Is Mac Jones on the Trade Block? Six Thoughts On the Patriots QB’s Situation
(PHOTO: David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports) 🕑 Read Time: 7 minutes
Posted Under: Patriots News
(PHOTO: David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports) 🕑 Read Time: 7 minutes
New England Patriots > Patriots Blog
(PHOTO: David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports) It’s been an interesting 24 hours since Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com reported on the club potentially exploring trade options for Mac Jones, and here are some thoughts on it.
Two moments still stand out that essentially defined Mac Jones’s 2022 season, and it happened long before the season even started.
Both came during the club’s final exhibition game in Las Vegas, which saw all of the frustration that had been building during training camp boil over during a 23-6 preseason loss to the Raiders.
After throwing an interception that helped the Raiders build a 10-0 lead, Jones had two possessions that went south where his emotions got the better of him. The first came during a possession that saw Jones take a deep shot to DeVante Parker, but the ball was a little long after he was forced to get rid of it relatively quickly due to cornerback Amik Robertson blitzing from the right side, knocking him down on the play. Jones eventually found Hunter Henry on a 3rd-and-8, but Henry was stopped just short of the marker and New England was forced to punt.
Jones wasn’t happy as he came off the field, with the second-year QB being spotted slamming the tablet behind the bench.
Things went badly on the next drive, despite Jones converting a fourth down where he fired a nice throw between two defenders on a pass to Kendrick Bourne to keep the chains moving.
Following a sack, Jones appeared to have a touchdown strike to Parker on a fade pattern, but it was called back due to an offensive pass interference call. The Raiders then again got pressure on Jones on a 3rd-and-13 and forced him to throw the football away, which led to New England having to settle for a field goal.
However, as Jones came off the field, he was clearly angry, with the quarterback ripping off his wristband with the play calls and throwing them away.
Obviously, that moment was relatively symbolic and it tells you how he felt about where things were with the offense. Even worse, looking back, it was clearly a precursor to what would come in 2022.
Following the additional reports of Jones looking for advice outside the team’s walls, that only seems to have further soured things with the person who obviously matters the most.
There have been multiple reports of Bill Belichick not being happy with Jones for that reason, with NBC Sports Boston’s Tom Curran repeating the point made previously about Belichick being unhappy following the initial report we heard back at the start of the offseason.
Time may heal some wounds, but this one appears to still sting to the point where he’s apparently still displeased about it.
Curran’s latest comments on the matter happened on an appearance on WEEI’s Jones & Mego with Arcand last Friday where Curran said Belichick was “still pissed” about what Curran believed was “a betrayal” that was “almost worse than bad play.”
“I will say that one thing that’s interesting to watch play out, is just what’s left over from Bill being agitated at Mac for, more than anything else, you know, the yelling and the gesticulations during the games was irritating enough, but Chris Simms alluded to this and I heard it reaffirmed today, going outside the building for council as to ‘Is this the way we’re supposed to be doing this?’,” explained Curran. “That really pissed Bill off, and as we know, a betrayal of Bill, or disloyalty in Bill’s mind, is almost worse than bad play.”
“And Mac, even though you could say, ‘Well, it’s ironic, the guy’s trying to get better, and he’s wondering ‘Are we supposed to be doing it this way?’ And asking people around football about it.’ That effort to improve was showing up the Matt Patricia-Joe Judge contingent and Bill putting them in charge. And when Bill caught wind of it, he’s still pissed about it. So I think a lot of that, how well are they going to be able to bury the hatchet on Mac’s perceived and presumed disloyalty in doing that. And does Bill O’Brien rectify that, or is Bill still itching to teach the kid a lesson?”
That simmered over the weekend, and then Florio’s revelation that things had potentially escalated to the point of Belichick exploring Jones’s trade value obviously surprised everyone. However, when you take the entire situation into account, it’s really not that surprising.
That crowd turned on Jones that night against Chicago. (PHOTO:Paul Rutherford-USA TODAY Sports)
Jones may smile and laugh in interviews, but behind closed doors, he doesn’t seem like a self-deprecating player who won’t stick up for himself if he’s not happy about things.
That may have started following his injury and Bailey Zappe’s ascension, thanks to back-to-back solid performances by the rookie QB against both the Lions and Browns. Fans quickly turned on Jones just three starts removed from a playoff appearance, with memories of Tom Brady immediately filling their minds as Zappe stepped in for the injured player and led them to success over two games.
That poetic parallel split the fan base, and according to a recent interview with Devin McCourty, it also somewhat split the locker room, with some players believing that maybe the club should have rolled with Zappe.
Belichick seemingly did little to eliminate any controversy. Leading up to that Chicago game, everything built up as a less than healthy Jones prepared to make his first start coming off of what was a pretty severe high ankle sprain.
It was obvious as he took the field something wasn’t right. The second-year quarterback was clearly hobbled by his bad ankle and certainly didn’t appear to have the same confidence we had seen previously.
He was extremely tentative and had a difficult time moving around against a tough Bears defense, with the cold rainy, wet conditions setting up a perfect storm on a night where Jones was never able to get anything going.
Thanks to an interception to Jonnu Smith that was thrown just short after he couldn’t get enough on it, Jones dropped his head and was booed off the field, followed by deafening chants for Zappe by the Gillette Stadium faithful.
The moment happened barely into the second quarter, and the entire situation was just surreal. Worse yet, Belichick gave them what they wanted, and Zappe went out and engineered two scoring drives before the Bears adjusted and shut down New England’s offense the rest of the way.
But the damage was done. Former Patriots linebacker Ted Johnson probably said it best. “Mac Jones will never forget the fans turning on him last night,” Johnson Tweeted after the game. “He strikes me as a guy who will always hold that against them.”
There’s probably truth to that, especially given that Jones put in a massive amount of work that past offseason intending on picking up where he left off following his promising rookie season.
His teammates didn’t like it either, with Jakobi Meyers holding little back after the game after seeing how Jones was treated.
“Not even as a football player. I mean, it’s tough as a man to see somebody who worked so hard kind of get that kind of treatment,” said Myers via CBS Boston’s Michael Hurley. “But at the end of the day, we’re all trying to feed our families, so we’ve got to go out there and make plays with whoever’s throwing it.”
Andrew Callahan of the Boston Herald then asked Myers for clarification on his “treatment” comment.
“Not even the coaches, just everybody,” Meyers said. “The crowd, all of it. It was an ugly situation, in my opinion.”
After the game, Jones was clearly frustrated. He talked about the fact he relies on a routine, while also citing his work ethic as a reason he deserved to remain the team’s starter. “I work really hard and put myself in position to [start]. Yes, I think I deserve that.”
Last season, being new to the team, Zappe hadn’t played under Josh McDaniels and only knew of Matt Patricia’s offense and his way of doing things.
Over that span, Zappe certainly exceeded expectations. He nearly pulled of an upset in relief of Brian Hoyer in Green Bay, and then proceeded to roll during two starts against the Lions and Browns to even New England’s record at 3-3, which had the Patriots with an opportunity to salvage their difficult start.
With Zappe, there was no frustration. There was no memory of a better way of doing things or conversations about what used to work. Plays were called and executed. Points were scored.
New England ran it up on Detroit to the tune of a 29-0 rout on an afternoon where they donned their classic red uniforms, which got the fans fired up, and they took the show on the road the next week where they nearly scored 40 points in a 38-15 win out in Cleveland against the Browns.
Those will be the two games referenced forever until the next time Zappe plays a meaningful snap. There have been whispers within the media that the club views his skillsets as similar to Jones, with the key question potentially being whether or not enough separates the two for them to stay the course.
Belichick was certainly complimentary of Zappe after his first start against the Lions.
“Bailey [Zappe] made a lot of good decisions, was accurate with the ball,” said Belichick. “Thought he showed some poise there at some pressure situations where he got out of it and found an open receiver, made good decisions.”
“Hopefully we can just keep building as a team and continue to improve every week like we have, if we work hard and really understand how we can play better, what we need to do to play better, coach better, communicate better. I think we can keep getting better. That’s what we’re going to try to do.”
Zappe finished that game hitting eight straight passes at one point and ended up connecting on 9 of his final 10 pass attempts.
Belichick’s praise of Bailey continued the next day during his appearance on WEEI, with Belichick refusing to name Jones the starter when asked whether or not he could foresee Zappe remaining under center.
“Yeah, I’m not going to get into a lot of hypotheticals on all the different things that might or might not happen and all that,” said Belichick. “You know, that’s just, to me, a waste of time. I’m not going to sit around here and dream up scenarios and all that. We’ll take things as they come and go from there. Obviously, Mac wasn’t active yesterday, so it wasn’t any part of any decision yesterday.”
Now it’s possible that he’s potentially not sure about Jones moving forward. Given how things went when McDaniels left, it’s possible he could relive all this a year from now should Jones go out and play well in 2023, only to have that success earn Bill O’Brien another head coaching job elsewhere.
Jones is extremely intelligent, and it’s clear that he had trust with McDaniels and didn’t share that same trust with Patricia. If he builds that with O’Brien and then again loses his offensive coordinator, it could set Belichick up for a sequel he probably won’t want to deal with.
Are Jones’s days in New England numbered? (PHOTO:Brian Fluharty-USA TODAY Sports)
Given what’s been reported, it’s possible maybe Belichick is trying to remove that scenario entirely.
Mike Florio’s report of Belichick exploring moving Jones seemed crazy at first until you take all the context into account. Some reporters have dismissed it as nonsense, but Florio hasn’t backed down and Tom Curran had him on his podcast shortly after it came out, and given both his and Phil Perry’s reactions, as surprising as it seemed, both appeared to believe there may have been some truth to it.
However, probably the most interesting take came from Doug Kyed of AtoZ Sports and formerly of NESN, who found out some additional information to add context to Florio’s report.
In a recent podcast with fellow local writer Michael Hurley, Kyed said that after hearing various buzz coming off of Tom Curran’s radio appearance on Friday, Kyed looked deeper into it and found out some interesting information just moments before Florio’s story went live.
“I had kind of just been like putting it off, I knew it was something I should, like, put out there,” said Kyed. “And then today, Mike Florio initially posted something about there being tension between Mac Jones and Bill Belichick.”
“Actually, first Rotoworld posted about it, and then Mike Florio did, and then I was like, all right, I should probably reach out to some people about it, see if there actually is [tension]. And the first person I talked to actually was like, ‘Yes, there’s 100% tension. There’s tension on both sides, this is real.’ And that person casually mentioned that Bill Belichick had tried to trade Mac Jones. And I was like, yeah, that’s kind of crazy, I don’t know.”
“People say things like that all the time. This is a reputable source and everything like that, but it was just like, kind of out of left field, something I would have to confirm from a few other people or whatever. And then literally five minutes later, because I had reached out to someone else about it, literally five minutes later Florio tweets this out. I’m like, ‘What the Hell?’ It’s been five days since this story first broke. I decide to finally get off my ass and do something about it 10 minutes ago. I found out this piece of information, which I was like I’m probably not going to do anything with this because I doubt that I’ll get it confirmed on the team’s side, and then Florio posts it.”
“So really, I wouldn’t necessarily feel comfortable putting that out there. The one thing I would put out there that I did get from more of the team’s side is that, ‘well, we haven’t gotten anything that we’d take.’ That doesn’t mean anything that they’ve gotten anything, that there’s been trade discussions, basically just, ‘We haven’t moved him yet.’ I don’t know exactly where I stand on this.”
That’s likely where many people stand. But the fact Kyed was told they haven’t gotten any offers they’d take doesn’t change the fact that it sounds like the discussion has at least been explored.
Meanwhile, Florio believes that the coming weeks could provide some answers as we get closer to the draft and teams begin getting more serious about their quarterback situations after they get a shot at improving through the available prospects. From there, as we’ve seen, anything can happen and often times, desperation causes teams to overpay to grab an asset they absolutely need.
Whether or not Belichick decides to move Jones at that point would certainly be interesting. Both Jakobi Meyers and Damien Harris, two of Jones’s closest advocates, are gone, as is Brian Hoyer, who apparently also wasn’t thrilled with how things went here last season. It’s possible the lone dissenter, Jones, could be next and Belichick may indeed roll with Zappe while also potentially drafting someone else behind him while shipping Jones elsewhere.
There would be nothing worse than moving a player, only to see him thrive elsewhere. The most interesting part of this is the fact that in the past when Belichick has moved on from someone, the net result has generally worked out in New England’s favor, and his track record has been pretty impeccable in that regard. Save, of course, from Tom Brady, albeit Brady lasted just three more seasons following his departure.
Given the importance of the quarterback position, this is definitely one he’ll need to get right. It’s entirely possible Zappe will make the same physical gains Jones did last offseason and that the fact he’s potential more coachable may lead them to parting ways with Jones, especially given his temper and demeanor when times get tough.
You obviously tend to find out the most from someone, not when things are good, but during difficult times. Jones’s reactions during the preseason and later against both Buffalo and Arizona are likely still burned in Belichick’s mind, along with the fact he sought guidance elsewhere while all of it was going on.
Seeing Jones go on to be a top quarterback in the NFL would be frustrating and it’s potentially a move significant enough to impact Belichick’s legacy given that he’ll forever be tied to whatever decision he does make.
At the same time, moving Jones will require a worthwhile enough return where New England can take a significant step forward as they try to get back to being among the AFC’s elite. If they could potentially grab a significant draft choice and/or a player, it allows them to build a nucleus around a quarterback in Zappe, who costs them little over the next few seasons. To complicate things further, in just his second season, Zappe is much farther away than Jones from seeing his salary skyrocket.
In a league where we’ve already seen how important it is to have the right guy under center, this is potentially one of the most important decisions Belichick’s going to make for a team that can’t afford any further steps backward heading into 2023. The only question is really whether or not what happened in 2022 is truly water under the bridge or if there is still more to come.
For now, reports have said that Jones has been at the stadium daily just as he always has, putting in the hours to prepare for what’s clearly his most important season as a pro.
Jones has said in the past that all he can control is his “attitude and effort.” Whether or not he’ll still be under center in September is up to Belichick, who if the reports are true, may be about to make his second-most significant quarterback decision as Patriots head coach.
Let’s just hope whatever call he makes is the right one.
SITE SEARCH
Coach scouted the TCU QB, so his actions are suggesting he’s def looking beyond Jones, Zappe doesn’t accumulate big yardage like Jones, but he takes better care of the football, & honestly, that wins more games. We got to see Zappe after a loss, of course he didn’t like it, but he handled it the way a #1 QB, that is essentially where the composure of the offense rests. Zappe has the emotional intelligence, humility, & sneaky confidence. Coach is good at drafting QB’s, even Stidham is in the league, so for me I’m not surprised he drafted two NFL… Read more »
Great article.
What we’ll never know is what was said in the conversations between Jones and Belichick during and after the season.
Belichick hit a home run when he drafted Jones, and screwed it up by not having a plan if McDaniels left.
This whole debacle is on Belichick. He made the right decision getting OBrien back. Now he needs to shut up about Jones and Zappe and let O’Brien be the face and voice for the offense.
Thanks, Dennis. How it plays out is going to be interesting and obviously, both Belichick and Jones are each heading into critical seasons, so definitely curious to see how it all plays out. Although the next concern is whether or not they also have a succession plan in place should O’Brien earn a job elsewhere if he manages to resurrect Jones’s career with a solid showing in 2023. Otherwise, as I mentioned in the article, they’ll be right back where they were in 2022 in the event they don’t also spend this season grooming someone for the sake of building… Read more »