Ugly Is Still a Win

Seahawks Survive a Sloppy Kickoff

If you stayed up late Wednesday night hoping the NFL would kick off 2026 with a fireworks show, I hope you didn’t pay for premium seats. What we got from Lumen Field was less Super Bowl rematch and more first scrimmage of August with the scoreboard turned on. Punts. Flags. Stalled drives. And then, just when it looked like New England had quietly pocketed a road win against the champs, Drake Maye soiled the bed.

Final: Seahawks 13, Patriots 10.

Let’s be honest about what this was. It was a bad football game with a dramatic ending. Those aren’t the same thing, even if the final 21 seconds tried to convince us otherwise.

The Throw

We’ll start where everyone in New England is starting.

The Patriots had done the hard part. Maye had dragged his offense down the field on the final possession, converting two fourth downs along the way, including a strike to Mack Hollins on fourth-and-9 right after the two-minute warning. He then picked up a first down with his legs on third-and-1 in the final minute. New England sat at the Seattle 16. Andy Borregales, who had already drilled a 50-yarder earlier in the night, was standing on the sideline with a chip shot and overtime in his back pocket.

And then Maye did the one thing you cannot do.

On third-and-5, he felt pressure, drifted, and floated a back-footed lob toward Hollins in the right corner of the end zone. Josh Jobe undercut it, tapped both toes, and that was that. Ball game, with 21 seconds on the clock.

Afterward, Maye didn’t dodge it. He acknowledged he was trying to get rid of the ball, saw Hollins deep, and simply didn’t put enough on the throw. His one-word verdict on the play was the right one: “It was unacceptable.”

Give the kid credit for owning it. But understand the gravity. Worst case, you kick the field goal and go to overtime. Best case, you take a shot where only your guy can make a play. Maye chose door number three: throw it up in a spot where only their guy could make a play.

That was his third interception, and all three came on New England’s final three possessions, every one of them in the fourth quarter. The first was a deep shot to Romeo Doubs into double coverage that was tipped and hauled in by Nehemiah Pritchett. Seattle cashed that in for the tying touchdown. The second came after Doubs dropped a wide-open ball that would have moved the chains; on the very next snap, Maye tried to thread one over the middle toward DeMario Douglas, and Julian Love read it the whole way, which should sound familiar to anyone who watched February’s Super Bowl. Seattle turned that one into the go-ahead field goal.

Maye finished 23 of 33 for 178 yards with a touchdown and those three picks. Run that through the formula and you get a passer rating of 54.9. For perspective, this is a quarterback who led the league in passer rating (113.5) a season ago. NFL Pro tracking had him 0-for-4 with all three interceptions on throws of 20-plus air yards.

What makes this maddening for Dave Portnoy (who should stick to pizza reviews) and the other insufferable Patriots’ fans, is that Maye was fine for three quarters. Through the third quarter he was 17 of 22 for 127 yards and a score. He was a perfect 10 of 12 through the first half, with his lone touchdown going to rookie tight end Eli Raridon, the first TD of the NFL season. Josh McDaniels kept things conservative early. ESPN’s tracking showed only one first-half throw traveling more than 10 air yards, with Maye’s other 11 attempts covering a combined 15 air yards. Patient? Sure. Explosive? Hardly. And the moment Maye decided to stop being patient, the game flipped. By his own admission, that’s exactly what happened.

15 thousand people have put their trust in me tonight. I am going to fight like hell for you. Thats my pledge pic.twitter.com/aVb09xFRlp

— Dave Portnoy (@stoolpresidente) September 9, 2026

The Pressure Came Late

Here’s the thing about Mike Macdonald’s defense. It doesn’t need to beat you for 60 minutes. It just needs you to blink.

In the first half, McDaniels had answers. NFL.com noted the Patriots’ well-timed counters neutralized many of the edge blitzes that wrecked them back in February. Maye was flushed and forced to scramble several times, but he wasn’t sacked in the first half, and New England didn’t commit a penalty or turn the ball over through two quarters. Mike Vrabel said afterward that he felt his team picked up most of the pressure, though Seattle got home on a couple of zero blitzes.

But as the game wore on, the aggression started to land. Devon Witherspoon had already come through unblocked on the opening drive to force a throwaway, and by the fourth quarter the looks were getting in Maye’s head. On the final interception, he sensed DeMarcus Lawrence coming from his left, bailed, and threw off his back foot.

Per ESPN, Seattle finished with 3 sacks and pressured Maye during 36% of his drop backs.

Flag Football

If turnovers decided this game, penalties made sure it was ugly getting there.

Seattle was flagged six times for 68 yards in the first half alone, while the Patriots somehow didn’t have a single infraction on the road in one of the loudest buildings in football. The Seahawks’ offense couldn’t get out of its own way with false starts, and the laundry directly fed New England’s scoring. Jobe was flagged for pass interference on an underthrown flea-flicker to A.J. Brown, putting the ball at the 2 and setting up Eli Raridon’s 2-yard TD reception. On the opening drive of the second half, a Patriots three-and-out turned into points when Chazz Surratt was called for roughing the kicker, extending the drive for Borregales’ 50-yard field goal.

Seattle kept shooting itself in the foot. Drew Lock appeared to hit Cooper Kupp for a touchdown late in the third quarter, only to have it wiped out by an illegal shift; the Seahawks settled for a 30-yard field goal. After Love’s interception, Seattle’s trip to the red zone was littered with flags and ended in a 26-yard chip shot rather than a touchdown.

New England wasn’t immune in the second half either. A delay of game backed the Patriots up to their own end zone before a punt in the third quarter, and Maye himself said the penalties “added up a little bit” after the break. All told, the game produced 17 accepted penalties for a total of 148 yards.

The Injuries That Matter More Than the Score

Seattle fans had a banner to raise and a title defense to begin. Five plays in, the mood changed.

Sam Darnold was sacked by Dre’Mont Jones on third down on the opening drive and came up limping with a right hip injury. He visited the blue tent, headed to the locker room, and was downgraded to out before halftime. After the game, Darnold underwent a CT scan at Harborview Medical Center, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter. Macdonald said a fracture appeared to be ruled out, calling it great news, but the initial test was described as encouraging and not conclusive. An MRI was scheduled for Thursday. The Seahawks visit Arizona on Sept. 20, and nobody knows yet who will be under center.

The good news for Seattle: Drew Lock was exactly what you want from a backup. He went 16 of 22 for 187 yards and a touchdown with a 113.3 passer rating, took what was there, and didn’t try to be a hero. His biggest throw was a quick strike to Jaxon Smith-Njigba on fourth-and-1 out of heavy 22 personnel. New England sold out for the run, Christian Gonzalez got pulled into the flat, and the reigning Offensive Player of the Year did the rest on a 45-yard catch-and-run to tie it. JSN finished with eight catches for 122 yards, 69 of them in the fourth quarter.

For New England, the injury may sting longer. A.J. Brown, the marquee offseason acquisition the Patriots gave up two draft picks to land, went down on a third-down incompletion on the first drive of the second half. Replay showed Pritchett’s knee landing on Brown’s right ankle as he reached for a low throw. Brown walked off under his own power but was ruled out entering the fourth quarter. He finished with three catches for 26 yards on four targets, plus that drawn pass interference that set up the Patriots’ touchdown.

Vrabel had no update after the game. What we do know is how much the offense changed without him. Doubs, in his Patriots debut after signing a four-year, $68 million deal, was involved in the first interception and dropped the ball that preceded the second. Maye himself admitted he missed Brown’s presence and should have put the throw that led to the injury on his chest.

Relax. It’s Week 1.

Now, before anyone in Foxborough starts drafting the obituary, let’s get some perspective.

Losing a season opener tells you almost nothing about February. Want proof? Look no further than the two teams on the field Wednesday night. Both of them lost in Week 1 last season. Seattle dropped a 17-13 decision at home to San Francisco. New England lost its opener at home to the Raiders. TO THE RAIDERS!

Seven months later, they were playing in Super Bowl LX.

The Patriots of all franchises should know this. The 2003 Patriots got shut out 31-0 in Buffalo on opening day and went on to win Super Bowl XXXVIII. The 2001 team that started the dynasty lost its opener too. More recently, the 2023 Chiefs lost the Kickoff Game at home to Detroit and still hoisted the Lombardi Trophy, and the 2020 Buccaneers opened with a loss in New Orleans before winning it all.

One game, one throw, one bad fourth quarter. The season is 17 games long. As Maye said, you can’t take them back, but you do get another one on Sept. 20 when the Steelers come to Gillette.

On the other side, Seattle’s win extends a remarkable run. NFL Research notes Macdonald is now just the seventh head coach in league history to win more than 10 straight games before turning 40, with five of the previous six enshrined in Canton. Not bad company.

Was This a Preview of Week 1 Offense Everywhere?

Here’s where I’d pump the brakes on judging either offense too harshly, and maybe the rest of the league’s too.

Neither team ran an offensive play in opposing territory until the Patriots crossed midfield with a little over 10 minutes left in the second quarter. Neither team converted a third down in the first quarter. The two punters combined for seven punts on the first eight possessions. Through three quarters, the teams had scored 13 combined points. New England’s first quarter featured 13 offensive plays and just three passes.

Why? Part of it is two very good defenses. But part of it, as the Boston Globe’s Christopher Price pointed out at halftime, is plain old early-season rust. Neither starting quarterback played a snap in the preseason. Think about that. Darnold lasted five plays. Maye’s first live action with Brown and Doubs came in a Super Bowl rematch in one of the loudest stadiums in the sport. New England was also breaking in a new-look offensive line and a punter elevated from the practice squad just that afternoon.

This is the modern NFL. Starters are wrapped in bubble wrap all August, and the first time a unit plays together at full speed, against a defense actually game-planning for it, is the regular season opener. Timing is off. Communication is off. Receivers and quarterbacks aren’t yet on the same page. Flags fly.

Will we see the same thing across the league this weekend, including when the Ravens open in Indianapolis? Maybe. It’s one game and a small sample, so I’m not declaring a trend. But if you see a lot of three-and-outs, false starts, and quarterbacks throwing to spots where receivers used to be, don’t be shocked. Limited live snaps together as a unit have a way of showing up on opening weekend, and the defenses, which don’t need nearly as much choreography to be disruptive, tend to be ahead of the offenses.

Wednesday night may have just been the trailer to this weekend’s feature film.

The Bottom Line

Seattle won ugly, lost its quarterback for who-knows-how-long, and still found a way, because that defense doesn’t care who’s taking snaps on the other side.

New England played well enough to win for 45 minutes, then watched its young franchise quarterback give the game away over the final 15. That’s the part that’ll sting. Not the loss itself, but the manner of it.

The good news for Patriots fans?

Week 1 has never been a crystal ball.

The bad news?

Maye’s next interception-free Sunday can’t come soon enough.

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