Did the Seahawks Create a Blueprint For Stopping Drake Maye and the Patriots' Offense?

Drake Maye and the New England Patriots may have a kryptonite.

In the team’s last two encounters with the Seattle Seahawks, that weakness may have been revealed to the entire NFL. With great success in Super Bowl LX and in Week 1 of the 2026 regular season, Seattle’s gameplan may soon become the blueprint for each of New England’s weekly opponents. That’ll start with the Pittsburgh Steelers in Week 2, but will be something to monitor each time Maye and the Patriots’ offense takes the field this fall.

Today, we take a closer look at the Seahawks’ strategy, and how other teams may attempt to employ similar tactics when facing off against New England’s MVP-runner up.

The 2025 regular season was one marked by incredible efficiency and accomplishment for Maye and the Patriots. 

In his first full season as a starter and at just 23-years-old, Maye took the league by storm, engineering a 14-3 record and recording 4,394 yards, 31 touchdowns, and just eight interceptions passing, and added 450 yards and four touchdowns rushing. Maye topped the league in several statistical categories, including yards per attempt (8.9), passer rating (113.5), QBR (77.1), and completion percentage over expectation (+9.1%). His NFL-best 72.0% completion percentage broke Tom Brady’s 2011 franchise record and ranks as the sixth-highest mark in NFL history.

He led the NFL in EPA/play (Expected Points Added per play, measures how much a play increases, or decreases, a team's expected scoring outcome compared to before the play happened) at +0.277, and his success was non-discriminant of defensive coverage (per Sumer Sports):

When the postseason arrived, Maye’s statistical outputs dropped-off precipitously. He played against some of the best defenses the league had to offer in four consecutive games, marking one of the most difficult runs by any quarterback in NFL history, and it showed. 

Not only was Maye facing his best competition, he was doing so against teams that seemed to lean into the rare crack in his armor during the regular season: Cover 6. This is how the coverage splits looked against Maye through the playoffs:

Maye still saw a large share of single-high safety coverages (Cover 3, Cover 1), and made the most of those opportunities when they presented themselves. The Cover 6 rate he saw began to see a substantial increase through the AFC Championship Game, as the Houston Texans (six plays), Denver Broncos (five plays), and Los Angeles Chargers (five plays) all began to work the coverage into their defensive package.

In Super Bowl LX, Seattle looked to exploit that weakness even further.

Last year, Seahawks’ head coach Mike Macdonald’s defensive scheme specialized in Cover 3 (ran on 212 of 705 dropbacks, 30.7%), with Cover 6 used as a frequent change-up (132 dropbacks, 19.1%). Seattle ran Cover 1 on 103 dropbacks (14.9%), Cover 4 and Cover 2 on 98 snaps (14.2% each), and Cover 0 on 25 dropbacks (3.6%). 

They showed a two-high (middle-field open) safety shell before the snap on 568 of 691 dropbacks (about 82%), making it their default pre-snap picture. Of those two-high looks, they rotated down to a single-high shell (middle-field closed) after the snap on 237 plays (about 42% of their open looks) — a disguise tendency, showing two safeties deep and then collapsing one late.

When building a gameplan to neutralize Maye on the game’s biggest stage, the Seahawks’ used their secondary coverage as a primary source of confusion for the young gunslinger. They held Maye to 27-of-43 passing with 295 yards, two touchdowns, two interceptions, one fumble lost, and six sacks. His EPA/play fell to -0.31 against a defense that ran Cover 6 substantially more than any other coverage. 

Seattle came out in Week 1 of the 2026 regular season with a similar gameplan, and after a disastrous fourth quarter for Maye, ended with similar results. Maye finished the game 23-of-33 passing with 178 yards, one touchdown, three interceptions, and three sacks, with an EPA/play of -0.14 — a clear improvement over his performance in February, but still a long ways away from the heights he achieved earlier last year. Here’s how that looked against the Seahawks by coverage faced:

In Super Bowl LX, Seattle showed two-high safeties on 47 of 53 dropbacks (89%) and rotated down to one-high after the snap on 15 of those plays (28%). That was also their most damaging coverage rotation against Maye, allowing an EPA/play of -0.844 on such snaps. The Seahawks stayed in two-high looks on 32 plays (60%) and also got the better of New England in those instances, resulting in an EPA/play of -0.256.

To kickoff the 2026 regular season, Seattle used a two-high safety shell on 33 of 42 dropbacks (79%) and stayed in that look on 25 plays post-snap (60%). On those plays, Maye and the Patriots registered a positive EPA/play of +0.116, but that was their lone highlight. The Seahawks rotated the safeties on nine snaps (40%) and registered a negative EPA/play across the board (-0.266 when rotating to one-high, -0.085 when rotating to two-high).

In both matchups, Seattle employed a high-percentage of Cover 6, with Cover 3 as their secondary shell post-snap. From his costly turnovers in the last two matchups to his regular season and playoff woes, it’s likely Maye will be seeing a lot more of those coverages in the coming weeks — and that may play right into the hands of Pittsburgh this Sunday.

The Steelers defeated New England in Week 3 of the 2025 regular season, 21-14, due in large part to five lost fumbles on the Patriots’ behalf. In the months since, Pittsburgh has endured a seismic shift in their coaching ranks, letting go of long-tenured head coach Mike Tomlin and replacing him with former Green Bay Packers’ and Dallas Cowboys’ lead-man Mike McCarthy.

McCarthy, an offensive-minded head coach, won’t be heading the charge defensively for the Steelers, however. That right belongs to newly acquired defensive coordinator Patrick Graham (formerly a defensive assistant coach in Foxboro from 2009-2015), who faced-off against Maye in the same role with the Las Vegas Raiders in Week 1 last season. 

Against Graham’s Las Vegas defense, New England fell, 20-13, with Maye completing 30-of-46 passes for 287 yards, one touchdown, one interception, and four sacks (one strip sack, recovered by left tackle Will Campbell). Here’s a closer look at Graham’s coverage run in Week 1 of 2025 against Maye, and in the 2026 season-opener against the Atlanta Falcons this past weekend:

Facing off against third-string quarterback Cooper Rush and an anemic Atlanta offense that turned the football over twice through the air in Week 1, Graham and the Pittsburgh defense weren’t forced to disguise much of their coverage. Graham’s preferred Cover 3 shell returned (nine plays, most frequently run coverage), but was outweighed heavily by two-high safety (Cover 2, Cover 4, and Cover 6) looks on 17 dropbacks in the smaller sample size.

Last week, the Steelers showed two-high pre-snap on 21 of 26 dropbacks (81%). Post-snap, they ended up in one-high coverage on 8 of 26 dropbacks (31%) — meaning only three of those 26 snaps (12%) disguised a two-high look pre-snap and rotated down to one safety after the snap, while none rotated the other direction (closed to open).

Pittsburgh’s lack of post-snap rotation in Week 1 bucked a trend for Graham dating back through 2025 with the Raiders, and could have been caused by the lack of a downfield passing threat from Atlanta’s side. Don’t expect that to continue against Maye.

In 2025, Graham’s Raiders showed a two-high shell on 374 dropbacks (63%), versus 216 snaps (36%) showing one-high safety. Their post-snap shell didn't match its pre-snap look on 208 of 593 dropbacks — about 35% of the time they rotated safeties after the snap, with "show 2-high, rotate to 1-high" (158 plays) being by far the more common disguise than the reverse (only 50 plays rotated from 1-high to 2-high).

Against Maye in the season-opener last year, Graham ran Cover 3 on 24-of-53 dropbacks (45.3%), but showed two-high safeties on 35 of 53 dropbacks (66%). They rotated the safeties post-snap on 21 of 53 dropbacks (40%) had the post-snap shell not match the pre-snap look, with 14 dropbacks (26%) disguised as a two-high pre-snap look that rotated down to one safety, and 7 snaps (13%) that showed one-high, then rotated to two-high.

Already planting the seeds of a Cover 6 change-up in the defensive arsenal, Graham ran the coverage six times on 26 dropbacks (23%) to begin 2026, as opposed to his three snaps on 53 dropbacks (0.56%) against Maye last September.

Like the Seahawks and previous postseason tilts, Maye can expect to see a high percentage of Cover 6 and Cover 3 on Sunday. 

Maye’s struggles against Cover 6 have been identified and exploited over the course of his last five games. 

Against some of the NFL’s elite defensive units, the numbers have not looked encouraging, and have set a precedent for future performances. The Steelers are the first in a line of teams that are waiting to continue that trend — and have already begun laying the foundation for their schematic approach to Sunday’s contest.

For the Patriots, they’ll enter with a clear understanding of how opponents will be trying to limit Maye’s effectiveness. For Maye, he’ll have the opportunity to prove that his recent woes were due to high-level competition, rather than repeated errors against similar defensive coverages. That could simplify the approach on New England’s end, and ultimately turn a weakness into a strength as Maye acclimates to his new playing conditions. But we’ll need to see that success translate onto the field before making that judgement.

How do you think Maye and the Patriots’ offense will fare against similar defensive coverages in 2026? Drop your thoughts in the comments below and join the conversation on Patriots Roundtable.

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