Good BSPN article on Mac

[archstanton543]

You're literally faulting BB for not identifying every good late 1st round and beyond QB in recent years. People would have lost their mind if we took Jackson in the first round in 2018 coming off the Super Bowl loss to Philly. Jalen Hurts in 2020 is questionable but I recall everyone on this board wanting Jake Fromm anyway.

You can play this game all day long. Like why didn't they trade up for Mahomes, right!

 

[mike_usagisan]

Bill had multiple chances to draft franchise qb after Brady and before Mac

Lamar Jackson
Jaylon Hurts

Or other non franchise qbs better than Mac
Davis Mills
Sam Howell

Or Veteran free agents to push Mac in TC
Baker Mayfied
Mariotta
Trubisky
Mike White
Tyrod Taylor
Gardner Minshew



Nobody forced BB to take Mac, he should own it

I'm not that interested in guys who clearly aren't franchise QBs. That gets us nowhere.

I only see a couple guys that I wish Bill had gone with, being the first two you mentioned, but I think if we had picked a QB in the first while Brady was here, Bill would have been crucified. Hurts was probably the guy we should have gone after, but I don't know that he was any safer of a pick than Mac was a year later. One developed (with the help of his franchise giving him great weapons) and the other clearly didn't.

 

[mike_usagisan]

You can play this game all day long. Like why didn't they trade up for Mahomes, right!

Correct, but it also shows how rare they are. We're talking about one QB post-Brady who we should have gotten. That's how hard it is to find the right guy and why every team ends up with QBs like Mac who were drafted high and didn't work out.

 

[Steve102]

I'm not that interested in guys who clearly aren't franchise QBs. That gets us nowhere.

I only see a couple guys that I wish Bill had gone with, being the first two you mentioned, but I think if we had picked a QB in the first while Brady was here, Bill would have been crucified. Hurts was probably the guy we should have gone after, but I don't know that he was any safer of a pick than Mac was a year later. One developed (with the help of his franchise giving him great weapons) and the other clearly didn't.

Quite literally, everyone said Mac was a high floor, low ceiling "safe" pick. Most NFL ready. No one thought he was a going to bust, except Bradyites who couldn't stand the fact that instead of their QB having movie idol good looks with a cleft chin and a super model wife, he looked like Howdy freakin' Doody and did the griddy.

It's another hindsight Bill Sucks See I Told You victory lap. Especially by the OP. All set with all of it. These guys root against the coach and the QB, it's like rooting against the airline pilot on the flight your on. Dumb.

Doesn't excuse the 2-10 mess that the team is today, in 2023. When they made the playoffs his rookie year, Mac looked to have a pretty good future. All the noise is I Hate Bill ********.

 

[mike_usagisan]

Quite literally, everyone said Mac was a high floor, low ceiling "safe" pick. Most NFL ready. No one thought he was a going to bust, except Bradyites who couldn't stand the fact that instead of their QB having movie idol good looks with a cleft chin and a super model wife, he looked like Howdy freakin' Doody and did the griddy.

It's another hindsight Bill Sucks See I Told You victory lap. Especially by the OP. All set with all of it. These guys root against the coach and the QB, it's like rooting against the airline pilot on the flight your on. Dumb.

Doesn't excuse the 2-10 mess that the team is today, in 2023. When they made the playoffs his rookie year, Mac looked to have a pretty good future. All the noise is I Hate Bill ********.

No, I know. It's just I have a problem with the "Bill drafted this guy" or "Bill didn't get Mac weapons" etc. arguments, but then fail to identify who were the people Bill should have gotten. When you start digging down into that, you find that there are often only a few and sometime no options that would have been better.

But also, I'm not all that interested in the hold Bill accountable for past failures thing. I'd rather talk about what Bill or whoever replaces him can do to get us out of this mess this offseason.

 

[Steve102]

No, I know. It's just I have a problem with the "Bill drafted this guy" or "Bill didn't get Mac weapons" etc. arguments, but then fail to identify who were the people Bill should have gotten. When you start digging down into that, you find that there are often only a few and sometime no options that would have been better.

But also, I'm not all that interested in the hold Bill accountable for past failures thing. I'd rather talk about what Bill or whoever replaces him can do to get us out of this mess this offseason.

It's all hatespeak. I just shake my head. You hate him so much, go root for the Jete.

I get the being mad at this 2-10 debacle, but 20/20 hindsight on draft picks is always a lose/lose argument. They should have drafted X with x pick. Stop it. The entire NFL would have made Tom Brady their 1st round pick in 2000 if they had hindsight. It's a waste of time.

 

[SlowGettingUp]

"Yards of separation" is sometimes (often) a misleading stat.

Yes - it has a negative correlation with receiving yards!

“Yards of Separation” is Fooling Us

We’ve been hoodwinked, bamboozled, lead astray, run amok and flat out deceived!

underblog.underdogfantasy.com

 

[borg]

McNoodle possesses zero physical tools necessary to elevate an NFL offense.

He's the Myles Bryant of the offense.

 

[One-If-By-Sea]

All in all, I think Mac could have become - might even still become, elsewhere - an average NFL starter. Bill's negligence, both as GM and as HC, made this impossible here. Mac is not good enough to overcome such negligence and stupidity. I'm not sure who, other than perhaps a few stellar outliers, could have done so. The net is that we do not as yet know what Mac's actual upside might be. We are left knowing now only what we knew when he was drafted: that his upside potential is probably limited at "average." The data is so corrupted by Bill's failures that no more definitive evaluation can be made. If I had to quantify the causes for Mac's failures here, I would put the blame at about 75% on Bill, and my solution, my way of avoiding a repeat of this ugly interlude, would be to fire it's main architect: Belichick. His fanboys will need to find another binky. The team has to get going on the rebuild, and ****yfooting any longer around the obvious facts of Bill's failures is a waste of time.

Another post devoid of any details or logic. An old man rambling and yelling at the wind.

 

[Ice_Ice_Brady]

As anti-Bill as I am, I still don’t dislike the Mac Jones pick. Most QBs bust…he was worth a shot without having to burn draft capital.

I hate Lamar Jackson. I like Jaylen Hurts but don’t necessarily think he fits in the Patriots offense, and I still wonder about the longevity of a guy like him boosted by a historically good line.

But it’s 1000% on Bill to have this absolute **** show of a supporting cast, especially the skill positions. The Eagles whiffed on Reagor (they passed on Jefferson). Tons of teams whiff on WRs and TEs in the draft but still have numerous competent players out there. The Patriots have not done enough to ensure they have at least a competent group out there, and it’s frustrating seeing how many teams whose #2 receiver is far, far better than anyone we have and often you can say that about their #3.

 

[ahmed]

Why? The article was an objective assessment of why Mac has failed. It doesn't whitewash anything or make excuses for his poor performances. In a nutshell, he is incapable of transcending a subpar surrounding cast with individual play.

I always ask myself a few things about what I am reading. Who wrote it, why and why now? It is random. You see these articles drop randomly about players or coaches at times of struggle. There was one about Vrabel a couple days back.

It makes sense if the subject is having some amazing year or on some special occasion which happen. This one dropped during a bad year, a horrible spell and in the middle of a snooze fest of a match up. So the question is why and why now?

To me these types of articles seem like someone is calling in favors. Of course I could be talking out of my ass but happens too often to be anything else IMO.

 

[ahmed]

Another post devoid of any details or logic. An old man rambling and yelling at the wind.

Amazing how people talk about hypothetical scenarios with such confidence lol. Of course easy to do so since it's completely made up so it can be whatever you want it to be.

 

[Tunescribe]

I always ask myself a few things about what I am reading. Who wrote it, why and why now? It is random. You see these articles drop randomly about players or coaches at times of struggle. There was one about Vrabel a couple days back.

It makes sense if the subject is having some amazing year or on some special occasion which happen. This one dropped during a bad year, a horrible spell and in the middle of a snooze fest of a match up. So the question is why and why now?

To me these types of articles seem like someone is calling in favors. Of course I could be talking out of my ass but happens too often to be anything else IMO.

Thing is, though, I don't think the article did Mac any favors or make him look any better than he actually is. It was a thoughtful look into his fall from grace. Which is interesting unto itself, considering a lot of people want to know why the Patriots are having such a bad season.

 

[One-If-By-Sea]

As anti-Bill as I am, I still don’t dislike the Mac Jones pick. Most QBs bust…he was worth a shot without having to burn draft capital.

I hate Lamar Jackson. I like Jaylen Hurts but don’t necessarily think he fits in the Patriots offense, and I still wonder about the longevity of a guy like him boosted by a historically good line.

But it’s 1000% on Bill to have this absolute **** show of a supporting cast, especially the skill positions. The Eagles whiffed on Reagor (they passed on Jefferson). Tons of teams whiff on WRs and TEs in the draft but still have numerous competent players out there. The Patriots have not done enough to ensure they have at least a competent group out there, and it’s frustrating seeing how many teams whose #2 receiver is far, far better than anyone we have and often you can say that about their #3.

Bill seems to try to patch the OL and WRs with dependable but unspectacular mid-level talent. He approaches TEs differently. Right now his OL and WRs are below mid- level with a disastrous effect.

It can be argued we are lucky to have our highest pick since Bledsoe (I am guessing here but I think I am right) in a draft rich with QB talent. But you can not convince me that the collapse was by design. It appears like Bill choked with his mid-talent strategy. Imagine if we ended the year at 8 - 9 or even 9 - 8 and picked 15th or 18th after all the QB talent was gone. It would be perpetual middling. Even though the season is a disaster, we are lucky with the reset, assuming we hit on a QB in the draft. Talk of drafting a WR and waiting for R2 to gamble on a QB is absurd.

 

[RIpats88]

Bill seems to try to patch the OL and WRs with dependable but unspectacular mid-level talent. He approaches TEs differently. Right now his OL and WRs are below mid- level with a disastrous effect.

It can be argued we are lucky to have our highest pick since Bledsoe (I am guessing here but I think I am right) in a draft rich with QB talent. But you can not convince me that the collapse was by design. It appears like Bill choked with his mid-talent strategy. Imagine if we ended the year at 8 - 9 or even 9 - 8 and picked 15th or 18th after all the QB talent was gone. It would be perpetual middling. Even though the season is a disaster, we are lucky with the reset, assuming we hit on a QB in the draft. Talk of drafting a WR and waiting for R2 to gamble on a QB is absurd.

This is what I've been saying in numerous threads where posters take the position that our roster is fine it's just the QB.

At best the way Bill wants to build the team it's a 6-9 win team. Middling at best.

No one expected us to be 2-10 at this point. And with better QB play sure we could win some of these games. But the elephant in the room is no one realistically could look at the roster and think we are no better than a .500 team.

 

[RIpats88]

I think it's unfair to criticize bill for drafting Mac Jones. It's pure revisionist history. Cam Newton was not good and Mac fell to us and we went 10-6 and made the playoffs.

Sure he flamed out. But plenty of QBs flame out in the league.

If you want to criticize bill for anything it's hiring a DC to be OC (that's a decision NO team in the league would take) and ignoring/whiffing on skill position players.

You can ask the question did Bill do everything he could to foster his young QB to succeed? And the answer is no. Sure we may have still ended up in the same place with Mac flaming out.

But no one can tell me if we draft a high prospect the best way to nurture him the next 3 years is to give him 3 separate OC's one of which is a DC and is learning on the fly! And surround him with average #3 receivers.

Compare that to most every other team who has drafted a QB and done everything they could for them to succeed.

 

[Mack Herron]

 

[TomPatriot]

This article is tepid and tells us what we already know. For example, we all knew Mac was a game manager (and not Mahomes) before the draft.

There are other lines of inquiry the writer could have pursued, but didn’t. There’s a lot more to this. Maybe someone will take that up after both Bill and Mac leave.

 

[Thelonious]

Another post devoid of any details or logic. An old man rambling and yelling at the wind.

Well, your post is certainly clear as to what sort of person you are.

 

[One-If-By-Sea]

Well, your post is certainly clear as to what sort of person you are.

Ouch. Touche. Is this high school?