PHOTO: Grant Halverson/Getty Images


We all knew it might be a little ugly at times when Bill Belichick decided to go with a rookie at quarterback.

After nine games, Mac Jones has now won more than he’s lost in the NFL and he hasn’t been the reason you lost any of them. I’d say that’s about as good as fans could have hoped for given how things started.

Jones was just 12-18 for 139 yards, one touchdown and an interception Sunday, he also had a fumble as well, but he’s now the quarterback of a 5-4 team that’s a half game out of first place in the division. Jones continues to keep his team in the game until the defense can find its footing and ramp things up and the biggest thing of all is he’s learning how to win different ways.

Hang a fifty burger on the Jets one week and only throw one touchdown pass (a 7-yarder to Hunter Henry) two weeks later, but they don’t ask how at the end of the year, just how many. Jones is plenty self aware and knows he needs to be better too.

“I think just when you look back on it, there is just reoccurring themes in terms of communication and I can do a better job with that,” Jones said when asked what the difference has been for the team these last three games. “Part of it is just the inexperience, but there is no excuse for that. I have been here for quite a while now and I can figure out the looks that I am not used to seeing, and just go from there. But, we have made progress every game I feel like. The big thing for us is don’t turn the ball over and I had two turnovers today so that is not good enough. I will look at it and see what I can do better.”

Obviously, one of the biggest issues a team can have – see the Carolina Panthers – is having absolutely zero confidence in your quarterback. That’s always a greater risk with a rookie, but it hasn’t been the case with this organization from day one. Everyone has shown confidence in Jones and even when he continues to struggle to string some great games together, they’re rallying around him.

“We’ve been working really hard and we have to continue that this week. It was a great team win,” said center David Andrews, who has praised Mac every single opportunity he gets. “I thought we did some things really well and there’s always some things that we can clean up. We’ll learn from that and we did some things to hurt ourselves like I said and so we have to fix that and correct that. When we executed, we had success so that’s got to be our formula every week.”

Right now, the formula is pretty clear. Run the ball (if the backs are healthy) let Mac flourish in play-action, give him an opportunity to throw from a clean pocket, find Henry in the red zone and let him try to earn the right to be viewed as the next true franchise guy by racking up wins, even if they’re ugly sometimes.

“There were just one or two things, really just on my part, with communication that I can clean up and that will solve 95% of the issues,” Jones added.