The New England Patriots and Seattle Seahawks have finally reached Super Bowl week.

And while there will be plenty of publicity of all sorts of topics, the most pressing matter for Pats fans this week is the right shoulder, and the overall health, of their superstar quarterback Drake Maye.

The news cycle, at least as far as football minutia are concerned, will focus on Maye’s injury status until it’s proven to be a non-issue, which likely won’t come until the second half of the week, at the very least.

Maye missed Friday’s Patriots practice with a right shoulder injury and an illness.

He had previously been listed as limited with just the shoulder injury. That suggests the illness may have been the reason for the downgrade.

Still, it’s not something New England wants to deal with in the biggest week of its season.

The good news is that last Friday’s practice was still nine days from the Super Bowl. The two-week gap between conference championship games and the big game has helped the Patriots and Maye out here.

Maye was hurt on a tackle that drove his right arm into the ground against the Denver Broncos in the snowy 10-7 AFC Championship Game win.

He and his head coach, Mike Vrabel, have both downplayed the injury when asked about it.

You can bet they’ll be asked about it again, because there’s a world where that shoulder acts up too much and Joshua Dobbs is playing QB for the Patriots in the Super Bowl.

That’s far from the most likely outcome, it seems, but it’ll be something that everyone is tracking this week.