Breer: How Krafts view Jerod Mayo, Pats coaches amid 2024 struggles

Breer: How Krafts view Jerod Mayo, Pats coaches amid 2024 struggles originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

Jerod Mayo’s first calendar year as New England Patriots head coach has been rocky, to say the least.

Since replacing the legendary Bill Belichick in January, Mayo has endured turbulence both on and off the field. His team enters Sunday with a 3-9 record — fourth-worst in the NFL — and he’s already dealt with his starting safety facing assault charges, his starting offensive tackle leaving the team after Week 2 and public criticism after calling his team “soft” following a London loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars, among other issues.

All of that criticism has led some to wonder whether Mayo and his new-look coaching staff will keep their jobs in 2025 and beyond. According to The MMQB’s Albert Breer, however, Patriots owner Robert Kraft and his son, team president Jonathan Kraft, understand that Mayo’s growing pains come with context.

“Just from having talked to (the Krafts) and having talked to people around them, I just get the feeling that they know where they are and this is going to take a couple of offseasons to get through,” Breer said on Patriots Pregame Live ahead of Patriots-Colts, as seen in the video player above. “There wasn’t anybody blind to the fact that the roster was not in a good spot coming out of 2023, and it’s not like they had a bunch of young talent that they could start to build off of.

“So, I think ‘resigned’ is probably the right word — that this was going to take a little while, that they were going to have to evaluate things on the fly, that there were going to be some bumps for Jerod Mayo as a first-year head coach.”

But what if things go even further south this season? If the losses continue to pile up over the final five games, will the Krafts change their view of Mayo? Breer suggested that changes on the coaching staff around Mayo are very possible, but that Mayo is very likely to return next season.

“There are a lot of aspects of the organization that I think will be under evaluation over the next six weeks,” Breer said. “That said, I do think (the Krafts) have respect for the spot that Jerod Mayo has been in and was in coming into this (season). And all the chatter and the pressure to win and everything else — I actually think they believe he’s handled that pretty well given the circumstances, given his lack of experience being thrust into this role.

“I still think Jerod Mayo is on really solid ground going into 2025. The question is, how different will it look around him? And I think there are fair questions to ask when it comes to that.”

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Kraft admitted earlier this year that he tabbed Mayo as Belichick’s successor as early as 2019, and our Tom E. Curran has reported that Mayo was thrust into his one year earlier than the Krafts originally planned. So, it makes sense why ownership would stand by Mayo in 2025 despite the team’s myriad issues.

But it sounds like the rest of the coaches — and perhaps the front office as well — don’t have the same assurances and will have to prove themselves over the final six weeks to remain with the organization.