Before the Washington Commanders traded Sam Howell to the Seattle Seahawks in March, he spent a season sharing a quarterback room with current New England Patriots veteran Jacoby Brissett.
Howell recently spoke with Mark Daniels of MassLive about how New England rookie signal-caller Drake Maye, referred to as Howell's "best friend," will grow while learning from Brissett.
"It’s funny that they get to work together now," Howell said about Brissett and Maye. "Jacoby is someone who has meant so much to me. And we were only together for that one year last year, but I call him one of my better friends. I couldn’t have asked for a better teammate. A better person to have in my corner."
Maye and Howell were teammates at North Carolina well before the latter competed with Brissett for the Washington starting job last summer. While Howell always seemed to have the upper hand in that battle, Brissett appears ahead of Maye at this stage of New England's process.
Brissett noted on Thursday that he wants to be a good teammate and mentor for Maye as the rookie develops throughout the offseason program. Howell sounds confident Brissett will be just that regardless of when Maye can start for the Patriots.
"The thing about Jacoby is he’ll always have my back, he’ll always have Drake’s back and I think they’re both really good teammates," Howell said. "They’re both really good people. They’ll do well together. They both like to play a little golf. So, they’ll get along just fine."
Interestingly, Howell introduced Maye to Brissett last summer when the three got together for a golf outing. The Patriots signed Brissett back in March before they knew they would make Maye the third overall pick of this year's draft.
"They’ll have a lot of fun," Howell added about Maye and Brissett. "They’ll be good together."
On Friday afternoon, DraftKings Sportsbook listed Maye as a +2200 betting underdog to win the Offensive Rookie of the Year Award for the upcoming season. Maye can't worry about such things and instead should concentrate on learning as much as possible from Brissett both on and off golf courses.
