In a matchup that features two teams trending in opposite directions, the 6-2 New England Patriots will play host to the 3-4 Atlanta Falcons. The Dirty Birds have struggled recently with losses in back-to-back games. The same can not be said for the Pats, who are 5-0 after starting the season 1-2.

First-year Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel has been a big reason for the turnaround in New England. The Pats already have six wins this year after finishing the previous two seasons with eight total victories.

“I think coach is challenging me to keep on taking that next step and those little things,” explained New England quarterback Drake Maye. “Moving defenders, using my cadence, and things like that. He's really challenged me and [is] coaching me hard to continue to do those things at a high level.”

Vrabel's presence has clearly had a positive impact on the Patriots' second-year quarterback. Drake Maye has the fifth-highest QBR this season and is also second in the league in passer rating.

“He's just very accurate from different platforms, whether that's in the pocket [or] that's out of the pocket,” said Vrabel of Maye during an October 20th interview. “There's really good accuracy. There's a lot of confidence. He's just an athletic quarterback. By that, I mean that there's different things that he does. It doesn't have to be so rigid and just dropback, plant, transfer, throw. There's a lot of other movements to him that I think make him unique. But the accuracy has certainly been very good.”

Even though Atlanta is reeling right now and has lost two straight games, the Patriots are not going to take the Falcons lightly.

“You're going to get Bijan Robinson, who [is] a premium player in this league and probably one of the best offensive players,” Vrabel said on Wednesday. “They've got good size at their skill positions. Drake London and (Kyle) Pitts… you've got to be conscious of where he's at in the matchups. Then defensively, they have the ability to take the ball away.”

Unfortunately for the Dirty Birds, there are some injury concerns regarding their best players. After quarterback Michael Penix Jr. and wideout Drake London missed last week, Penix is listed as questionable to play this week, while London does not yet have an injury designation.

“We’ll kind of be in a wait-and-see mode. Realistically, that's just about everybody else, as well,” Falcons head coach Raheem Morris said on Monday. "Michael Penix, Drake London, Zach Harrison, all of those guys will kind of be [in] the wait-and-see mode, day-to-day mentality.”

Even before the injuries, the Falcons have had trouble finding the end zone. They have only scored touchdowns on 45% of their red zone trips this season, which ranks 29th in the NFL.

“We’ve got to fix it, and we’ve got to fix it fast,” offensive coordinator Zac Robinson told reporters on Wednesday. “Last two weeks [were] not reflective of what we had built the previous two weeks… We’ve just got to play a lot better across the board. We’ve got to coach better, all those things. But, [I] told the guys we're still two weeks removed from what we had against Buffalo, so we haven't forgotten how to play. We still have good players. We have good coaches. It's just getting back to that, and just maintaining a level of consistency.”

If Atlanta hopes to pull off the upset on Sunday, it's going to need to do a better job of running the football after being held to 45 rushing yards against the Miami Dolphins. Raheem Morris knows that the offense and the defense benefit from a strong rushing attack.

“You’ve got to go out and execute the game plan that we had in place to go out there and try to win that football game,” Morris said after the loss to Miami. “We want to be able to go out there and control (the game) with the run, be able to control it with our time of possession, [and] do all the things that we're capable of doing. That actually protects our defense. That keeps those guys off the grass. That gives us a chance to go out there, earn field position on special teams, and win the football game.”

Prediction for Atlanta Falcons @ New England Patriots (-5.5)

As strange as it sounds, the Falcons have one of the best defenses in the NFL. They allow the fewest passing yards per game in the league, so they should be able to contain Drake Maye. The problem is that the Pats have the second-best run defense in the NFL, which will make it difficult for the Falcons to execute their game plan and establish offensive rhythm. Even if Michael Penix Jr. returns to the lineup, it'll be challenging for Atlanta to win a road game against a team that is playing this well at the moment.

Prediction: Patriots 23 - 20 Falcons

How to watch Atlanta Falcons @ New England Patriots (-5.5)

Falcons @ Patriots starts at 1:00 p.m. EDT at Gillette Stadium. You can watch it on CBS or stream it via the Paramount+ app or YouTube TV.

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