The fact that we have to routinely go back to 2019 as if that's the representation of Tom Brady's career is silly. That season was atypical for a variety of reasons and even then the production was better than this by a lot of metrics.
The reason we use 2019 as an example is it's the closest comp we have, considering a lot of the team has been the same during Mac's 3 years since. I mean, in your same post, you said we can't compare 2006 and 2013 passing environments to now, so what can we use?
But what was "atypical" about that season?
In the two prior seasons, Brady threw for almost 9,000 yards, had 61 tds, 19ints, and a rating around 100. He completed 66.3% and 65.88% of his passes.
In the two seasons following 2019, he threw for almost 10,000 yards, 83tds, 24ints, and had a rating around 102. He completed 65.7 and 67.5% of his passes.
2019, the last year with a shit offensive skill position group, a beat up/bad offensive line, he had a year comparable to Mac. Other than that, what was different? Was Tom Brady not mentally tough enough to deal with his contract situation? Was he in a fight with the coaches? The same coaches, Bill and Josh, that he had for years?
The stat isn't a "fluke." The stat is fucking useless. That's the point. If you never look at anything in football in context and just look at numbers, you don't get anything of value. Mac Jones could easily have 4 of those come from behind wins in his last 6 starts, but instead we had Meyers playing pin the tail on the donkey with the football, Rham fumbling inside the 10 against Cincinnati, an NFL receiver who couldn't catch a ball in his hands in Bourne, an NFL receiver in the same game who couldn't get his feet down twice, and an offensive line that couldn't block my mother last week on the final play. If those 4 games go the other way, we're all here praising Mac for hanging in and getting a W, but instead, for reasons outside of Mac's control, I'm constantly reading a stat that means what, exactly? Mac can't get it done? Have there been games where Mac was the reason they didn't pull it out? Absolutely, but the idea he's the reason they've not won a single one of these games (except one) isn't based in reality. That's the point.
This isn't just about skill position players either, Tom Brady threw the ball into the ground 40 times in 2019 when facing pressure. And he faced less pressure than Mac is facing right now. If folks think Brady isn't firing passes into the dirt that Mac is running around trying to make plays on, then I have no idea how to continue this either. This isn't a dig on Brady either, who is my favorite player and non-family member/friend on Earth, it just is.
@slamminsammya I think you have a point though. I think it would make a lot of sense to figure out why they get out to such slow starts (at least to start this season).