still some games left and we’re battling. We’ve got to battle. I think that’s just, that’s it.”
Green Bay pushed the lead to 31-14 less than five minutes into the half on a 10-yard jump ball TD for Savion Williams. Two Packers field goals and a 39-yard touchdown catch for Watson following a fumble for Stevenson – with a Mack Hollins 22-yard TD catch late – made it 42-14 Packers heading to the fourth. One more early field goal for Green Bay early in the final quarter capped the visitors’ scoring.
Tommy DeVito played late and led a drive that ended with a four-yard Corey Kiner TD run in garbage time.
Stevenson, Will Campbell, Carlton Davis and Ben Brown were all banged up in this one with an eight-hour flight ahead on Wednesday.
The roller coaster season is currently in another major, scary dip.
“Yeah, I think, man, we’ve been through a lot. I think just start with nine games, and it’s crazy we got pretty much half the season left. We’ve been through a lot and we’ve got a lot of bumps and bruises, got some big wins, got some bad losses,” Maye added when asked to assess where things are at. “So we got to find a way to be consistent. Coach preaches that, being consistent, being the answer. And in these games when you face adversity, we got to do a better job, beginning with me, of handling it and playing games from ahead. That’s the biggest thing, offensively speaking from offensively. And then from a team standpoint, we got to band together. This is the National Football League, it’s any given week, and these teams around the league are, we got a target on our back.
“We won the AFC, played in the Super Bowl. Everybody’s had top offense, top defense, so everybody’s coming after us and we got to respond.”