Why the ‘clutch gene’ criticism of Drake Maye misses the mark

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Why the ‘clutch gene’ criticism of Drake Maye misses the mark | Karen Guregian

Karen Guregian · MassLive

Thu, Dec 18, 2025 ·

4 min read

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FOXBOROUGH - In a matter of a week, Drake Maye has gone from being an MVP candidate, to a potential problem.

Actually, the time span can be condensed to the second half of Sunday's loss to the Bills.

How is it even possible for Maye, who's thrust himself into the conversation as being among the best quarterbacks in the league, to be put in any kind of problem category?

Chalk it up to the nature of the position.

In the first half against Buffalo, Maye was a star. In the second, he failed to deliver a win. He couldn't match scores with Josh Allen, and couldn't produce a game-winning drive when afforded the opportunity.

So now, there are questions about whether he has a clutch gene. Because if he doesn't, if he can't engineer comeback wins, how good can he really be?

That's the crux of the argument. The rebuttal?

At this point, it's still TBD whether Maye is capable of pulling off the necessary end-of-the-game heroics.

Making the leap that he's not capable of doing that with such a small sample size isn't fair. During the 10-game win streak, for example, Maye never had to face a deficit in the fourth quarter.

Given his exploits this season, it's easy to forget he's 23, and a second-year quarterback who hasn't been in position to pull out too many games.

He didn't deliver Sunday, which was disappointing. Even though the offense put up 31 points, it wasn't enough.

The second-to-last drive was a three-and-out, with Hunter Henry making a critical drop on a 3rd-and-12 play, while the final drive couldn't produce a first down on four tries.

In those two final series, Maye went 1-for-4 for five yards. He was sacked twice.

Some of that was on receivers not getting open, and some of it was on Maye for holding the ball too long.

So there were no late-game heroics. Given the performance of the defense, allowing five touchdowns on as many possessions, it was on Maye to produce more with the offense.

That was the expectation, and it didn't happen.

Naturally, the blame is going to fall squarely in the quarterback's lap. And overall, this wasn't Maye's best game, particularly in the second half.

It marked his first game with a sub-80 passer rating in 2025 and the lowest passer rating of his career (with a minimum of 10 pass attempts).

So that's been the exception, not the rule.

We'll see how he responds Sunday against the Baltimore Ravens in another primetime game. While a win wouldn't wrap up the division, it would guarantee the Patriots a ticket to the post-season.

"It stings when you don't come up on the winning side, but what I've tried to learn in this league is it's on to the next week," Maye said Wednesday. "The next week's just as important as the last week and the week before that. Every week's important, and it matters. (I'm) just trying to play to my best ability, fix the things that I can fix, make plays, try to fix plays that I wish I had back and try to not let them happen again."

It's become apparent the Patriots need Maye to perform well, in order to win. With a defense that's now struggling, he's the trigger man. He has to make it happen.

While Maye didn't say that in so many words, the expectations he has for himself fall in line with that premise.

"I expect a lot of myself . . . I expect to show up in big games. I expect to show up when the team needs me," Maye said. "That's what I hope everyone in the locker room feels. You want to play within the system. You want to play within the scheme and use your teammates around you.

"I've been trying to do that as much as I can because those guys around me are great players. You have to realize you don't have to do it by yourself . . . I want to win. When the pressure is on, you don't have to make a hero play. Just a winning play."

It'll be interesting to see if the Ravens employ some of the strategy the Bills used. After getting torched by the Maye-Diggs combination Week 5, Buffalo was not going to let that happen again. They blanketed Diggs, who had just three catches for 26 yards.

They also paid close attention to Henry (1 catch, 18 yards), forcing Maye to look past two of his favorite go-to-receivers. Along with that, they kept two safeties deep.

No doubt Josh McDaniels will work on devising quicker avenues and better alternatives for Maye if an opposing defense manages to take both Diggs and Henry away.

While Maye has been outrageously efficient this year, and done a good job overcoming whatever obstacles defenses have thrown his way, he still has to work through some schemes that have given him trouble.

He also has to fill that gap on his resume - leading his team to a fourth-quarter comeback win. Thus far, in two seasons, he's 1-14 when trailing in the fourth quarter. Last year shouldn't count, but it does.

He did have that final second play in Tennessee last year, where he ran around for an eternity buying time, before finding Rhamondre Stevenson in the end zone to tie the game and send it into overtime.

But that was rendered mute after failing in overtime, throwing a pick.

Still, he's overcome half-time deficits, and been money on third down. He just needs to adequately satisfy the fourth-quarter comeback quotient.

It's still early. He knows the drill. He knows it's on him to lift the team in close games.

But it's still too soon to ask Maye to be perfect when he's still learning to be great.

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