The New England Patriots wasted no time turning a page on the 2024 season and fired Jerod Mayo just moments after the team beat the Buffalo Bills in Week 18. Mayo didn't even make it to Monday despite being Robert Kraft's hand-picked replacement for Bill Belichick a year ago.
As bad as the 2024 season was for the Patriots, it was surprising to see the Patriots act so swiftly in dismissing Mayo considering the background of why he was hired in the first place. With Mayo being a beloved former player in the locker room, several notable Patriots players have already spoken out about this shocking decision.
Rob Gronkowski, who played with Mayo for six years and left before Mayo joined the Patriots' coaching staff, certainly did not seem happy with his former team's decision. Gronkowski outright called the move unfair and insinuated that Mayo should have gotten more time to develop as a head coach.
Rob Gronkowski says the Patriots were "unfair" to fire Jerod Mayo and that he "never had the chance to develop as a head coach."
— Jason Reed (@EatYourReedies) January 5, 2025
Interesting how FOX quickly went to break in the middle of Gronk's point 🤔 pic.twitter.com/5fyewlyKqT
Rob Gronkowski is not a fan of the Patriots firing Jerod Mayo
To be fair, Gronkowski didn't really say anything that was untrue in this clip. To completely judge a head coach after just one season in which the roster he was given wasn't great is a bit harsh. As Gronk said, the Patriots never gave Mayo a chance to develop as a head coach.
Of course, there is much more nuance to the situation. Many Patriots fans would argue that Mayo was not qualified to be the team's head coach after only serving as a positions coach before being promoted. That may be fair, but is still is strange to fully commit to Belichick's predeccesor only to give up on him after one season.
Could Mayo have been better? Absolutely. But he was given a rigged deck of cards that were never going to result in a playoff appearance. It doesn't matter who was the head coach in 2024, the Patriots would have been in a similar situation.
Perhaps if Mike Vrabel wasn't available then Kraft would have given Mayo another shot and would have given him the proper time to develop. It is abundantly clear that there is mutual interest between the Patriots and Vrabel, which might be why New England acted so swiftly to begin with.
But that reality does not seem to sway Gronkowski's opinion at all. It's impossible to blame Gronkowski for feeling this way after watching his former teammate get the short end of the stick from the organization they both played for.