There remains a fair amount of buzz around Kentucky quarterback Will Levis here in New England, which is setting up what could potentially be an interesting night on Thursday for the New England Patriots.
Former NFL Network reporter Mike Giardi, who continues covering the league on his own despite not being currently employed by a network, appeared on NBC Sports Boston this week and reiterated that there continues to be real interest by the Patriots.
“As I mentioned on Felger & Holley last night, there is real interest in QB Will Levis from the Patriots,” Tweeted Giardi. “Not universally, but there are important folks in that building that believe in the talent. What I’ve heard about his visit from other stops… he hasn’t blown anyone away.”
But the big question is, if Levis doesn’t go as high as some think and should he slide down the board, whether or not New England would use the 14th pick to select him.
The fact Levis visited as one of the final players could be interpreted in a multitude of ways. It could be that they truly are intrigued, and wanted to get a sense of whether or not he was worth the risk of a first-round selection given their other needs. At the same time, it could also have just been that, along with trying to get a sense of who he is, along with his strengths and weaknesses. The latter could be useful in the future when the Patriots ultimately face off against him with whatever team he potentially ends up with. New England has been no stranger to bringing in other top talents at the quarterback position over the years, and there could be elements behind why they’ve been fairly successful against many of those young quarterbacks.
However, whether or not they’d actually pull the trigger is obviously what everyone will be wondering.
Tom Curran of NBC Sports Boston has talked about that fact a fair amount recently. He said during his most recent podcast on Tuesday that the team needs to be aggressive, but he doesn’t believe it will involve drafting a quarterback early on.
“As I tell the Patriots to be aggressive, does that include going off at the quarterback position? No,” said Curran. “I mean, the Patriots should adopt that ‘F-them picks’ mentality that is everywhere in the league, take advantage of the willingness of teams to deal, put those picks together, and move up. Not necessarily at 14, but you can’t wait there until 46 and 75 to make your second and third picks.”
“Now, back to Mac. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again. The Patriots moving on from Mac Jones would be Bill Belichick basically putting an ‘I effed up’ shirt on and parading it around the draft room. He was the offensive rookie of the year until J’Marr Chase overtook him in 2021. Last year before the season began, he had shown dramatic improvement. Now he can’t play? That would be a complete and utter resignation by Bill that he said, ‘I didn’t do it right.’ He can’t play now? Well why can’t he play now? Because Bill made it that way.”
“You know I also said earlier this offseason that Mac Jones gets traded over Robert Kraft’s dead body. And to me, Kraft looks fine. O.K.? And God-willing, it stays that way. It makes no sense for a coach, whose seat is fairly warm, to defy the owner.”
“It’s not gonna happen.”
For those who are intrigued by Levis and his impressive arm talent, Jones still has him beaten when it comes to his vision and his decision-making.
If you go back and look at every turnover from Jones last season, one thing that stands out is the fact that almost none of his throws were stupid decisions where he threw it right to the other jersey, or forced a ball into coverage for a turnover. His worst throw last year came back in their meeting against the Raiders in preseason where Jones lost track of the linebacker on a pass to Kendrick Bourne, with the linebacker hidden behind the defensive line before stepping into the lane as Jones released the football.
The rest were balls that were either underthrown or just a solid play by the defender.
The numbers essentially tell the story. Over an eight-game span ahead of the finale in Buffalo, Jones completed 173-of-266 (65%) for 1777-yards along with 8 touchdowns and just one interception. Some will argue that it’s because they stopped letting him air it out, but that’s also not true. Jones had over 50 attempts of 15+ yards over that span, well above the number of attempts he had during the first half of the season.
He also played well in the first half of the Bills game, completing 13-of-16 (81.3%) for 119 yards and two touchdowns, including a perfect 5-of-5 in the red zone.
People point to the three turnovers from that game, but the story remains the same. The first came on a deep ball to Agholor up the right sideline in the third quarter where he didn’t quite get enough on it and Tre’Davious White went up and took it away. The second came on a 3rd-and-19 with just 5:06 left to go in the game and the team trailing 35-23 where they absolutely needed to make a play. So Jones threw high to Hunter Henry in the end zone, obviously hoping for him to either make a play or possibly draw a flag. Instead, the ball went off his hands, and the Bills came away with the turnover.
The final one went off of Damien Harris’s hands, which capped a frustrating finish.
That game has been the drum beaten by critics of Jones for most of the offseason, but for anyone who has watched Levis, there’s definitely a significant concern when it comes to ball security.
As good as Levis has been and for all of his physical advantages, he takes a fair amount of risks. Watching several of his games, and having also watched some additional ones recently, Levis puts the ball in harm’s way more than he should and is late getting the ball out in tight coverage on a “gotta have it” type of play. There were also a fair amount of his 23 turnovers he threw over the last two seasons where he made a throw that was just an awful decision.
His accuracy also isn’t great. A lot of times the ball gets there, but the receiver has to adjust (it’s either high, behind them, a little too far out in front) and as a result, isn’t able to get a lot of yards after the catch.
As a result, taking Levis and using the 14th overall pick for him when they have other needs would certainly be risky.
Gregory Fisher-USA TODAY Sports
That’s not to say the Patriots shouldn’t continue evaluating and drafting quarterbacks. But the better approach may be for them to handle it the way they did with Jimmy Garoppolo and potentially target one in the second or third round, with the hopes they end up with a similar talent.
Had the situation been a little different in the past, it clearly might have been successful had things panned out a little differently. It so just happened that his selection came when the Patriots had Tom Brady at quarterback, and ultimately ended up being a situation of bad timing.
Clearly, if they’re not 100% sold on Jones, that wouldn’t be an issue this time around if a similar player was available.
Obviously, only those in the building know which direction they’ll ultimately go on Thursday night. What could throw everything off would be another team missing out on “their guy” at quarterback and deciding to throw everything at switching gears and prying Jones away from New England.
NBC Sports Boston’s Michael Holley also said on Tuesday night that he believes the Patriots are getting ready to move on from Jones.
“When Cam Newton was throwing for 8 touchdowns all year, ‘Cam’s our quarterback,'” said Holley of Belichick’s comments. “‘Hey Bill, you guys have lost three in a row, ‘Cam’s our quarterback.’ He drafts Mac Jones, first round, ‘Cam’s our quarterback.’ But he can’t say anything about Mac.”
“They’re bringing in a quarterback, one of their 30 visits, with a quarterback who is going to go in the first round [Will Levis]. So listen, they have soured on Mac. They don’t say his name anymore, it’s not just Belichick, it’s Billy O’Brien. I think he’s out. I really do.”
Would Belichick take a ridiculous haul to part with Jones and possibly move forward with Bailey Zappe? From all reports, it sounds like they’re high enough on their second-year QB to be O.K. with that. Not to mention given that Jones is one season closer to his salary escalating to $30-million+, parting with him would push that possibility off given that Zappe, a former fourth-round pick, still has three years left to go on his rookie deal.
As we know, desperation makes teams do crazy things, and if teams were indeed testing the waters on Jones this offseason, the fact Belichick potentially listened then would likely open the door for a club to make an offer now that might be too good to refuse. Albeit, that’s what it would probably need to be for them to even consider it.
Needless to say, with the draft just one day away, after everything that’s already transpired this offseason and the stories we’ve heard, it’s probably hard to take anything off the table heading into tomorrow night.
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Ian Logue is a Seacoast native and owner and senior writer for PatsFans.com, an independent media site covering the New England Patriots and has been running this site in one form or another since 1997.
