Pats Pulpit
The New England Patriots won their final regular season game of the season on Sunday, beating the Miami Dolphins 38-10 to finish 14-3 on the year and clinch the No. 2 playoff seed in the AFC. They ended the game with a franchise-tying four rushing touchdowns, and pulled away in the second half before giving some of their starters a breather down the stretch.
Let’s get into our lessons learned from the game on Sunday.
The Patriots won by pounding the rock on Sunday, and Rhamondre Stevenson was the catalyst for that. He had two separate runs of over 35 yards, including a 56-yarder on the first drive of the game, and finished with seven carries for 131 yards and a pair of touchdowns; he added 22 yards and a touchdown on two catches.
It was the type of performance that gets you excited about what we could see from the Patriots in the playoffs. Having Stevenson’s power running, especially if he can break some longer runs too, makes the Patriots tough to stop on the ground, because everyone knows what TreVeyon Henderson brings to the table with his speed.
You also can’t help but feel incredibly happy for Stevenson. After losing his dad this past summer, and then the fumble issues at the beginning of the year, he finished the season with a bang.
Mike Vrabel has fought for his players, and they love playing for him. So, it should come as no surprise that trying to get guys their incentives was a big part of the final game of the year.
The Patriots got Stefon Diggs over 1,000 yards, which triggered a $500,000 bonus for him. K’Lavon Chaisson had a sack, which pushed him over seven for the season, earning him a $500,000 bonus. Hunter Henry went in for the first play with Josh Dobbs so he could catch his fifth pass of the game, which unlocked a $250,000 bonus for him as well.
The Patriots might have ended up paying some of those incentives regardless, but it’s an important thing to get those. The team making it a point to do it in a game that was out of reach shows the commitment they have to their players.
Honestly, I don’t care what the MVP vote ends up looking like, and who ends up getting the award. Drake Maye is my MVP.
The oddsmakers moved Matthew Stafford ahead of Maye after their performances on Sunday, but that doesn’t matter to me at all. I also think it doesn’t matter to Maye or the Patriots either: they had three rushing touchdowns inside the 5-yard line on Sunday, and they could have chosen to try to pad Maye’s stats on all of those occasions, but decided to run the ball in instead.
Regardless of this and how the voting shakes out, the numbers he put up this year...
