Jerod Mayo is perhaps the most unassuming coach in the NFL right now. The Super Bowl-winning linebacker turned rookie head coach has all the eyes on him as he gets his protégé, Drake Maye, ready for the coming season. It takes all sorts of smarts to learn Bill Belichick’s defense and Mayo did a great job of juggling it with physical strain as a linebacker.

Drew Bledsoe, Tom Brady’s senior, had a special relationship with Jerod Mayo. They both went on a trip with the New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft and there, the former player got to know the coach a little better. In view of this, since the football season is about to start, Bledsoe took to The Rich Eisen Show to give his take on the Patriots rebuild and recalled a story too.

“I got to spend a bunch of time with him,” Bledsoe shared. “We went on a trip together. Mr. Kraft took us to Israel and we both, Jerod and I were on that trip. I got to spend a week with him. He’s almost like a ‘Bond Villain.’ He’s an NFL linebacker so he’s got that physique but in high school, he was a white hat hacker. He was a computer nerd.”

Bledsoe further added, “He would break into companies and then he would tell them how he broke in so they could go fix their problem. So, you take an NFL linebacker body, and you got a computer nerd brain, he’s sort of like a superhero or a ‘Bond Villain’ kind of a dude.” Bledsoe thinks Mayo is a “great guy” and that players love him as a coach.

Speaking of Mayo’s physical prowess, he was a heavy hitter from the get-go. In his rookie year, he recorded a whopping 100 tackles, a forced fumble, a fumble recovery, and even defended 4 passes. Further in the 2010 season, Mayo recorded 114 solo tackles (175 total), had two sacks, a forced fumble, and defended 4 passes too. Rob Gronkowski even went as far as to dub him the “Tom Brady on the defensive side of the ball” and praised his football IQ too.

“Jerod Mayo was just a phenomenon on the football field with lining everyone up, and then also in the meeting rooms as well. He knew where every player needed to be during any situation that occurred on the defensive side of the ball,” Rob Gronkowski said on Julian Edelman’s podcast, Games with Names.

Coming back to rebuilding the Patriots, besides the Matthew Judon setback, Drake Maye is showing signs of improvement if we look at the past two games. Jerod Mayo, though, still has his heart set on Jacoby Brissett at QB1, but come Monday, things might be different.

Jerod Mayo is holding back on QB1 decisions!

Drake Maye played just one series in the preseason opener against the Carolina Panthers. He completed 2 of his 3 passes over 19 yards and that’s clearly not big enough of a sample size to make him the starter. But things seriously started to look up in the loss against the Eagles in the second game. Maye went 6 of 11 for 47 yards but didn’t score a touchdown.

In the meanwhile, the veteran Jacoby Brissett and Joe Milton (to a point) were holding the fort for the Pats. Mayo wanted to play it safe and didn’t want anyone to get their hopes up. “It’s a competition amongst all of the guys on the field, including the quarterback spot. Hopefully, that makes sense to you guys, but he’s [Brissett] still QB1.”

The Patriots will be going against the Commanders on Sunday 08/25 at 8:00 PM EDT and it will become clear after that where Brisett, Maye, Milton, and Zappe stand. “Sunday night game, it’s always kind of hard to crank through the film, especially on the road, but I think Monday, Monday-Tuesday, we probably need to know who it is. That doesn’t mean I’ll tell you on Monday or Tuesday,” the Patriots head coach informed the media.

Mayo sees the confidence growing in Drake Maye, but it might be too early to throw him out there on the battlefield with experienced defenses. Do you think Drake Maye should take a backseat this season? Let us know in the comments.