Whether Bill Belichick decides to keep Mac Jones as his starter, or moves in another direction, will be revealed soon enough.
Given the bye week, it was important for the Patriots to assess and deconstruct what’s left of the quarterback they chose 15th overall in the 2021 draft.
With a year remaining on his contract, and a decision on an option year closing in, the Patriots need to figure out if Jones can possibly be salvaged – whether they keep him, or ultimately move on.
To gain an educated perspective, I enlisted Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner, who has watched and evaluated film of every Jones appearance through three seasons.
What has he seen from the Patriots starter?
In short, Warner says over time Jones has lost his superpower, the key trait that helped him become the best rookie quarterback in the league his first season. He’s lost his ability to read a defense and quickly decipher if the play has a chance to work, or if he has to switch to something different.
So how did that happen?
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“He’s never going to be the most talented guy in the NFL. That’s not a knock on Mac. I was the same way … we’re just not overly gifted from a talent standpoint,” said Warner. “So you have to play to your strengths and what you do well. And I thought his rookie year, what he did well was see and process information. And get the ball to the right guy or at least make positive plays by getting through his checkdowns and getting completions. To me, that was his superpower. And that’s become an issue. So you have to ask, what’s happened, and why, even with the simplest of plays, can Mac not get back to doing the exact same thing when he was a rookie?”
Part of the answer likely involves being coached by a defensive coach pretending to be an offensive coach last year. Another is having an offensive line that’s made Jones gun-shy because of being hit so much. A third part might be having no one in his arsenal who can separate and get open against man coverage.
So his Kryptonite is likely a combination of all of the above. Plus, Jones hasn’t helped himself navigating through the rough waters. Along with his vanished superpower, several other traits that made Jones so good coming out of college, along with his rookie year, have also disappeared.
Jones’ footwork and technique are a mess and that’s impacted his trademark accuracy.
“That’s another one of those things he used to be pretty good at. He was accurate with the football,” said Warner. “Now, he’s not very accurate with the football. He’s missing a lot of throws.”
Case in point, the interception he threw that got him pulled in favor of Bailey Zappe against the Colts in Germany a week ago. Technique-wise, on the pivotal play, Jones was falling away, throwing off his back foot. So he didn’t have much zip on the football. Mike Gesicki had broken free in the end zone, but the ball fell way short, picked off by Colts safety Julian Blackmon at the goal line.
Had Jones connected, the Patriots would have gone ahead. Instead, they continued to trail by four points with five minutes to play with Jones now asked to take a seat on the sidelines.
“It’s hard to even make sense of that throw,” said Warner. “He made the right read, and obviously, the throw has to go up and over, but that throw was so drastically short that you’re dumbfounded by what happened there. It’s hard to miss that bad. So not only is he missing, but he’s missing drastically on plays.
“So that’s what I’m seeing and it’s unfortunate because he started out so promising,” the Super Bowl winning-quarterback went on. “We know there’s been a lot of issues around him. The question right now is how do we get back to that guy? Can we get back to that guy, and what’s it going to take? I don’t know the answer to that.”
More to the point, do the Patriots or Mac know the answer? Can offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Bill O’Brien fix what’s broken?
As a quarterback, Warner said he never had a confidence issue to the point where mistakes carried over and bothered him. With Jones being a mistake-repeater, throwing ill-advised passes that have led to killer picks time and again – he’s thrown 10 interceptions in 10 games – Warner couldn’t quite relate.
But, when he played, the long-time NFL Network analyst said he was occasionally guilty of overthinking plays, and sometimes aiming his passes, instead of just firing away and freely throwing the football. Warner said sometimes, he’d try to do too much trying to make up for what he lacked around him.
“I’ve been there, but you’ve got to fight through it, and get out of it,” said Warner. “But the process for each quarterback to do that I believe has to be different.”
Having Jones take a break, a mental breather, seems like a logical first step. But the Patriots don’t appear to have much faith in Bailey Zappe or Will Grier. So it’s possible Belichick will stick with Jones. Or, bite the bullet and go with one of the subs.
Whether he gets a timeout or not, Jones isn’t in a good place. The problems haven’t improved. They’ve just gotten worse. Jones can’t get out of his own way. His inner clock has sped up, whether there’s pressure in the pocket or not. He panics during the bigger moments.
“It’s not a fun place to be,” said Warner, “especially when you’re the leader, and you have the ball in your hands every snap.”
Adding to the problem, earlier in the week, the Boston Herald reported that Jones had lost 80 percent of the locker room.
“That’s tough. If a quarterback’s not playing well, and the players in the locker room don’t feel like he’s playing well, and they don’t feel like they have a great chance to win with that guy the way he’s playing right now, they want a change,” said Warner. “They want something that gives them belief they can win.”
Zappe has come on in relief three times this season, and hasn’t shown much. Grier hasn’t played at all. And Malik Cunningham is a project who needs time, although the Patriots seem convinced converting him to wide receiver is the way to go.
Jones remains the best option, but not in his current state.
“Based on what we saw his rookie year from Mac, it seems like he’s broken a little bit,” said Warner. “He’s been broken somewhere along the way. So you wonder if he can be fixed. And that becomes the dilemma and the challenge for both Mac, and the coaching staff, and the guys around him.”
A huge dilemma that won’t be solved overnight, much less in one week.
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