• Mayo spoke to the media at 9 a.m., followed by an appearance on WEEI at 9:30 a.m
• The players are available in the afternoon. Read on to hear what they say.
• Former Patriots head coach Bill Belichick will appear on “The Pat McAfee Show” around noon to talk NFL.
• He will also appear Monday night during the “ManningCast” broadcast of Monday Night Football with Eli and Peyton Manning on ESPN2.

Mayo began the day by addressing the media. Here are the highlights.

His thoughts on the game: “Of course we are disappointed. You know, six losses in a row is never a good thing. Last night after the game I said I felt like we just went out there and played softly. Right now we’re playing softly. And when I talk about “playing softly” I mean stopping the run, running the ball and covering kicks, which we failed to do. Now, when I say this, do you think we have the people there who can turn this ship around? 100%. But you know that through hard work, through our work on the practice field and through our work out there, we get better every day.”

About demanding instead of humiliating: “It’s in my DNA. A lot of these things are about relationships and dealing with people as human beings, so that’s in my DNA. That doesn’t mean we’re out there gently training these guys. I think the coaches are doing a good job and training them hard. And of course if we were sitting here at 6-1 it would be easy to continue to get that message across, but at 1-6 it’s a natural question from you: Should we change our coaching style? And right now I just think we have to keep working hard and keep pushing the players to get good results on the field.”

How Drake Maye surprised him: “It’s just his general toughness. He takes hits, comes back up and still goes into the pocket. Think he’s doing a good job talking about the progression from game one to game two. There were no ball losses yesterday, which is going in the right direction. He’s definitely playing at a good level for us.”

On Kendrick Bourne’s comments about player discipline off the field: “It’s part of the job of a professional. That’s your job. Your job, not just inside this building but outside this building, is to take care of your body and all that stuff. That’s part of it and that means longevity in this league. The message is: We simply have to get better. We have to do everything a little better. … You want to go to heaven, you have to go through hell sometimes, and it might feel like that right now, but hopefully we’ll change the situation.”

When stopping the run: “It’s the top seven. We just have to be more disciplined, build a wall and beat blockers in front of us. It’s not the X’s and O’s. We just have to be where we’re supposed to be. Last week it was the big runs where we talked about taking away those three big runs. And (this week) it’s not a problem. We’re not even having this conversation. Yesterday it was almost like death by 1,000 cuts, whether it was 4 yards, 6 yards, 5 yards, and that’s hard. This is hard.”

On Ja’Lynn Polk’s now-deleted Instagram post: “I didn’t talk about that. I don’t question his dedication to the team at all.”

Regarding veterans’ punishments: “No matter who it is, whether you are a newcomer or an experienced player, it is simply unacceptable. We see what happened yesterday. You know, we jump off the side and then they go for two points. It’s like we’re all giving these guys extra opportunities by shooting ourselves in the foot. And that’s just not good football.”

Emma can be reached at [email protected] or at @_EmmaHealy_.