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Why Drake Maye could hit the ground running in Josh McDaniels’ offense originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

NEW ORLEANS — There are myriad benefits to Drake Maye having Josh McDaniels as his new offensive coordinator, including McDaniels’ experience as a play-caller, his willingness to adapt to his players, and his voluminous knowledge of NFL defenses.

But in addition to all that, having McDaniels as his offensive coordinator gives Maye the ability to learn elements of his second offense in as many seasons before McDaniels is even allowed to coach him up.

Because this will be McDaniels’ third go-round as offensive coordinator in New England, there exists an expansive library of video clips from those previous McDaniels-led seasons — a throwback highlight reel of sorts, featuring Tom Brady, Rob Gronkowski and others — that Maye can dive into.

The 22-year-old quarterback told NBC Sports Boston this week in New Orleans that, as a fan of Brady’s, he couldn’t help but be drawn to watching the old Brady tape at his disposal last fall even though he was running a different offense under West Coast disciple Alex Van Pelt.

🔊 Next Pats Podcast: EXCLUSIVE: Drake Maye FIRED UP to work with Josh McDaniels | Listen & Subscribe | Watch on YouTube

“I found myself last season saying, ‘Hey, what did Tom Brady look like in seven-on-seven?’ or ‘What did Tom Brady look like in quarterback individual?’” Maye said.

“You find yourself, you know, flipping through the database and pulling up Tom. What a cool thing to have film on Tom, you know, back in the day. I found myself (watching) him throwing to Gronk in seven-on-seven so it’s pretty cool.”

Not only does playing for the same franchise Brady did give Maye access to all that video. But when he watches Brady running the McDaniels offense, he’ll be able to see play-calls right there on his screen and get a feel for McDaniels’ verbiage, if that’s the language McDaniels plans to import.

That’s no small benefit given the collectively-bargained restrictions on how much players and coaches can interact during the offseason.

For example, Maye could pull up a clip of an empty-formation play run by Brady, and along with the video clip he may see a play-call that on an old Brady wristband would read something like this:

G EMP RT HING 74 SPEC ILL A BENDER JET (DBL)

Maye would then watch a play run from a shotgun (“G”) empty (“EMP”) formation with the tight end on the right side of the formation (“RT”). He’ll see the H-back, aligned out wide on the two-man side of the formation, and motion in toward the ball before the snap (“HING”). He would know “74” is a dropback protection and that “Special Illinois” would tell his pass-catchers exactly what to do.

On the three-man “Special” side of the formation, the outside receiver runs a locked five-yard hitch, the No. 2 runs a seam, and the No. 3 runs an under route over the middle about five yards off the line of scrimmage. On the two-man “Illinois” side of the formation, the outside receiver would run a 12-yard in-cut, and the No. 2 would run an under route over the middle about three yards off the line.

(You can learn more on “Special Illinois” here from former Patriots offensive coordinator and Penn State head coach Bill O’Brien.)

The “A” in the play-call stands for “alert,” meaning if Brady decided to change the play at the line, he’d point to the ear holes of his helmet, shout “Alert!” and expect some altered routes.

The “Bender” is a seam route that bends to the numbers at about 15 yards and then turns in toward the nearest upright. “Jet” is a route combination to the two-man side of the formation, featuring a hitch on the outside and a “juke” route on the inside.

The snap count is “DBL” here, meaning it’s a silent count from the shotgun where the quarterback doubles-up on heel-lifts for the center to know when to snap the football.

It looks like a lot. Spoken aloud, it sounds like a mouthful. But it’s sequenced and encoded to ultimately help players think quickly and understand assignments clearly.

  • G EMP RT (gun, empty, tight end on the right)

  • HING (H motions in)

  • 74 (dropback protection)

  • SPEC ILL (concept)

  • A (alert)

  • BENDER (seam: 15 yards to numbers, then to upright)

  • JET (hitch/juke to weak side of formation)

  • DBL (silent gun snap count, two heel lifts)

With enough time on task studying McDaniels’ system, Maye theoretically could become a proficient enough decoder to teach himself a new offensive language this offseason. At the very least, he can get a jump start on becoming fluent in McDaniels, which gives him a bit of an advantage as he tries to get his arms around his second offensive scheme in as many seasons.

“You know, obviously I think I’m a bright kid and I don’t think it will be too challenging,” Maye said. “But obviously, you know, I think it’s a new offense, and you’ve got to do it, and they don’t give you much time to work with coaches during this time period. You got to have time off.

“Fortunately, like I said, we’ve got the whole library from years ago back when the greatest to ever do it did it in the same offense. And what a guy to watch film on. And, of course, coach McDaniels has been one of the best in the business as a coordinator. Looking forward to running the offense that Tom Brady did.”

Even though Maye’s time this offseason learning directly from McDaniels will be limited, he does have the good fortune to have Brady and McDaniels’ greatest hits at his fingertips.

In some ways, those clips and their corresponding play-calls could function as his own personal Rosetta Stone before immersing himself in a different language in his second season.

Drake Maye FIRED UP to work with Josh McDaniels | The Next Pats Podcast

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