THE CLAIM
Drake Maye had a turnover-plagued start to the season with six interceptions and a fumble lost in his first three games, but had seemed to calm things down, with only two turnovers in the next three games. But the ugly turnover bug came back last night, costing the New England Patriots an excellent opportunity in the Chicago Bears’ red zone.
The Ringer’s Sheil Kapadia points out that turnovers are the Achilles’ heel for an otherwise successful Patriots offense.
How worried should the Patriots be about Maye’s turnover woes, and it is simply part of his game to take elevated risks with the ball?
THE VERDICT: AN UNLUCKY GUNSLINGER
It’s true that turnovers have detracted from otherwise excellent play more for Drake Maye than any other quarterback in the NFL, and the Patriots have suffered as a consequence.
But Maye’s play in 2025 doesn’t show a reckless quarterback, with the notable exception of his struggles in the playoffs.
If anything, Maye has been unlucky to have as many turnovers as he’s had this year, meaning the natural regression in his play, combined with better luck, should elevate his impact back to one of the top quarterbacks in the NFL, benefiting the Patriots greatly.
THE EVIDENCE
Drake Maye is on an island if you plot the landscape of NFL quarterbacks in terms of non-turnover efficiency and turnover impact: He’s excellent in the former, horrible in the latter.
Maye ranks fourth in EPA per dropback (excluding garbage time) on non-turnover plays, trailing only Lamar Jackson, Brock Purdy and Josh Allen. But while nearly all of the other top quarterbacks by that measure also avoid turnovers, Maye has been the fourth-worst in turnover EPA per play. He’s all by himself in the plot above.
But that wasn’t always the case, as Maye’s 43.8 expected points lost to turnovers in 2026 is already approaching his 17-game total in 2025 (48.1).
If we look back at Maye’s 2025 regular season, his turnover rate per play was significantly lower (1.8% to 3.9%), averaging 1.3 interceptions per 100 dropbacks, which has jumped to 3.2 this year. While Maye struggled with turnovers in the playoffs last season, it was as much due to taking sacks and fumbles lost as to interceptions. Maye’s much larger history as a quarterback in 2025 shows that his elevated interceptions this year will likely regress to a “true” number closer to 2%.
Fumbles lost are the other part of the turnover equation, and Maye appears to be on a poor luck streak there also. Maye’s sack rate has improved from 7.8% (22nd best) in 2025 to 5.2% (12th) this year, but he has only one fewer fumble lost in seven games than all of last year, having taken 34 fewer sacks. Maye had an elevated fumble rate in the 2025 playoffs, but that corresponded with a leap in sack rate that we haven’t seen in 2026.
