It's one thing to suffer a severe loss in September when you're still figuring out some things. It's another when you have a winning record and, in early November, get beaten by nearly three touchdowns at home. That's one of the many narratives surrounding the New England Patriots right now.

A 45-27 loss to the Green Bay Packers in Week 9 raised a lot of questions about coaching, both sides of the ball, and what happens when your best players don't show up to play on Sunday. Not talking about injuries, but more about not being mentally prepared.

The Patriots looked flat-out on their home field against the Packers. No physical prowess, no in-your-face dominance, and no real control of the game either. For the second time this year, a loss puts them in a hole where their identity is in question.

Let's see whose stock is up and who's fallen dramatically after the frustrating loss to the Packers. 

Stat sheets will show a disaster for the Patriots in Week 9 for the most part, but if you look hard enough, you'll see that DeMario "Pop" Douglas was an outlier.

For the second straight week, Douglas stepped in as Drake Maye's WR1 on the field, and even in an embarrassing loss, he still pulled in five catches for a career-high 102 yards. Douglas has been reliable over the last three games, with Romeo Doubs out and A.J. Brown returning, then immediately becoming week-to-week.

Douglas' impressive stats on Sunday gave New England its first 100-yard receiver of the 2026 season.

For the Patritos, it was too little, too late for the end-of-the-game spark they had in Week 9. The Packers had already had things locked in by the time RB3 Corey Kiner began to hit a stride. Still, he deserves some praise.

Kiner had eight touches for 55 yards, averaging 6.9 yards per carry. He would go on to score his first career touchdown in a meaningless fourth quarter for the Patriots.

A real key point here is this, though: in Week 9, Kiner racked up 224 return yards on special teams. He had nine kick returns that averaged 24.9 yards per return, with a long of 28 yards. If only the Patriots offense could branch off of what he was doing on special teams during the game.

As the trade deadline approached and has now passed, Christian Barmore was in the mix as a candidate the Patriots want to move, since he's on an expiring contract. Well, Barmore seems to be sticking around for the remainder of 2026 at least.

Barmore had a positive night, regardless of how the rest of the Patriots' defense looked. He anchored the interior defensive line with one sack, one quarterback hit, four combined tackles, and one tackle for a loss.

Barmore's reps fueled trade rumors leading up to Tuesday's trade deadline. He recorded a season-low 26 of 61 defensive snaps (39%).

What is there to say about Christian Gonzalez's Week 9 performance that hasn't been said in the last 48 hours? When the final whistle blew on the 45-27 loss, Gonzalez posted the worst game of his NFL career.

Surrendering 11 catches on 12 targets for 192 yards and two touchdowns, Gonzalez finished the game with a PFF grade of 25.7 (career low).

Gonzalez became the first defender since at least 2018 to allow more than 80 receiving yards to two different receivers (Matthew Golden and Christian Watson) in the same game. When Mike Vrabel spoke about his key players needing to have a good game, Gonzalez is undoubtedly one of them.

The other player Vrabel subliminally mentioned in his post-game press conference was no doubt quarterback Drake Maye. The third-year face of the franchise had three first-half interceptions that helped the Patriots fail on numerous offensive drives.

The Packers' defense repeatedly made Maye second-guess throws throughout the game and baited him into forced throws against their zone coverage.

Maye walked out of Gillette Stadium with 11 interceptions on the season, which now ties Justin Herbert of the Los Angeles Chargers for the worst in the NFL.

As Carlton Davis III left the game with a knee injury, rookie Karon Prunty came in. It's hard to blame him here given the circumstances he was walking into, espicially in the secondary, but either way, Prunty didn't necessarily help them out.

With the Packers already striking hard at the Patriots' major defensive backs, quarterback Jordan Love also went after the inexperience of the rookie cornerback. On a free-release slot fade, Prunty gave up a 10-yard touchdown pass to Savion Williams.

Week 9 marked Prunty's biggest workload of his very young NFL career, but he was credited with zero passes defended and three tackles (one solo, one assisted), none of which were tackles for loss.

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