How Patriots QB Drake Maye's family shaped him to meet this moment

Drake Maye sent a text to his brother, Luke, in Japan the other day. Drake is the newly minted New England Patriots quarterback after being the No. 3 overall pick in the 2024 NFL Draft. Luke is in Japan playing pro basketball. Big things are happening for both brothers.

But the text was about golf.

"Drake's talking about how he's getting a new driver for next time he plays," Luke said. "He needs it because I just beat him about two weeks ago."

Golf is the athletic Switzerland for the Maye brothers. Neutral ground.

Luke, 27, is a former North Carolina basketball national champion. Beau, 22, was a basketball walk-on for UNC. Cole, 25, won an NCAA baseball title at Florida. None of them ever played golf at the collegiate level. Cole is the most practiced player, the first one to get a custom set of clubs.

Football, basketball and baseball aren't really fair playing fields for the Maye brothers. Golf levels the competition — which is to say that golf fuels the competition. Most other sports are unsafe for these young men.

"I've watched them play two-on-two basketball, and it's a bloodbath," said Scott Chadwick, Drake Maye's high school coach.

Now, to be clear, the Maye family is as nice and polite as they come. They are "yes please, ma'am" and "no, thank you, sir" kind of guys. But they are also as competitive as they come. On the course, there are no gimmes. Drake will make his brothers putt everything out, even from four feet. It's 18 holes of trash talk, even when visitors join.

"I've missed a shot that cost us a hole," Chadwick said. "I wanted to apologize so badly to Luke because now Luke had to listen to Drake trash-talking."

There aren't many competitions that Drake would shy away from. In fact, only one comes to