The Michael McCorkle "Mac" Jones Thread

[Jinhocho]

Wait, you're asking him why he's cherry picking, and not the guys pointing to one fucking play over and over and over again?

Hey DOTB I respect you about football and in general lots. If Mac Jones were the QB of the Jets or Panthers, what would you recommend the Pats give up for him in a trade to bring in next year?

I think we get lost in something where he is like Darnold or Wilson etc and people get stuck defending him because we picked him. He strikes me as the kind of QB that we would have loved to see on the schedule 2x a year - easily rattled, poor mechanics, somewhat of pouty/bitch attitude, cant make a ton of throws, and easy to force him into a gameplan or throws where he and the team have no success.

I had a lot of faith or rather hope in the guy in year 1, but the warts were visible even then.

 

[Bowser]

Yeesh. This question.

 

[Deathofthebambino]

Hey DOTB I respect you about football and in general lots. If Mac Jones were the QB of the Jets or Panthers, what would you recommend the Pats give up for him in a trade to bring in next year?

I think we get lost in something where he is like Darnold or Wilson etc and people get stuck defending him because we picked him. He strikes me as the kind of QB that we would have loved to see on the schedule 2x a year - easily rattled, poor mechanics, somewhat of pouty/bitch attitude, cant make a ton of throws, and easy to force him into a gameplan or throws where he and the team have no success.

I had a lot of faith or rather hope in the guy in year 1, but the warts were visible even then.

If Mac Jones were the QB of the Jets or Panthers and playing identical to how he is now, I wouldn't give up more than a 6th or 7th for him, and that's only if I was looking to bring him in as a backup because I think he's better than 90% of the backups in the NFL right now.

Now, if he were playing for the Jets, I think he'd be playing better than Zach Wilson would be, because at least he'd have actual skilled NFL players with some talent around him. Folks love to make excuses for other QB's, like Zach getting killed behind his offensive line, or Bryce Young struggling because of the lack of playmakers around him, but Mac gets none of that benefit of the doubt here, and he's got both problems staring him in the face.

I do not think Mac is going to win a Super Bowl, or ever be a top 10 QB for that matter. I never push back on folks that feel that he's a bad quarterback. I push back when I see him blamed for shit outside of his control, or when he does make a play and his teammates fuck him over, I'll point that out. That's what objective analysis looks like. What we see here in most cases is so far from that, I try not to acknowledge it a lot, but it's literally every thread. Go here, it's Mac bashing, go there, it's Mac bashing, and its constant even in weeks he really shouldn't be pointed out as the problem.

I mean, @E5 Yaz just watched the video I posted from the Eagles game and came away from it saying Mac looked pretty good. PFF had Mac rated as like the #6 QB in week one. He went 35/54 for 316 yards, 3tds, 1 int.

Here's the GOAT thread after that game, in which Mac is immediately shit on. The standards he's being held to, are fucking outrageous:

https://sonsofsamhorn.net/index.php?threads/game-1-philly-goats.40455/

It's funny, looking back at that thread, there's things in there that are still being discussed now.

Someone made a point that Mac was throwing short passes because they didn't trust him to throw it deep. I made the same point then that I made today (of course, nobody else remembers, or have chosen to forget that this is Bill O'Brien's offense):

Or maybe it's about taking what the defense is giving, and also a bit of recognition that it's not Mac, we have no outside threats at receiver, especially without Parker.

And it's kind of Bill O'Brien's thing. Here's a piece on his philosophy from prior to the season:

https://www.patriots.com/news/analysis-what-will-the-patriots-offense-look-like-with-bill-o-brien-returning

 

[Deathofthebambino]

Yep. That was a shit-ass play by Mac. I'm pretty sure my only contribution to the game thread was to bitch at what a crap throw that was. Buuuuuuut.....



...this is absurd. Of course receivers get open SOMETIMES (just not as often as every other WR group in the NFL). Of course the OL can hold up for a play here and there (just not as often as every other OL group in the NFL).

Using this one play to arrive at a meaningful conclusion is insane. Literally. It is bereft of rationality.

Mac isn't a very good QB (probably middle of the starter pack as a ceiling, which isn't very good), but he has played decently enough that a better set of players around him would've likely resulted in more wins. How many more? 1? 2? 3? Who knows. But more. Frankly, given the frequency and magnitude of the worst drops, anyone arguing to the contrary is not acting in good faith.

And the thing is, it wouldn't even take a materially better roster to have these extra (1? 2? 3?) wins: just 3-4 fewer drops. Meaning that even if Parker and JuJu and whoever the fuck don't drop massive passes and we get a couple more wins, this team still sucks at OL and WR. And Jesus, those broken tackle numbers are astonishing.

I think the point that DotB has been making is NOT that Mac is great (or even really good), it's just that there is a MASSIVE amount of logically flawed (to be charitable) football "analysis" driving a lot of the discussions on Mac. And logically flawed (to be charitable) football "analysis" deserves to be called out as being exactly that, even if the conclusions reached at the end aren't that dissimilar to what rational football analysis tells us (i.e., Mac isn't very good).

The reason this distinction is important to me (I can't speak for DotB) is that irrational analysis offers no prescriptive insight as to possible fixes going forward. It's just shouting into the ether. It's not interesting, it's not provocative, and it offers no foundation upon which to discuss less black & white options going forward. If this forum was moderated as heavily as the main Red Sox forum, there'd be about 15 posts in this thread.

Absolutely. How about this stat? The Pats have 15 broken tackles and 14 dropped passes (and frankly, I think the dropped passes statistic in the NFL is heavily skewed to favor receivers, they typically only count the most egregious ones, not ones where an NFL receiver should be able to make a play).

That said, you can speak for me anytime.

 

[j44thor]

None of those plays are remotely comparable. The QBs are on the move. Mac had perfect protection, his receiver had easy separation, and it was out-breaking and not a bomb down field. It was such a fucking simple throw.

View: https://twitter.com/goodNEfan/status/1721231758308319742

Why is everyone running 15-30yds downfield on 4th and 3? Rham was the only one running a route near the sticks and he was coming out of the backfield.
That is a pass that QBs miss regularly, 25yds downfield is not a gimme though it is completed more often than not. But why on 4th and 3 can't they design a play to get 5yds? Reagor is 10yds beyond Thornton on that play. Did BOB not realize it was 4th down? Why are we relying on basically a rookie WR not known for running crisp routes as the 1st read on a 4th and 3 and he is 20yards downfield. For all we know he ran the route poorly given he was later benched for the rest of the game. It is possible Mac slightly missed his spot and Thornton bent the route in for no reason before breaking it back out throwing off the timing. This isn't Jules running the route I'm not giving TT the benefit of the doubt here. Mac played poorly but this game was also coached poorly and the WR execution was poor. Rham was basically the highlight on offense with HM to the OL for not completely sucking, just playing average in large part due to WAS trading by far their two best DL last week.

The Rham rainbow was by far a more egregious pass as there was absolutely no reason to throw a high lob off the back foot when Rham was open by 10yds and I trust Rham to be in the right spot a lot more than TT. As someone else had mentioned Mac threw his guy covered on that play vs. the one to TT where he was trying to throw him open but the "all-22" will likely tell the story better on that play.

 

[BigSoxFan]

If Mac Jones were the QB of the Jets or Panthers and playing identical to how he is now, I wouldn't give up more than a 6th or 7th for him, and that's only if I was looking to bring him in as a backup because I think he's better than 90% of the backups in the NFL right now.

Now, if he were playing for the Jets, I think he'd be playing better than Zach Wilson would be, because at least he'd have actual skilled NFL players with some talent around him. Folks love to make excuses for other QB's, like Zach getting killed behind his offensive line, or Bryce Young struggling because of the lack of playmakers around him, but Mac gets none of that benefit of the doubt here, and he's got both problems staring him in the face.

I do not think Mac is going to win a Super Bowl, or ever be a top 10 QB for that matter. I never push back on folks that feel that he's a bad quarterback. I push back when I see him blamed for shit outside of his control, or when he does make a play and his teammates fuck him over, I'll point that out. That's what objective analysis looks like. What we see here in most cases is so far from that, I try not to acknowledge it a lot, but it's literally every thread. Go here, it's Mac bashing, go there, it's Mac bashing, and its constant even in weeks he really shouldn't be pointed out as the problem.

I mean, @E5 Yaz just watched the video I posted from the Eagles game and came away from it saying Mac looked pretty good. PFF had Mac rated as like the #6 QB in week one. He went 35/54 for 316 yards, 3tds, 1 int.

Here's the GOAT thread after that game, in which Mac is immediately shit on. The standards he's being held to, are fucking outrageous:

https://sonsofsamhorn.net/index.php?threads/game-1-philly-goats.40455/

It's funny, looking back at that thread, there's things in there that are still being discussed now.

Someone made a point that Mac was throwing short passes because they didn't trust him to throw it deep. I made the same point then that I made today (of course, nobody else remembers, or have chosen to forget that this is Bill O'Brien's offense):

Or maybe it's about taking what the defense is giving, and also a bit of recognition that it's not Mac, we have no outside threats at receiver, especially without Parker.

And it's kind of Bill O'Brien's thing. Here's a piece on his philosophy from prior to the season:

https://www.patriots.com/news/analysis-what-will-the-patriots-offense-look-like-with-bill-o-brien-returning

Not sure I follow your valuation logic. If Mac is a top 10% backup in your estimation, a clearly valuable asset on a rookie deal, why wouldn’t you give up similar comp as what Trey Lance got (a 4th), especially if you think some of Mac’s struggles are related to what he has to work with?

 

[Deathofthebambino]

Not sure I follow your valuation logic. If Mac is a top 10% backup in your estimation, a clearly valuable asset on a rookie deal, why wouldn’t you give up similar comp as what Trey Lance got (a 4th), especially if you think some of Mac’s struggles are related to what he has to work with?

Well, I wouldn't have given up a 4th for Lance, so I guess the answer would be "Because I'm not Jerry Jones." I have no idea what Dallas saw in Lance, if they worked him out, they think he could step in to their offense as a similar player to Dak...The guy was a 3rd overall pick, buried due to injuries early and then fell down the depth chart and SF didn't need him with a younger, cheaper option in front of him, with more years left.. He very well might be better than Mac, but I think Jones lost that trade, and if BB gave up a 4th for him, I wouldn't have been thrilled with it.

But yes, there are very few backup QBs out there that I'd take over Mac. Dallas is also much closer to having a chance than the Pats are. Trading a 4th to rent a backup fir a year and a half on a roster like the Pats makes way less sense than shoring the back up QB spot on a roster like Dallas.

 

[dirtynine]

If we’re all sure Mac can’t win a Super Bowl as a Patriot, what else matters? I guess this is the Mac Jones thread, so carry on, but… why litigate the details? Does anyone have a standard of success for Mac on the Pats that they honestly believe he can achieve? The receivers, line, coaching, team, etc. might suck around him but he has to succeed here to be a success, full stop. If it’s not going to happen, regardless of why, what else is there to say? Change everything but Mac?

 

[Deathofthebambino]

If we’re all sure Mac can’t win a Super Bowl as a Patriot, what else matters? I guess this is the Mac Jones thread, so carry on, but… why litigate the details? Does anyone have a standard of success for Mac on the Pats that they honestly believe he can achieve? The receivers, line, coaching, team, etc. might suck around him but he has to succeed here to be a success, full stop. If it’s not going to happen, regardless of why, what else is there to say? Change everything but Mac?

You see another option on the roster or the free agent market that could win a SB with this roster?

If you do, we're all ears. I think everyone is on board with Mac not being the answer long term.

 

[soxhop411]

MassLive has a story that among other things states that Jones found out he was the 3rd string QB for the last game of the season when we all did (when inactives were released)

FOXBOROUGH – The frustration was at a boiling point for Mac Jones.


Heading into the final game of the 2023 NFL season, the Patriots quarterback was on an island. According to team sources, the communication between Belichick and Jones was nonexistent by this point.

Teammates said Jones worked hard inside Gillette Stadium following his demotion on the team’s quarterback depth chart. He showed up early, worked more in the weight room, and stayed late.

That hard work didn’t influence the coaches. Not only was Jones demoted to third string, but nobody told him. He found out he was inactive when the Patriots released the list 90 minutes before kickoff, according to a team source.



Leading up to this game, the quarterback reps were split differently in practice, but no one on the coaching staff told Jones why and no one told him he’d be the team’s emergency third quarterback.



On the other sideline Zach Wilson, who was drafted the same year as Jones, also lost his starting job. But the Jets had been upfront with their struggling quarterback. The Athletic reported that the Jets told Wilson they were going to trade him in the offseason. According to a source who was on the field pregame, the Patriots quarterback was so bothered by his team’s lack of communication, he told a member of the Jets’ staff that he appreciated how their organization handled Wilson’s situation.



Jones privately lamented to locker room confidants that no one talks to him.



After putting together one of the best rookie seasons for a quarterback in NFL history, Jones didn’t develop like anyone envisioned. The Patriots 2021 first-round pick went from the future of the franchise to a third-string quarterback over three years.



Over the last three months, MassLive spoke to over a dozen sources in and around the Patriots organization to find out where things went wrong. These sources, who spoke anonymously, painted a picture of dysfunction between Belichick and his young quarterback.



“It’s a broken relationship,” described one Patriots source.



Over the last two years, inconsistent coaching and issues with roster building led to universal offensive mistakes and Jones no longer looking like the once-promising quarterback. It came to a head during the Patriots’ disappointing 2023 season. Now Jones’ future with the team is uncertain.

A lot more of the story below
https://www.masslive.com/patriots/2024/01/inside-the-fall-of-mac-jones-how-a-once-promising-patriots-qb-unraveled.html

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

View: https://twitter.com/Danklecko9073/status/1751983720918139312

 

[Silverdude2167]

Imagine costing the best coach in the history of the league his job and wondering why he wasn't nice to you.

 

[MuppetAsteriskTalk]

Please fire this clown into the sun as soon as possible.

 

[Valek123]

This is the quickest way out of town I’ve seen with a new coach. Can’t imagine having him around a rookie, or being the backup if they bring in a veteran. His camp is either smart(get him cut) or stupid(thinking this would in anyway endear them to NE fans).

 

[Eck'sSneakyCheese]

The entitlement with this kid is next level. Not understanding what earning the job means and being a petulant ass about it is obnoxious. No one talked to you because you don’t get it and it’s pointless to repeat it. He needs to be off this team.

 

[EvilEmpire]

I have to admit that I'm mildly curious where coach-killer Jones ends up next.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

I have to admit that I'm mildly curious where coach-killer Jones ends up next.

The Birmingham Stallions.

 

[Marciano490]

I like the part where he started working hard after his demotion.

 

[MuppetAsteriskTalk]

I have to admit that I'm mildly curious where coach-killer Jones ends up next.

Mac Jones Kia of somewhere far away from New England.

 

[Two Youks]

I like the part where he started working hard after his demotion.

Was going to say the same thing.

I also like how he decided talking to a Jets staff member about it was the appropriate thing to do. As though complaining to people outside the organization isn’t part of what landed him on Bill’s shit list in the first place. Obviously a smart kid and leader of men.

 

[Cellar-Door]

Mac Jones Kia of somewhere far away from New England.

Tuscaloosa, but it will be Fords, he'll get you into the perfect F-150 for all your needs.

 

[MuppetAsteriskTalk]

Tuscaloosa, but it will be Fords, he'll get you into the perfect F-150 for all your needs.

Fords are too reliable. I think...

 

[Marciano490]

The line about one of the greatest rookie seasons ever was also a nice touch. And maybe it’s statistically true by some metrics, but it was still a lovely addition.

 

[Van Everyman]

Counterpoint: there is a non-zero percent chance Belichick mishandled this relationship and crushed the kid's confidence for reasons we may not ever fully understand.

I get that we are on a message board and are sad that our historic coach got canned after a really shitty season. And I understand we are all world renowned experts at reading body language and parsing press conference language. But all the evidence points to the responsibility for this, at a minimum, being at least partly in Belichick's lap. For the millionth time:

• What if Bill hadn't made a failed HC and defensive guy Mac's offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in year 2?
• What if Bill had put receivers around Mac who didn't need a scheme to get open?
• What if Bill had drafted and/or signed OL help in 2022 and 2023?
• What if Bill hadn't frozen Mac out for seeking offensive coaching input from people other than offensive super geniuses Matt Patricia and Joe Judge?

I'm not a "Mac Defender" -- and I'm not saying Mac is blameless here. The article says that he started freelancing when everything went to shit with the receivers and he got down on himself.

But I'm also not a "Bill Belichick Got Fired And It Was All One Player's Fault" guy. I mean, this story has teammates and staff saying positive things about Mac's character explaining away a lot of the bad things he did as understandable, and stories of him playing hurt and making mistakes when Vedarian Lowe completely whiffs on blocks. And then when posters read stories about him working hard when he got demoted and concluding, "OH SO ***THAT'S*** WHEN MAC STARTED WORKING HARD?!?"

At some point during the last 3 years--from drafting Mac, to having zero plan for when Josh inevitably left, to shopping in the bargain basement --Bill fucked this up. Hell, I'd guess he would admit that himself, since he always fell on the sword for the team's failures and said responsibility lied with him. It's one of the things I respected most about Bill at the end of the day. He owned his team's mistakes.

I'm ready to move on to 2024 and whatever comes next post-Mac, and I'm not really ready to debate all this crap for the 100th time. But people need to stop being babies about this. Mac failed as a QB here in significant part because Bill's system was a dysfunctional mess. That the QB wasn't strong enough to persevere is too bad but it's not indicative of him being some terrible person.

I fully expect 70% of the board to beat the shit out of me for saying this but I don't care. Bill owns this mess, period.

 

[Silverdude2167]

Counterpoint: there is a non-zero percent chance Belichick mishandled this relationship and crushed the kid's confidence for reasons we may not ever fully understand.

I get that we are on a message board and are sad that our historic coach got canned after a really shitty season. And I understand we are all world renowned experts at reading body language and parsing press conference language. But all the evidence points to the responsibility for this, at a minimum, being at least partly in Belichick's lap. For the millionth time:

• What if Bill hadn't made a failed HC and defensive guy Mac's offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in year 2?
• What if Bill had put receivers around Mac who didn't need a scheme to get open?
• What if Bill had drafted and/or signed OL help in 2022 and 2023?
• What if Bill hadn't frozen Mac out for seeking offensive coaching input from people other than offensive super geniuses Matt Patricia and Joe Judge?

I'm not a "Mac Defender" -- and I'm not saying Mac is blameless here. The article says that he started freelancing when everything went to shit with the receivers and he got down on himself.

But I'm also not a "Bill Belichick Got Fired And It Was All One Player's Fault" guy. I mean, this story has teammates and staff saying positive things about Mac's character explaining away a lot of the bad things he did as understandable, and stories of him playing hurt and making mistakes when Vedarian Lowe completely whiffs on blocks. And then when posters read stories about him working hard when he got demoted and concluding, "OH SO ***THAT'S*** WHEN MAC STARTED WORKING HARD?!?"

At some point during the last 3 years--from drafting Mac, to having zero plan for when Josh inevitably left, to shopping in the bargain basement --Bill fucked this up. Hell, I'd guess he would admit that himself, since he always fell on the sword for the team's failures and said responsibility lied with him. It's one of the things I respected most about Bill at the end of the day. He owned his team's mistakes.

I'm ready to move on to 2024 and whatever comes next post-Mac, and I'm not really ready to debate all this crap for the 100th time. But people need to stop being babies about this. Mac failed as a QB here in significant part because Bill's system was a dysfunctional mess. That the QB wasn't strong enough to persevere is too bad but it's not indicative of him being some terrible person.

I fully expect 70% of the board to beat the shit out of me for saying this but I don't care. Bill owns this mess, period.

Counterpoint Mac was good for 10 games in his first season and then well you watched him play. If his entire career was doomed because of a bad coordinator in his 2nd year and could not recover in his third, he does not deserve to be a NFL QB.

 

[BaseballJones]

I'll say that all the stuff you guys are saying is true. Yet at the same time, it borders on irresponsible if the HC doesn't at least explain to a player what he's doing with him.

"Yeah I'm sitting you because you've been a catastrophe this year."
"Now you're third string because your attitude sucks."

Whatever the reason is, you gotta communicate with your players. It's not difficult to do and that "conversation" should take about 20 seconds. That doesn't require you to have a "relationship" with the player, or be friendly. It just requires not having him completely in the dark or just assuming he can read your mind.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

Counterpoint Mac was good for 10 games in his first season and then well you watched him play. If his entire career was doomed because of a bad coordinator in his 2nd year and could not recover in his third, he does not deserve to be a NFL QB.

Very much this. He played on a stacked college team with no fans in the stands for a lot of the time. He got to the NFL, encountered his first taste of adversity, and completely fell apart.

He's softer than puppy shit and clearly does not have the emotional fortitude to succeed in the league. He's always been mama's special boy and the moment he was not he essentially threw a tantrum.

This is all, 100%, on Mac. Some of it is due to his natural physical limitations. But a lot of it is due to the space between his ears. I'm sorry that Big Bad Bill didn't hold your hand to explain to you why you were benched. Maybe he thought the entire seasons' worth of sucking might be self-explanatory.

God I hate this guy so much. He really should have been a Duke kid.

 

[ShaneTrot]

I am not a fan of Jones but this was a clusterfuck all over. To be the lowest-scoring offense in the NFL, a lot of things have to go wrong. Everyone with a frontal lobe has been saying they needed to upgrade the offensive tackles and WRs since Brady's last year in NE. The drafting, development, and coaching on offense were dreadful the last two years.

 

[Two Youks]

I'd say the most telling part of the entire QB scenario is that Zappe played more competitive football than Mac with the same roster and the OC who was supposed to fix Mac.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

The most telling part is that Mac is apparently a worse teammate and person than he is a QB. The entitlement is ridiculous.

Talking to a Jets staffer? Straight to jail.

 

[FL4WL3SS]

Counterpoint: there is a non-zero percent chance Belichick mishandled this relationship and crushed the kid's confidence for reasons we may not ever fully understand.

I get that we are on a message board and are sad that our historic coach got canned after a really shitty season. And I understand we are all world renowned experts at reading body language and parsing press conference language. But all the evidence points to the responsibility for this, at a minimum, being at least partly in Belichick's lap. For the millionth time:

• What if Bill hadn't made a failed HC and defensive guy Mac's offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in year 2?
• What if Bill had put receivers around Mac who didn't need a scheme to get open?
• What if Bill had drafted and/or signed OL help in 2022 and 2023?
• What if Bill hadn't frozen Mac out for seeking offensive coaching input from people other than offensive super geniuses Matt Patricia and Joe Judge?

I'm not a "Mac Defender" -- and I'm not saying Mac is blameless here. The article says that he started freelancing when everything went to shit with the receivers and he got down on himself.

But I'm also not a "Bill Belichick Got Fired And It Was All One Player's Fault" guy. I mean, this story has teammates and staff saying positive things about Mac's character explaining away a lot of the bad things he did as understandable, and stories of him playing hurt and making mistakes when Vedarian Lowe completely whiffs on blocks. And then when posters read stories about him working hard when he got demoted and concluding, "OH SO ***THAT'S*** WHEN MAC STARTED WORKING HARD?!?"

At some point during the last 3 years--from drafting Mac, to having zero plan for when Josh inevitably left, to shopping in the bargain basement --Bill fucked this up. Hell, I'd guess he would admit that himself, since he always fell on the sword for the team's failures and said responsibility lied with him. It's one of the things I respected most about Bill at the end of the day. He owned his team's mistakes.

I'm ready to move on to 2024 and whatever comes next post-Mac, and I'm not really ready to debate all this crap for the 100th time. But people need to stop being babies about this. Mac failed as a QB here in significant part because Bill's system was a dysfunctional mess. That the QB wasn't strong enough to persevere is too bad but it's not indicative of him being some terrible person.

I fully expect 70% of the board to beat the shit out of me for saying this but I don't care. Bill owns this mess, period.

You are a Mac defender and you trolled mercilessly for two years for saying that he sucked. Now that it's apparent to everyone he sucks, you're still making excuses for him, but you're "not a Mac guy" so that you can continue to come out looking good.

I don't care either way, but at least admit it.

 

[DeJesus Built My Hotrod]

I'll say that all the stuff you guys are saying is true. Yet at the same time, it borders on irresponsible if the HC doesn't at least explain to a player what he's doing with him.

"Yeah I'm sitting you because you've been a catastrophe this year."
"Now you're third string because your attitude sucks."

Whatever the reason is, you gotta communicate with your players. It's not difficult to do and that "conversation" should take about 20 seconds. That doesn't require you to have a "relationship" with the player, or be friendly. It just requires not having him completely in the dark or just assuming he can read your mind.

Is this how things are done in professional sports? Because in my experience seeing decent high school programs and talking to people who have played in D1 programs in college, these sorts of communications feel more like the exception rather than the rule. Most of the time, these athletes are kind of on their own to figure things out including when the coaches have lost faith in them.

But maybe its different in the NFL.

 

[BusRaker]

I guess it's obvious he'll go to the Jets practice squad so he can be honestly and fully informed of the level of shit that he is

 

[sezwho]

Counterpoint: there is a non-zero percent chance Belichick mishandled this relationship and crushed the kid's confidence for reasons we may not ever fully understand.

I get that we are on a message board and are sad that our historic coach got canned after a really shitty season. And I understand we are all world renowned experts at reading body language and parsing press conference language. But all the evidence points to the responsibility for this, at a minimum, being at least partly in Belichick's lap. For the millionth time:

• What if Bill hadn't made a failed HC and defensive guy Mac's offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in year 2?
• What if Bill had put receivers around Mac who didn't need a scheme to get open?
• What if Bill had drafted and/or signed OL help in 2022 and 2023?
• What if Bill hadn't frozen Mac out for seeking offensive coaching input from people other than offensive super geniuses Matt Patricia and Joe Judge?

I'm not a "Mac Defender" -- and I'm not saying Mac is blameless here. The article says that he started freelancing when everything went to shit with the receivers and he got down on himself.

But I'm also not a "Bill Belichick Got Fired And It Was All One Player's Fault" guy. I mean, this story has teammates and staff saying positive things about Mac's character explaining away a lot of the bad things he did as understandable, and stories of him playing hurt and making mistakes when Vedarian Lowe completely whiffs on blocks. And then when posters read stories about him working hard when he got demoted and concluding, "OH SO ***THAT'S*** WHEN MAC STARTED WORKING HARD?!?"

At some point during the last 3 years--from drafting Mac, to having zero plan for when Josh inevitably left, to shopping in the bargain basement --Bill fucked this up. Hell, I'd guess he would admit that himself, since he always fell on the sword for the team's failures and said responsibility lied with him. It's one of the things I respected most about Bill at the end of the day. He owned his team's mistakes.

I'm ready to move on to 2024 and whatever comes next post-Mac, and I'm not really ready to debate all this crap for the 100th time. But people need to stop being babies about this. Mac failed as a QB here in significant part because Bill's system was a dysfunctional mess. That the QB wasn't strong enough to persevere is too bad but it's not indicative of him being some terrible person.

I fully expect 70% of the board to beat the shit out of me for saying this but I don't care. Bill owns this mess, period.

I don’t post that often as the ‘debate’ often feels like Bill has golden halo and Mac is anti-Christ, but fwiw I’m in that silent 30% : ). More interesting though, is the opinion of the rest of the (non-SOSH) NFL.

Mac is going to be in someone’s camp next year, and could easily find a role as backup. BBs performance over the last couple years may end up finishing off his football career.

 

[Dotrat]

What bothers me about this is how unnecessary making it public is in terms of Mac Jones's football life / abilities. And as a PR move, it's essentially career suicide.

Let's accept for a moment that Bill treated him poorly, barely communicated with him, and froze him out. Let's stipulate that Patricia was incompetent and Judge did Sean McDermott cosplay--in each case driving Mac understandably batty. None of us really know what went on, after all. There may well have been things various coaches could have done that might have helped him play better.

However, there's nothing, nothing at all to be gained from making his discontent public. He sucked last year, mostly sucked in 2022, and (as @Two Youks pointed out) an arguably less talented (certainly not markedly more talented) backup routinely played more competitive football than he did over the last two seasons. So buckle down and try to improve--try to salvage your professional life by committing to getting better. After all, the Pats are under new football management. There's a chance to start again. Or would be if he cared as much about playing QB than he does making ham-handed attempts to repair his image.

 

[Van Everyman]

You are a Mac defender and you trolled mercilessly for two years for saying that he sucked. Now that it's apparent to everyone he sucks, you're still making excuses for him, but you're "not a Mac guy" so that you can continue to come out looking good.

I don't care either way, but at least admit it.

Ahh, I knew you’d show up here, esp. when I said that.

Is it really controversial to say that the NEP offense devolved into a dysfunctional mess the last two years? Even if we have some disagreements as to who is chiefly to blame, do we really think the OL wasn't a problem? That the receivers dropping balls weren't a problem? That the running game drying up wasn't a problem? How is any of that on Mac?

I honestly have no idea whether Mac is the worst quarterback of all time or not. What I do feel pretty confident in saying is that he was poorly served by the team the last few years and wasn't put in a position to succeed. And where I initially thought that was maybe some bad OL health luck and bad timing with Josh leaving in Year 2, I've come to believe that Bill kind of screwed the pooch when it came to roster building and building a deep bench of coaches on the offensive side of the ball.

We can debate that on other threads but the idea that he handed the keys of some Cadillac Coup Deville offense to Mac Jones and he just pissed it all away seems pretty hard to believe. If that makes me a "Mac Defender" to perpetuity, so be it. I've been called worse things.

 

[DeJesus Built My Hotrod]

What bothers me about this is how unnecessary making it public is in terms of Mac Jones's football life / abilities. And as a PR move, it's essentially career suicide.

Let's accept for a moment that Bill treated him poorly, barely communicated with him, and froze him out. Let's stipulate that Patricia was incompetent and Judge did Sean McDermott cosplay--in each case driving Mac understandably batty. None of us really know what went on, after all. There may well have been things various coaches could have done that might have helped him play better.

However, there's nothing, nothing at all to be gained from making his discontent public. He sucked last year, mostly sucked in 2022, and (as @Two Youks pointed out) an arguably less talented (certainly not markedly more talented) backup routinely played more competitive football than he did over the last two seasons. So buckle down and try to improve--try to salvage your professional life by committing to getting better. After all, the Pats are under new football management. There's a chance to start again. Or would be if he cared as much about playing QB than he does making ham-handed attempts to repair his image.

Great post.

Its yet another datapoint that whomever is advising Mac Jones or his camp (assuming they are the source of this report because who else cares about Mac Jones right now?) is doing him no favors. Football in general and the NFL in particular aren't typically sympathetic to these types of narratives - the coaches never really gave the player a chance - and especially when the athlete in question really doesn't do anything special.

However Team Mac chose to go with the woe-is-me narrative rather than one of rededicating himself to the craft, reworking his body, footwork etc.

 

[Cellar-Door]

Was this a tough QB situation.... sure.
On the other hand, Mac Jones completely imploded, and couldn't significantly outplay Bailey Zappe.
That's bad.
Also, the QB sets the tone for a team, and where Zappe kept his head down, and determined to work hard and win the job, take his lumps..... Mac consistently whined, complained, blamed everyone else for his problems, ran to anyone who would listen about how it was so unfair and not his fault, and how could he be expected to perform, etc.

Guy pretty clearly was not built for long term success in the NFL, beyond his on-field issues, he clearly had a terrible mental makeup for the rigors of the NFL.
Zappe might stick around in the NFL, but he lacks the tools to ever be even a good backup. Mac should have been positioned to be at least a fringe starter or solid backup, but even that looks unlikely now because he can't handle the mental side of it.

 

[FL4WL3SS]

Ahh, I knew you’d show up here, esp. when I said that.

Is it really controversial to say that the NEP offense devolved into a dysfunctional mess the last two years? Even if we have some disagreements as to who is chiefly to blame, do we really think the OL wasn't a problem? That the receivers dropping balls weren't a problem? That the running game drying up wasn't a problem? How is any of that on Mac?

I honestly have no idea whether Mac is the worst quarterback of all time or not. What I do feel pretty confident in saying is that he was poorly served by the team the last few years and wasn't put in a position to succeed. And where I initially thought that was maybe some bad OL health luck and bad timing with Josh leaving in Year 2, I've come to believe that Bill kind of screwed the pooch when it came to roster building and building a deep bench of coaches on the offensive side of the ball.

We can debate that on other threads but the idea that he handed the keys of some Cadillac Coup Deville offense to Mac Jones and he just pissed it all away seems pretty hard to believe. If that makes me a "Mac Defender" to perpetuity, so be it. I've been called worse things.

He was poorly served, but you also need to acknowledge how he handled it. There were multiple opportunities to introspect and improve and he never did that. I'm not even sure having Patricia coach him was an issue, especially if he was against the coaching change from the beginning and himself didn't buy in because he thought he was more important than everyone else. What happened under a proven OC? He got even worse.

 

[dcdrew10]

Mac was both a symptom and a casualty of the disfunction of the last 5 years, but especially the last two seasons. He was not THE reason the Patriots have been shit post-Brady, that’s squarely on the shoulders of the person making roster decisions and coaching. BB drafted a pocket passer with a weak arm and who hadn’t face adversity and then surrounded him with a wet paper bag OL and receivers who got no separation. If Mac lacked the ability to sling it in small windows or run when the pocket collapsed it’s not entirely his fault. Now he certainly shit the bed when it stopped being easy and that’s on him. We knew he was physically limited and it turned out he was mentally limited, too, but it’s not like he’s the Gavrilo Princip blowing up the Patriot dynasty.

 

[Over Guapo Grande]

Very much this. He played on a stacked college team with no fans in the stands for a lot of the time. He got to the NFL, encountered his first taste of adversity, and completely fell apart.

Outside of the 100k at each of his home games? The SEC as a whole averaged 72k (so more than a banged-out Foxboro) fans per game in 2019.

https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/sports/college/auburn/2019/12/22/2019-sec-home-football-attendance-drops-lowest-average-since-2001-stadium-alcohol-sales-greg-sankey/2712365001/


EDIT - my bad, had his draft year (post COVID) wrong. Keeping it up as a mea-culpa.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

Outside of the 100k at each of his home games? The SEC as a whole averaged 72k fans per game in 2019.

https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/sports/college/auburn/2019/12/22/2019-sec-home-football-attendance-drops-lowest-average-since-2001-stadium-alcohol-sales-greg-sankey/2712365001/

I may have been misreading his seasons, I thought he played during the pandemic.

 

[Cellar-Door]

Mac was both a symptom and a casualty of the disfunction of the last 5 years, but especially the last two seasons. He was not THE reason the Patriots have been shit post-Brady, that’s squarely on the shoulders of the person making roster decisions and coaching. BB drafted a pocket passer with a weak arm and who hadn’t face adversity and then surrounded him with a wet paper bag OL and receivers who got no separation. If Mac lacked the ability to sling it in small windows or run when the pocket collapsed it’s not entirely his fault. Now he certainly shit the bed when it stopped being easy and that’s on him. We knew he was physically limited and it turned out he was mentally limited, too, but it’s not like he’s the Gavrilo Princip blowing up the Patriot dynasty.

Worth noting, this gets mentioned a bunch, but..... it actually isn't particularly true. Parker gets no separation, but in 2021 the Patriots were 3rd best in WR separation. Of course separation is not a very good stat since for example Jamar Chase and DeAndre Hopkins are often right at the bottom with Parker.

 

[Over Guapo Grande]

I may have been misreading his seasons, I thought he played during the pandemic.

No, you were right. I forgot that we are in 2024 already.

 

[cshea]

I may have been misreading his seasons, I thought he played during the pandemic.

He was the starter in 2020 for the pandemic which had limited capacity crowds. He did start games in 2019 after Tua's injury pre-pandemic.

 

[Rico Guapo]

Mac Jones sucks and was never going to succeed in the NFL because of physical and mental limitations.

BB the GM constructed a dumpster fire of a roster on offense which did Mac no favors.

Both can be true, and I firmly believe both ARE true, hence why BB is gone and Mac is soon to follow (relatively speaking) even if he is on the roster in 2024.

 

[DJnVa]

I'd say the most telling part of the entire QB scenario is that Zappe played more competitive football than Mac with the same roster and the OC who was supposed to fix Mac.

He sucked last year, mostly sucked in 2022, and (as @Two Youks pointed out) an arguably less talented (certainly not markedly more talented) backup routinely played more competitive football than he did over the last two seasons.

What does "more competitive football" mean? Numbers show Zappe was worse.

EDIT: You know what, who cares? It's likely we'll be watching Jayden Daniels or Drake Maye slinging passes in like 7 months, so...whatever.

 

[BaseballJones]

Is this how things are done in professional sports? Because in my experience seeing decent high school programs and talking to people who have played in D1 programs in college, these sorts of communications feel more like the exception rather than the rule. Most of the time, these athletes are kind of on their own to figure things out including when the coaches have lost faith in them.

But maybe its different in the NFL.

I don't know how that all happens. But it's insane to not have these conversations. Sometimes it's obvious to the coach but not obvious to the player. If you care at ALL about a person's development - which you should as their head coach - you have the conversation. Again, it's not a massive time consumer.

"Hey Mac, have a seat. I haven't been seeing what I want to see, and your attitude is not what we need. We've asked you to do X, Y, and Z, and it's not happening. I just want you to know you're being demoted to third string."

That takes 20 seconds to say. Less, even. At least then he knows what the deal is.

I mean don't get me wrong. I've seen lots of times in HS sports where a coach doesn't communicate with his players, but - speaking as a HS coach myself - it's malpractice to not do so. If you care at all about these people.

There's literally no reason to not have these conversations. When I put a kid on the bench, I tell her what the deal is so she's not left in the dark. Even if it's for an obvious reason. It's not hard to do and it leaves no room for the whole "coach just doesn't like me for some reason; he plays favorites" crap.

 

[BaseballJones]

No, you were right. I forgot that we are in 2024 already.

I can't believe the start of Covid was FOUR YEARS AGO.

 

[lexrageorge]

Counterpoint: there is a non-zero percent chance Belichick mishandled this relationship and crushed the kid's confidence for reasons we may not ever fully understand.

I get that we are on a message board and are sad that our historic coach got canned after a really shitty season. And I understand we are all world renowned experts at reading body language and parsing press conference language. But all the evidence points to the responsibility for this, at a minimum, being at least partly in Belichick's lap. For the millionth time:

• What if Bill hadn't made a failed HC and defensive guy Mac's offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in year 2?
• What if Bill had put receivers around Mac who didn't need a scheme to get open?
• What if Bill had drafted and/or signed OL help in 2022 and 2023?
• What if Bill hadn't frozen Mac out for seeking offensive coaching input from people other than offensive super geniuses Matt Patricia and Joe Judge?

I'm not a "Mac Defender" -- and I'm not saying Mac is blameless here. The article says that he started freelancing when everything went to shit with the receivers and he got down on himself.

But I'm also not a "Bill Belichick Got Fired And It Was All One Player's Fault" guy. I mean, this story has teammates and staff saying positive things about Mac's character explaining away a lot of the bad things he did as understandable, and stories of him playing hurt and making mistakes when Vedarian Lowe completely whiffs on blocks. And then when posters read stories about him working hard when he got demoted and concluding, "OH SO ***THAT'S*** WHEN MAC STARTED WORKING HARD?!?"

At some point during the last 3 years--from drafting Mac, to having zero plan for when Josh inevitably left, to shopping in the bargain basement --Bill fucked this up. Hell, I'd guess he would admit that himself, since he always fell on the sword for the team's failures and said responsibility lied with him. It's one of the things I respected most about Bill at the end of the day. He owned his team's mistakes.

I'm ready to move on to 2024 and whatever comes next post-Mac, and I'm not really ready to debate all this crap for the 100th time. But people need to stop being babies about this. Mac failed as a QB here in significant part because Bill's system was a dysfunctional mess. That the QB wasn't strong enough to persevere is too bad but it's not indicative of him being some terrible person.

I fully expect 70% of the board to beat the shit out of me for saying this but I don't care. Bill owns this mess, period.

Mac Jones was not well served by the roster around him. At the same time, Mac was the one that started contacting former coaches and players for advice to undermine his coaches, some of whom were in different organizations. Mac absolutely sucked this season despite the Pats bringing in an experienced and highly regarded offensive coordinator, one who had success elsewhere. Mac was the one that missed wide open receiver after wide open receiver, or threw horrible passes up for grabs by the opposing defense. And now Mac is the one contacting players and coaches from other teams.

Yes, his supporting cast sucked. But Mac also totally sucked. And given the way he sucked, Bill didn't owe him a single fucking word.

If Mac is on the team in any way, shape or form when the 2024 season starts, it will be the worst roster move in local sports lore since Harry Sinden kept Marty McSorley on the roster the day he traded Raymond Bourque.