Photo: Barry Chin/Boston Globe
Mac Jones hadn’t lost much in his football career prior to being a member of the Patriots.
Whether it was high school or Alabama, the rare loss Jones took was usually quickly pushed aside by a dominant performance with elite players around him a week or two later. Things are different now, and Jones is faced with quite a difficult task for a rookie quarterback this weekend.
After basically calling out his teammates by saying the team hadn’t practiced well leading up to the Indianapolis game, Jones is now in a place where he must lead by example this week and on the field Sunday. The rematch with Buffalo will be much tougher than the previous weather-aided win. On Wednesday evening, Jones talked about the mindset after the first practice this week and what could be different.
“I think every week is a new week. You have so many days to prepare. We’re all working hard,” he said. “That’s all you can ask; to just work hard every day and get ready to play against a really good Bills team. That’s all you can ask.
“I think every day is a new day and is a learning experience. Whether it’s Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, or Saturday, you’re just trying to fix the things that you can fix, and then improve on the things that you know what you need to do, like your fundamentals. For me and everyone else, it’s just “improve your fundamentals” and then, by the time Sunday comes, you’re just playing the game that you know how to play and have played for a really long time.”
His teammates and coaches have consistently said he’s a fantastic leader and a guy they want to play for. So, when the chips are down with the AFC East title on the line, how will Mac respond to that particular loss last Saturday night? Was it just a lack of execution by everyone on one night, or is he still not quite ready yet?
Mac may have to rely on N’Keal Harry, Kristian Wilkerson, Gunner Olseweski and Tre Nixon with both Kendrick Bourne and Nelson Agholor missing practice on Wednesday and Thursday too, adding even more pressure to the situation.
“I think it just goes back to everyone’s been here. We’ve been together. We have a lot of banked reps as an offense, regardless of who’s playing what position and who’s in there,” said Jones. “We have that standard and I’m still trying to play to that standard, just as everyone else is. It’s just a new week, a new chance to prepare together, and kind of go out there and put a finished product on the field on Sunday.
“I think all the receivers we’ve had, all the way back from OTAs, have put in a lot of effort. I know Tre’s one of those guys and so does everybody else. They’re ready to go and they step up whenever their time comes. All the receivers are prepared equally because they have a standard that they hold themselves to in their receiver room, just like we do in the quarterback room and, ultimately, altogether as an offense. I think they’re all prepared. They’re all ready to go and, whoever plays, I have trust in all those guys.”
In the heat of watching a game and in the immediate aftermath of a loss, we often forget that Jones has only played 14 professional games. We all knew this would be a bit of a rocky ride and for the most part, Jones has actually done a really good job of keeping the speed bumps to a bare minimum.
There’s another “is he ready to win a big game?” spot for Jones on Sunday. Indianapolis made him look like a rookie more often than not last Saturday and the last time we saw him play Buffalo he literally could have played with one arm tied behind his back.
The questions around him still linger and in fairness, Jones is still learning how to carry a team as an NFL quarterback. A win that requires him to lead the way on Sunday would go a long way in proving he can be “the guy” early in his career.
It sounds like he knows it too.
“I think every experience is a learning experience. Everyone’s different. Everyone comes from different places, but whether you win or you lose, you can still learn,” Jones added. “In college, you lose games and you have to learn from it. In the NFL, obviously, it’s hard to win, so you have to learn from the errors you make personally, which are the most important because that’s how it affects the team. I’m always very hard on myself because if I don’t play great, then it affects the people around me. Those guys are playing really well and I can play a lot better. It just goes back to me.”