Drake Maye has completely reinvigorated the New England Patriots franchise, reaching the ceiling that some draft analysts predicted for him when the Patriots drafted him third overall in the 2024 draft. He leads all quarterbacks in passing yards this season with 2,836, which is 258 per game, and he doesn't have a single game under 200-yards passing this season.

Now he gets to face a Cincinnati Bengals defence that is allowing the 4th-most passing yards in the entire NFL and is tied for the 3rd-most yards allowed per attempt. Maye should have absolutely no problem carving open this Bengals secondary and continuing his hot streak. I expect to see him over 250 yards passing on the day.

Higgins very much plays second fiddle to Ja’Marr Chase in the Bengals offence, given that Chase is one of the best receivers in football. However, Higgins has hit a nice patch of form and recovered from early season issues once veteran quarterback Joe Flacco arrived to fill the void left by an injured Joe Burrow.

At time of writing it’s unclear if Burrow will play this week, but I don’t think it matters who’s under centre for Higgins. He has only gone under 62 receiving yards once with Flacco, and Chase is suspended for this game, leaving Higgins as the number one target for whichever Bengals quarterback is under centre. The Patriots have allowed the 8th-most passing yards in the league this season, and their offence will run the score up in this matchup, so I expect Higgins to reach the 50-yard mark comfortably.

Stefon Diggs has been one of the big beneficiaries of quarterback Drake Maye’s meteoric rise this season. With the second-year signal caller leading the league in passing yards, Diggs has seen 72 targets for 659 yards and three touchdowns in 11 games this year. That puts him at 59.9 receiving yards per game, including a monster nine receptions for 105 yards last week against the New York Jets.

The Bengals pass defence has really struggled this season, giving up 2,573 yards. That’s good for 4th-most in the entire NFL, and they’ve also allowed a league-worst 25 passing touchdowns this year. I like the anytime touchdown option for Diggs, who has three touchdowns in his last four games, but the 40+ receiving yards is too tantalising to pass up.

The NFL has trended more towards mobile quarterbacks for a while now, and while not every team can have a Lamar Jackson style signal caller, being able to scramble to extend drives is crucial. Maye certainly has that element to his game and has shown it off even more this year than he did last year. Through 11 games he has rushed 70 times, compared to just 54 in 13 games last season.

That has translated to some respectable yardage totals, but crucially he has hit the 15-yards rushing mark in six games this year. It can be hard to predict how often a quarterback might scramble, even when looking at defensive line pressure rates. The Bengals have given up 53 rushing yards to Caleb Williams and 26 to Jordan Love, both of whom are quarterbacks with slightly less of a tendency to run than Maye.