I am a believer in Mac Jones. I really am. But if Patrick Mahomes had this offensive talent to work with, the Pats would be scoring tons of points. Yes, Mahomes is great, obviously. But the point is that this team DOES have enough offensive talent to be good. I mean, let's not forget.....for all our griping, they finished 9th in offensive DVOA, 7th in OSRS (from pro-football-reference), 6th in points scored, and 15th in yards gained.
With Mac as a rookie, they had one of the better offenses in the league.
Agreed. If they play Bourne, and whenever Thornton comes back, if he can pickup where he left off, that should really round them out, too.
I'm a believer that this offense is really talented. With good QB play, they will be a good offense. With great-to-excellent QB play, they will be a great-to-excellent offense.
In game 1, Mac was OK. No turnovers that were entirely his fault. High completion %. Seemed to be going through his reads well. Pocket presence could be better. Biggest problem was he missed several throws. Fade to Jonnu. 'Go' to Agholor (which was likely a TD if they hit that; Agholor had a full step and was full stride, no one was going to catch him). The tipped INT was a bit underthrown, but hard to fully blame Mac for that. I'm sure I'm forgetting a few others, too.
For fun, you can calculate how fast a QB throws the ball by watching YouTube highlights, slowing the video to 0.25x speed, and timing in seconds the amount of time from when the ball leaves the QB's hand to when it's caught. Then divide that number you got via timing by four, since the video was moving 4x slower than real-time, and that is the actual time in seconds. Note where the QB released ball and where it was caught to determine yards travelled, and calculate speed. Some throws are easy, because the ball travels in a straight line. Other throws, that move a lot horizontally, require more legwork to figure out actual air yardage travelled. If it's helpful, an NFL field is 53.3 yards wide, and the distance from each hash to the nearest sideline is 23.5 yards.
Mac is normally throwing in a range from 40-50 mph.
Brady is normally throwing in a range from 45-55 mph, and can turn it up to 60 if needed (I believe he's been clocked at 61mph).
Mac doesn't need to get significantly better. He needs to get 15-20% better consistently. His passes that travel at 43 mph need to travel at 48 mph. And his passes that travel at 48 mph, need to travel at 54 mph. Drill mechanics, technique, weight transfer, generating torque from his hips and core, which is setup via good footwork and balance. The guy is 6'2", maybe 6'3" in cleats, with big hands (I believe his hands measured slightly larger than Brady's at the combine, but double-check me on that); he's physically gotten leaner and looks more fit. He's no Josh Allen or Patrick Mahomes, but there's absolutely no physical aptitude / raw arm talent limitation with Mac. It will come down to mechanics, technique, and drilling those until they are habitual and consistent under game conditions. Only time will tell if Mac can elevate his game to that truly great-excellent-elite level.
