New England Patriots
Grant, a former wide receiver at Assumption University, played a major role in Drake Maye’s second-year jump.
Ashton Grant is a Manchester, Conn. native, attended and played football at Assumption University in Worcester, and began his coaching career at Holy Cross. Danielle Parhizkaran/Globe Staff
Patriots quarterback Drake Maye will finally experience some coaching continuity in his third season.
After having different head coaches, offensive coordinators, and quarterbacks coaches each in his first two years in New England, Maye will be coached by Mike Vrabel, Josh McDaniels, and Ashton Grant again in the 2026-27 season.
Grant, who would likely have been considered for all three remaining vacant offensive coordinator positions around the NFL, has reportedly decided to remain with the Patriots, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter. Schefter noted that Grant is choosing not to interview for the Las Vegas Raiders’ OC job under new head coach Klint Kubiak. The Los Angeles Rams and Seattle Seahawks also have open OC positions.
Grant, a Manchester, Conn. native, played a major role in Maye’s second-year developmental leap, which helped lead the team to Super Bowl LX. Though the Patriots fell to the Seahawks in disappointing fashion and Maye struggled in the playoffs, he nearly won the NFL MVP award for his impressive season.
Maye, 23, led the league in completion percentage (72.0 percent) and QBR (77.1). He threw for the fourth-most passing yards (4,394), third-most touchdowns (31), and threw just eight interceptions.
Grant, who was a wide receiver at Assumption University from 2014-17, received high praise from Maye Tuesday, following a thrilling season. Maye credited Grant with helping him learn an entirely new offense under Vrabel.
“Ashton has been awesome with just kind of relaying the connections between the past offense that he was in last year with the Browns that we had last year and just translating it, now using our own terminology and kind of building the foundation for this offense,” Maye said. “There’s so much more we can take with this offense and give me more tools and more answers at the line of scrimmage.
Grant was a quality control coach with Holy Cross football in 2019 in his first coaching gig once his professional playing career ended. He joined the Browns in 2020 as part of the Bill Walsh NFL diversity coaching fellowship and remained in Cleveland in various offensive coaching roles until Vrabel hired him in February 2025.
Grant and Vrabel were colleagues in the Browns organization in 2024 when Grant was an offensive assistant/QBs coach and Vrabel was a coaching and personnel consultant. Vrabel recently spoke about his brief but impactful history with Grant and what drew him to hire the young coach with the Patriots.
“I got to evaluate him every day and what he did in Cleveland. I think it’s a good balance between him and Josh,” Vrabel said of Grant on Jan. 21. “And Josh was really excited for us to be able to add Ashton. Was in on those interview processes that we had for the quarterbacks coach, and I think Ashton really fit his vision that he had.
“First year in the system, it’s going to be — Josh is going to have a heavy role in that, but also, I’ll go in there and Ashton will be meeting with these guys situationally. I think it is a good balance between him and Josh and how long Josh has done it. And maybe the newness and the youngness of Ashton is a nice little balance.”
Kaley Brown
Kaley Brown is a sports producer for Boston.com, where she covers the Bruins, Celtics, Patriots, and Red Sox.
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