The game: Patriots at Titans
The beer: Liars Bench Pair of Pennies Czech Amber Lager
The result: Win, 31–13
The record: 5–2
The headline: “Treason! Treason! The spectre looms again!” – Rainbow, “Kill the King”

The commentary: “Kill the king,” you ask? I’m just riffing on my old Nashville Kings bit and celebrating G’s embrace of seventies and eighties rock & roll as represented in our curated MONKEY ROCK playlist. What’s on your mind?

Political thought crimes aside, the former Houston Tennessee Oilers botched their rebranding opportunity as badly as you’d expect from someone nicknamed “Bud.” The team plays in Nashville—where the only king America ever wanted made his first recordings—and decided that, no, let’s take the Jets’ old name and dress it up with some cute little cosmic flames. Red states can’t do anything right—good luck with those TennCare claims next year, you clowns.

More foolhardy red-state NFL management: I finished America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys last night and it was a weird goddamn series. I get that Jerry Jones wants his former glory documented before he dies but the whole premise is borderline pathetic given the franchise’s irrelevance ever since Yo La Tengo secured the Biffy® Creamy®. I’m left with nothing I didn’t already learn in Jeff Pearlman’s five-star Boys Will Be Boys: The Glory Days and Party Nights of the Dallas Cowboys Dynasty and felt like the eight episodes were so padded that the details of those early and then successful seasons were lost. Why spend so much time fluffing up who was responsible for the Herschel “Total Cleansing” Walker trade without once mentioning who the Cowboys drafted with the acquired picks? Strange all over. I await America’s Basement: Are the Jaguars From London Yet? with dread.

Let’s see what’s in the newspaper today. “Hmm, ‘Canada stalls on trade pact.’” Wow, The Simpsons really does predict the future!

With his top weapon sidelined, Sean McVay proves the ultimate chameleon

Blah blah blah, who cares. Get to the rest of the league, Guardian NFL writer Doug Farrar.

MVP of the week
Drake Maye, QB, New England Patriots.

Hell yeah!

Speaking of offenses nobody wants to deal with, how about the suddenly resurgent New England Patriots, who marched to 5–2 on the season following their 31–13 thrashing of the Tennessee Titans.

Our entire fucking fanbase is losing its mind and I am right up in there.

This game was personal for New England head coach Mike Vrabel, who was fired as the Titans’ head coach on 9 January 2024…

Global date format: as adorable as “sport.”

…following a second straight losing season, but a 54–45 overall record.

He managed that without Tom Brady too. Even beat him a couple of times.

Vrabel would need Maye, the second-year star from North Carolina…

How they faring?

…to make that revenge happen, and Maye was all about it. He completed twenty-one of twenty-three passes for two hundred twenty-two yards, two touchdowns, no interceptions and a passer rating of 135.9. In this game, Maye broke Tom Brady’s franchise record for completion percentage in a single game with a 91.3% rate, besting the GOAT’s 88.5% against the Jaguars on 27 December 2009.

Adorable. Wonderful.

Maye wasn’t just throwing underneath stuff, either. He completed seven of nine passes of ten or more air yards for a hundred forty-nine yards and both of his passing touchdowns, and even the announcers (including former New England cornerback Jason McCourty) weren’t fully ready for Maye to do what he did.

You sure it wasn’t Devin? That’s the only explanation.

Last week, my esteemed colleague Oliver Connolly…

Love that guy! How did I miss this??

…went deep on how Maye has become a Pro Bowl-level quarterback. After this game, any argument to the contrary would be rather silly.

Doug must be trying to wrangle some British citizenship, throwing around phrases like “esteemed colleague” and “rather silly” like an Old Etonian. Cheers!

The Vrabel hire has been a triumph for the Patriots, a lost organization in the last days of Bill Belichick in 2023 and under former head coach Jerod Mayo in 2024.

Generous to restrict only Belichick’s “last days” as lost but accurate to so label Mayo’s entire run. MALAISE FOREVER.

As for the Titans, who fired head coach Brian Callahan last week? Not so much.

Sarcastic stinger for the win. Pip-pip! Anyway, Oliver, you’re up from a week ago, with sincere apologies.

Has Drake Maye ended the Patriots’ painful Tom Brady hangover?

[Vibrating.]

Plenty of franchises spend decades looking for a star quarterback. New England appear to have found one after a few short years in the wilderness.

We’ve come a long way since last season’s week nine Google alert: DRAKE MAY LEADS PATRIOTS TO OVERTIME LOSS TO TITANS.

You have to feel for the Browns, Jets and Bears.

Pass.

Those franchises have spent decades in quarterback purgatory, rotating through prospects and placeholders. Meanwhile, after just five years of searching, the Patriots—the post-Tom Brady Patriots—appear to have found the guy.

Fred Kirsch as Jerry Jones: “We got our guy!”

Five years. From Brady to Cam Newton to Mac Jones to Bailey Zappe to Maye’s first choppy season to this: a twenty-three-year-old quarterback who looks like a top-five starter and MVP candidate.

Good lord, what a list! Skip to the end already, I’m busting.

For twenty years, the Pats lived the gilded life. But the last few seasons have been about failing to build a bridge from Brady to whatever would come next. They’ve found the answer now. Prepare for your Masshole friends to rediscover their Brady-era bluster.

As I directed my television following Milton Williams’s third-quarter sack: “Just stop the game.” Non-stop flights to Santa Clara, etc., come February. What else you got, inter-net?

Drake Maye’s ascent to stardom is gathering speed as Patriots stack wins

“Gathering speed”? That sounds awfully level-headed, Mr. Yahoo.

No, he’s not Tom Brady 2.0. But he’s very good, and getting better every week.

Read the room. Time to check in on a couple of former rivals—smug superiority, no matter how premature, is delicious. Guardian, hit me again!

Jets owner outlines hopes for team: “If we can complete a pass, it would look good”

Isn’t there something I hate about Woody Johnson? Hmm…

[…] While the Jets have tried numerous head coaches and starting quarterbacks in recent seasons one constant, except for his stint as ambassador to the United Kingdom during Donald Trump’s first term…

Bingo!

…has been Johnson’s ownership. The Jets have missed the playoffs every season since 2011, the longest drought in the NFL.

Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy, even though “Handy” Bob Kraft might have failed so spectacularly without Brady and Maye. Onward.

The Ravens’ doomsday clock inches towards midnight—will their season survive?

“Ravens’ doomsday clock”? Oh boy oh boy oh boy…

A few months ago Baltimore were seen as a Super Bowl contender; now they’re struggling to make the playoffs.

Semi-colon! I can’t parse this entire article—the ecstasy would consume us all. Marvelous schadenfreude highlights:

• The Ravens’ season is on the brink…
• 1–5 after a miserable start…
• If they fall to 1–6, their season is effectively over…
• Injuries have been everywhere and constant…
• That’s not MVP-level Lamar…
• Thirty [offensive] points a week could be necessary…
• Those final three games will be tricky—the Ravens host the Patriots…
• Time isn’t just running out; it’s nearly gone…
• Harbaugh’s future may hinge on Sunday…
• If they sputter to the end of the campaign, they will be looking at a hard reset…
• If you’re relying on [luck], you’re not a very good team.

Maybe those guys gotta study the rulebook and figure it out.

Up next: If Deion Sanders is “Prime Time” then Shedeur must be “Early Window.” Cheers!