Most of what’s being said and written this week about Mac Jones has a sort of past-tense twang to it, and understandably so. The New England Patriots are staggering to the finish line of a season in which their third-year quarterback has been guilty of too many questionable reads, too many bad passes, too much schlumpy, defeatist body language, and, well, here we are: Everyone’s ready to move on from Mac.
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But it’s what happens after the moving on that’s intriguing. Yes, Jones could well be a Patriot in 2024, albeit in the kind of reduced role that the Arbella people didn’t have in mind when they enlisted him to do their television commercials. But if he does get exiled from New England and winds up at another outpost in Football America — new colors, new outlook, and, yes, of course, a new coach — don’t you want to see how that story plays out?
I do. To even contemplate such a scenario presumes that Jones does indeed have a future as an NFL quarterback, rather than managing the Buffalo Wild Wings at River City Marketplace in Jacksonville, Fla. And in order to presume this future-as-an-NFL-quarterback thing, one needs to sign up for the It’s Not All Mac’s Fault Club. For those who are of the opinion that Bill Belichick’s Little League-style, everybody-gets-a-chance-to-get-practice-reps approach to preparing for Game Day hasn’t been, ahem, in the best interests of the team, it’s OK to consider a future in which Jones is throwing passes for another team.
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As to whether those passes for the new team actually land in the mitts of the new team’s receivers, that’s next year’s story. But again: You should want to see how that story plays out. We don’t talk about that enough. What we do talk about is Belichick’s future, and where the Hall of Fame-bound coach is working next season as he continues his pursuit of the Don Shula record.
But I’ll take a leap here and make this claim: Fans will be more intellectually stimulated next season in Jones turning his career around than in Belichick closing in on Shula’s NFL-record 347 overall coaching victories. (Belichick has been stuck at 331 for five weeks. It only seems like five years.)
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Most NFL fans outside New England either don’t care whether Belichick breaks the record, or don’t want him to do so. This is especially true for fans of the Browns, Colts, Jets and Dolphins, to name a few. As for Patriots fans, they’d be more invested in whether Belichick were to remain in New England and set the record at Gillette Stadium, complete with a 21-gun salute from the End Zone Militia and a hearty thumbs up from Robert Kraft in the emperor suite. Will Pats fans, and Kraft, rejoice if/when Belichick sets the record somewhere else? Of course. It just won’t be the same, is all.
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But next year’s Mac Jones watch is going to be fascinating and compelling. It all boils down to one question — Can Jones play football at this level? — and the answer to that will inspire endless debate. Now if Jones gets another chance somewhere else and fails, it’ll mean the end of the road — not just for him, but also for the It’s Not All Mac’s Fault Club. Critics will have the evidence they need to point out that, yep, it was all Mac’s fault, end of discussion.
But if Jones goes someplace with quality receivers (which he doesn’t have in New England) and a quality offensive line (see last set of parentheses), not to mention a younger coach who is willing to actually speak the name “Mac Jones” in a sentence, then maybe the result will be a sure-fire, hop-on-my-back NFL quarterback who can take a team deep into the Super Bowl tournament.
It’s been popular lately to compare Jones to Jim Plunkett, the 1970 Heisman Trophy winner from Stanford who was selected by the Patriots with the first pick in the 1971 NFL Draft. The Patriots didn’t win during Plunkett’s five seasons in New England, and for some of the same reasons — chiefly weak offensive line play that resulted in Plunkett’s being subjected to many a punishing hit. He eventually drifted to the San Francisco 49ers for a couple of seasons, but it was when he joined the Raiders in 1979 that his comeback was made complete. Two Super Bowl victories attest to that.
Patriots quarterback Jim Plunkett drops back to pass against the Baltimore Colts in 1975. Plunkett played five seasons for the Patriots (1971-75) before finding Super Bowl-winning success with the Raiders. (Focus on Sport / Getty Images)Though it’s sometimes difficult to compare players from different eras, Plunkett’s raw skills and toughness were far superior to what we’ve seen from Jones. In that respect, then, the comparison doesn’t work.
Here’s where it does work: Patriots fans kept a sharp eye on Plunkett during his Raiders years. I won’t be so brazen as to claim Pats fans rooted for the Raiders to win Super Bowl XV (three TD passes by Plunkett) and Super Bowl XVIII, this because of the terrible Ben Dreith roughing the passer call on Sugar Bear Hamilton against Ken Stabler that cost the 1976 Patriots a playoff victory. Well, that and many other reasons. The Raiders were an easy team to hate in those days, just as the 21st-century Patriots have become an easy team to hate.
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But Plunkett? Everyone in my crowd wanted to see him do well, and he did.
I don’t know that Jones will have Pats fans rooting for him in the years to come if he’s playing for another team. But they’ll be following him all right, and with a vengeance. Because they’ll want to see how the story plays out.
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(Top photo: Kathryn Riley / Getty Images)
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