Are the Patriots Better Than the Team the Seahawks Destroyed in the Super Bowl?
New England upgraded at wide receiver and offensive line, but many of the flaws that got exposed by Seattle in the Super Bowl remain unanswered heading into Week 1.
The Seattle Seahawks will play back-to-back games against the New England Patriots, just seven months apart. With 53 days until Week 1, and Seahawks rookies reporting to camp on Friday, it’s a good time to ask the question:
Will the Patriots be a better team than the one that looked inept and unqualified when they reached the Super Bowl and ran into Seattle?
Spoiler alert: The answer for me is a resounding…Eh.
The Patriots did the classic move of adding players at the positions perceived to be the biggest weaknesses, like trading for A.J. Brown and acquiring several new starting offensive linemen, and obviously these moves couldn’t hurt.
But what New England did not do — and few playoff teams ever do — is address the real elephant in the room:
The Patriots were so overrated when they got to the Super Bowl.
Therefore, many of the weaknesses that got overshadowed by problems at receiver and offensive line will either be exactly the same, or are heavily reliant on internal development. Will New England put up a better fight on September 9?
These are a few of the most notable differences.
A.J. Brown replaces Stefon Diggs
As if there wasn’t enough room for two sex scandals on the team, the Patriots decided to not bring back Diggs and he remains a free agent as he defends himself in civil court just months after going through a criminal trial. Those issues aside, New England would have still pursued wide receiver upgrades and moved on from Diggs, which is what they did by trading for Brown and signing Romeo Doubs as a free agent.
Interestingly, despite adding two, they’ve still only subtracted one. Back again are Mack Hollins, Kyle Williams, Kayshon Boutte, and DeMario Douglas, which I believe does imply the Patriots will let camp decide who to cut or trade before Week 1.
But just in case you want a reminder of how bad the Patriots are at drafting wide receivers, in the previous four years alone:
2022: Tyquan Thornton, 2nd round (waived during 3rd season)
2023: Boutte, Douglas, 6th round
2024: Ja’Lynn Polk, 2nd round (traded prior to 2nd season)
2024: Javon Baker, 4th round (cut prior to 2nd season)
2025: Kyle Williams, 3rd round (fighting for survival in year 2)
Nobody said drafting receivers was easy, but since 2015 the Seahawks have found Tyler Lockett, DK Metcalf, and Jaxon Smith-Njigba within the first three rounds of the draft. Just 10 percent of any of those Seattle examples would be better than any top-150 pick receiver the Patriots have drafted since Deion Branch in 2002.
That tangent brought to you by the fact that New England traded a 2028 first-round pick for Brown and gave Doubs a four-year, $68 million contract despite never gaining 750 yards in a season.
They gave Doubs more money than the Seahawks gave Rashid Shaheed, and there is no bonus value coming from Doubs on special teams. He has to prove it all on offense:
In 59 career games, Romeo Doubs has never hit 100 yards. Never.
(Curiously, in four career playoff games, he’s done it twice.)
Now playing with Maye and opposite of Brown, perhaps Doubs will experience a triumphant second act. All he’s really being asked to do is be better than Mack Hollins, and that is a test he should pass.
Of course, Brown is also better than Diggs, and he will also be motivated for the first time in a long time.
Being productive in this offense won’t be as much of a struggle for Brown as it was in Philadelphia, so a great season, maybe even a career year, is not out of the question.
For what it’s worth, Brown has only faced the Seahawks twice, once with the Titans and once with the Eagles. In those games, Brown combined to catch eight passes for 99 yards on 19 targets. And Seattle’s defense is better now than it was during that era.
Offensive Line Changes
Going into the Super Bowl, narratives painted Drake Maye as a quarterback headed into elite territory, citing New England’s top-three rankings in points, yards, and passing yards. Onlookers also recognized that the Patriots managed these numbers despite a lack of talent at receiver and along the offensive line.
(Almost everybody: ESPN’s Mike Reiss predicted a Patriots win because of their offensive line matchup against Seattle’s defensive line.)
The Seahawks sacked Maye six times in the Super Bowl (he set a playoff record by being sacked 21 times total) and top-five pick Will Campbell was credited with 14 pressures allowed…the most by any offensive lineman in ANY game, including the regular season.
Immediately after the season, the Patriots traded center Garrett Bradbury, parted ways with Diggs, brought in those two receivers, added a new fullback named Reggie Gilliam, and could have new starters at three offensive line positions in 2026:
Jared Wilson moved to center after playing guard last season
Signed guard Alijah Vera-Tucker in free agency
Drafted tackle Caleb Lomu in the first round
Offensive line coach Doug Marrone has his work cut out for him.
These players may be more talented than their predecessors, but Wilson is moving to a new position; Vera-Tucker’s career has been anything but than the slam dunk it was assumed to be as a first-round pick in 2021 and he hasn’t played since 2024; Lomu is a rookie, and beating veteran Morgan Moses by Week 1 will be a challenge.
If by some miracle they’re all starting in Week 1, will they have any chemistry?
Those question marks also serve as distractions from the ones about Campbell and right guard Mike Onwenu.
Is New England’s offensive line “better” than the one Seattle ate in the Super Bowl?
There’s no question the Patriots are much happier about the direction they’re headed in compared to where they were seven months ago, but the Week 1 version of this offensive line could actually be worse than the one the Seahawks faced.
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Underwhelming Defensive Changes
The way that Patriots fans were talking about New England’s defense headed in the Super Bowl, you would have thought they were accidentally the wrong half of the preview guide and mistaking them for Seattle.
This argument was built entirely off of a Super Bowl team playing one of the easiest pre-Super Bowl stretches that we’ve seen in decades.
Raw numbers: 46 points allowed in 5 games
Context: Jets (Brady Cook), Dolphins (Quinn Ewers), Chargers (Justin Herbert), Texans (CJ Stroud), Broncos (Jarrett Stidham)
The Seahawks’ previous five opponents? Matthew Stafford, Bryce Young, Brock Purdy, Brock Purdy, Matthew Stafford. Seattle faced the MVP with Sean McVay twice, and a quarterback better than all of those quarterbacks except Herbert with Kyle Shanahan twice.
And the Seahawks still finished with defensive stats that vastly exceeded New England’s.
In most categories, the Patriots were above-average. In some, like 30th in red zone defense, they were awful. But New England’s offseason was so fixated on fixing the offense that very little has changed about the defense:
Signed OLB Dre’Mont Jones
Signed S Kevin Byard
Drafted OLB Gabe Jacas
Jones probably won’t be much different than the player you saw in Seattle as recently as two years ago. Byard is 33. Jacas isn’t likely to have much of an immediate impact.
The Patriots already have some great defensive players, otherwise they wouldn’t have reached the Super Bowl.
Players like CB Christian Gonzalez (negotiating new deal), DT Milton Williams, and DT Christian Barmore are the most obvious and perhaps stand alone in that regard.
Perhaps most of New England’s optimism revolves around defensive coordinator Zak Kuhr, who enters his second season on the job and is viewed as a coach who might have a Mike Macdonald-type rise, although he still has a lot more to prove for that type of belief.
The Patriots’ defense could be better than last season based on in-house development, but there’s little to suggest that they will be better. If they’re just the same, that’s not bad. Don’t get it confused with great.
Patriots: Better, Worse, or Same?
If we think of the Patriots as they were seen going into the Super Bowl (because they looked so bad in the Super Bowl) and compared that to the Patriots right now, I’d have to lean towards…the Same.
Frankly, I worry a little for Maye, a quarterback who was not as good last season as his almost-MVP numbers would indicate. Either Maye plays better (and he definitely could as a third-year passer) and the numbers remain steady…
Or he regresses, gets a little more unlucky, and fans will be calling him 2026’s C.J. Stroud.
The supporting cast changes were made to address those concerns and help Maye improve, but how long will it take the offensive line to get up to speed? Will Maye and Brown have instant chemistry? And what if Doubs continues to be the player he’s always been?
The New England Patriots had an easier time being better in 2025 than they were in 2024 because the bar was so low. Coming off of a 14-3 season and winning the AFC, the Patriots are stuck between avoiding a drop-off from what got them to the Super Bowl, and avoiding complacency given how thumped they were by Seattle when they got there.
AJ Brown is a big-bodied wide receiver, kind of like a DK Metcalf with better hands. He's not going to line up anywhere but outside, He's not going to break a corner's ankles with double-moves, and when the play goes to the other side of the field, he's known to nap five yards past the line of scrimmage. With Diggs gone, don't be surprised if Doubs gets more quick looks from Maye than Brown does.
I believe that the Patriots' 2025 O-line was pretty much intact when they got to the playoffs, where the quality defenses they faced (Texans, Broncos and Seahawks) exposed their (many) shortcomings. I can't see a reworked, refitted new group of blockers being able to keep up with the Seahawks in Week One.
If Sam Darnold has the game that he almost had in the Super Bowl (delivering those throws that were just a little low, high or late), this rematch could make the Super Bowl look close.
I don’t really feel qualified to speak on whether the Pats are better than last year’s Super Bowl team. I don’t feel AJ Brown is a great receiver, although I do feel he’s better than DK as a very similar type player. My guess is they are a slightly better team, but the Seahawks are also a better team than last year’s Super Bowl team. If Price is a big hit at RB, I believe the Hawks are markedly better than last year’s team. At this point in time I would say week one is a bigger blow out than the Super Bowl.
When it comes to my opinion about other teams, I really only follow the Seahawks, Rams and 49ers. What I do during the season is watch the last two games of our next opponent on NFL+ premium after I rewatch the Seahawks last game. I may watch Gruden discuss the Seahawk game on his podcast if he does one. I can’t see how you can really follow more than a few teams with any real understanding about them. This is why I think experts are often so clueless. You simply can’t really know a team in an hour a week devoted to them.