The Patriots Lost to Seattle Again — Except This Time Drew Lock Did It

The NFL season officially began Wednesday night with the exact matchup New England probably wanted and, by the end of the night, probably wishes it could avoid for another seven months. Seattle Seahawks 13. New England Patriots 10. Same opponent that ended New England's season in the Super Bowl. Same result.

I tweeted during the game, “What’s worse, losing the Super Bowl in embarrassing fashion, or losing seven months later on a Wednesday night to the same team that beat you in the Super Bowl?” I still do not really know the answer, but watching New England blow a 10-0 lead against Drew Lock certainly makes the argument interesting.

The Patriots had seven months to sit with a 29-13 Super Bowl loss to Seattle. They spent the offseason trying to fix the exact weaknesses the Seahawks exposed, most notably trading for A.J. Brown and signing Romeo Doubs to give Drake Maye more help at receiver. Then they walked back into Seattle on opening night, watched the Seahawks raise their championship banner, got an early break when Sam Darnold was injured on Seattle's opening possession, built a 10-point lead and still found a way to lose.

That is a difficult opening night to explain away.

Seattle's night almost immediately looked like it was heading toward disaster. Darnold was sacked by former Seahawk Dre'Mont Jones on Seattle's first offensive series and injured his right hip. He completed just one of two passes for 13 yards before leaving, and Seattle ruled him out before halftime. Initial X-rays and a CT scan showed no fracture, which Mike Macdonald called encouraging news, but Darnold is undergoing an MRI to determine the extent of the injury.

That should have been the game for New England.

You are playing the defending champions, their starting quarterback goes down five plays into the season and Drew Lock has to come off the bench after attempting only three passes all of last year. If you consider yourself a Super Bowl contender, that is a game you have to win.

For most of the first three quarters, it looked like New England would.

Seattle could barely move the football. New England led 7-0 at halftime after Drake Maye found rookie tight end Eli Raridon for the game's first touchdown, and the Patriots eventually stretched the lead to 10-0. Seattle didn't even get on the board until Jason Myers kicked a field goal with 3:13 left in the third quarter.

Then the entire game flipped.

And the weirdest part is that the guy who flipped it was Drew Lock.

Lock finished 16-of-22 for 187 yards and a touchdown after being thrown into the game almost immediately. Those numbers aren't going on an MVP plaque, but considering the circumstances, I don't know how much more Seattle could have asked from him. He didn't panic. He didn't start playing hero ball. He hung around long enough for Seattle's defense to take over, then delivered the biggest offensive play of the night when the Seahawks desperately needed it.

Trailing 10-3 early in the fourth quarter, Seattle faced fourth-and-1.

Lock used play action and found Jaxon Smith-Njigba underneath. What looked like it might be a routine conversion turned into a 45-yard touchdown when Smith-Njigba turned upfield and found open grass. Suddenly a game New England had controlled almost the entire night was tied 10-10.

Smith-Njigba ended up being Seattle's offensive star, finishing with eight receptions for 122 yards and the touchdown. Once again, when Seattle needed somebody to create offense, JSN was the guy.

But if Drew Lock deserves credit for surviving, Seattle's defense deserves credit for winning the game.

Drake Maye threw interceptions on New England's final three possessions.

Three straight drives.

Three interceptions.

That is almost impossible to survive.

Maye finished 23-of-33 for 178 yards, one touchdown and three picks. For the first three quarters, he had largely played a controlled game and New England looked like it was going to grind out an ugly road win. Then the fourth quarter turned into a complete disaster.

The first interception came when Maye tried to attack deep looking for Romeo Doubs. The ball was tipped into the air and Nehemiah Pritchett came down with it.

Then came the sequence that Doubs is going to hear about all week.

Doubs had a crossing route that should have resulted in a first down. The ball hit him and he dropped it. On the very next play, Maye tried to attack over the middle and Julian Love intercepted him.

That is about as bad a two-play stretch as you can have after signing a major contract with a new team.

Doubs signed with New England in March after four seasons in Green Bay. His contract is worth roughly $68 million over four years with about $39 million guaranteed, depending on the reported accounting of the deal. He is being paid to become an important piece of Maye's receiving corps.

Opening night stat line?

Zero catches.

Zero yards.

And one enormous drop before an interception.

There are 16 games left, so obviously nobody should declare the contract a disaster after one night. Doubs had a career-best 724 receiving yards and six touchdowns for Green Bay last season, and there is a reason New England wanted him. But when a team invests around $17 million annually in a receiver, the expectation is that he helps win games like this.

Wednesday night, he did not.

That became even more painful because New England lost A.J. Brown during the third quarter.

Brown injured his right ankle when a Seattle defender landed on him while breaking up a pass. He was initially listed as questionable, was eventually ruled out and left the stadium in a walking boot. Brown had three catches for 26 yards before leaving and also drew the defensive pass interference penalty that helped set up New England's first touchdown.

That injury might ultimately be the biggest story coming out of this game.

New England gave up significant draft capital to acquire Brown specifically because it needed an elite receiver for games like this. The Patriots traded Philadelphia a 2028 first-round pick and a 2027 fifth-rounder for him. If Brown misses meaningful time, the entire shape of New England's offense changes immediately.

And they were already playing without TreVeyon Henderson, who was ruled out before the game because of an ankle injury.

Henderson led New England in rushing last season with 911 yards and nine rushing touchdowns. So by the second half Wednesday, the Patriots were trying to close out Seattle without Henderson and without Brown.

That matters.

It does not excuse what happened.

New England still had a 10-0 lead against Drew Lock.

That's where I'm having trouble giving them much sympathy.

Even after Seattle tied the game, the Patriots still had opportunities to regain control. Instead, Maye threw the second interception, Seattle turned it into a 26-yard Jason Myers field goal and suddenly the Seahawks led 13-10 with under six minutes remaining.

Then New England got one final chance.

To Maye's credit, the Patriots actually moved the football. They converted fourth-and-2 when Maye scrambled for five yards, then converted fourth-and-9 after the two-minute warning on an 11-yard completion to Mack Hollins. They got themselves well within range of kicker Andy Borregales, who had already hit from 50 yards earlier in the game.

New England could have played for overtime.

Instead, they went for the win.

I actually do not hate that decision.

You're on the road. You have momentum. Your offense has finally moved the football. Go win the game.

The problem was the throw.

On third-and-5 with 21 seconds left, Maye underthrew Hollins near the goal line and Josh Jobe stepped in front of it for interception No. 3.

Ballgame.

Seattle 13. New England 10.

That was it.

Seven months after Seattle intercepted New England's hopes of winning the Super Bowl, Seattle intercepted New England's final three possessions in the rematch.

There is something almost poetic about that.

Extremely annoying poetry if you're a Patriots fan, but poetry nonetheless.

For Seattle, this is the kind of win that says something about why this team won the championship in the first place.

Their starting quarterback gets hurt immediately.

Their offense does practically nothing for three quarters.

They're down 10-0.

And instead of folding, the backup quarterback stays composed, the defense starts hunting turnovers and the Seahawks figure out a way to leave the stadium 1-0.

That is championship-team behavior.

It doesn't always look pretty.

Sometimes the defending champion wins because it has Patrick Mahomes.

Sometimes it wins because Drew Lock survives until the defense steals the football three times.

You take both.

Lock is unquestionably one of the biggest winners from opening night. Nobody entered Wednesday expecting him to become one of the major stories of Week 1. By midnight, he had just led the defending champions back from a 10-point deficit after being unexpectedly forced into the game on the first possession.

If Darnold's MRI reveals anything that keeps him out beyond a short period, Lock may suddenly become extremely important to Seattle's season.

Seattle should obviously hope that isn't necessary.

The good news is that the early imaging showed no fracture. The unknown is whether there is any soft-tissue damage that could cost Darnold time.

For New England, the injury concern is Brown.

The performance concern is Maye.

The “what exactly did we pay for?” concern after one game is Doubs.

And the psychological concern is that Seattle appears to have become the one team this Patriots group simply cannot finish against.

That's what takes me back to the tweet I sent during the game.

What is worse?

Getting embarrassed by Seattle in the Super Bowl?

Or spending seven months thinking about it, going back to the exact same stadium, watching their championship banner go up, watching their starting quarterback leave almost immediately, building a 10-0 lead against Drew Lock...

…and losing to them again?

I think Wednesday might actually be worse.

The Super Bowl obviously matters infinitely more.

But New England had every possible chance to make a small statement that February was behind them.

Instead, it looked like the exact same matchup in a different month.

Seattle stayed patient.

Seattle's defense made the defining plays.

New England made the mistakes.

And when the game was there to be won, the Seahawks took it.

Drew Lock is 1-0.

The defending champions are 1-0.

The Patriots are 0-1.

A.J. Brown and Sam Darnold are now injury stories we need to follow.

Romeo Doubs gets to spend the next week staring at a zero in the box score after signing a huge contract.

Drake Maye gets to spend it watching film of three fourth-quarter interceptions.

And New England gets to spend another seven days answering questions about losing to the same team that ruined their previous season.

The NFL is officially back.

And somehow Seattle is already ruining the Patriots' year again.