There's been a lot of talk about how good Mac Jones looked and how much the same Cam Newton looked at Patriots camp on Thursday, May 27th. With Nick Quaglia, Marv Ezhan, and Mike Molyneaux of CLNS's patriots round table warning that the Newton bandwagon are coming out swinging on twitter against any criticism of the Patriots 2020 starter. So beware if you criticize Cam.
Mike Reiss of ESPN is one of the people praising Mac Jones. Reiss is impressed with how quickly Jones is appearing to pick up the Patriots playbook. Everyone knows the Patriots have one of the toughest playbooks. Last season it was said to be like learning calculus.
Reiss said about how quick Jones was learning the Patriots system, "This is uncommon for rookie Patriots quarterbacks who are adjusting to the volume of information, and also the fast pace in which coaches teach it. It's a lot to process, and that doesn't even factor in how a simple shift by the defense can require a reaction from the quarterback that changes everything in an instant.
Along those lines, every throw from Jones in 7-on-7 and 11-on-11 drills Thursday seemed to go to the right place. There was little, if any, indecisiveness. He's probably further along than any Patriots rookie quarterback, at this point, than anyone who came before him."
Now before the Newton bandwagon gets their torches and pitchforks, Reiss did say not to give up on Cam. But as for Mac Jones, Reiss says, "It was one day in shorts and T-shirts in May, which is critical context. But those seemed like encouraging signs for the Patriots."
Now this isn't the first time there's been reports about how well Mac Jones was doing. Back on May 16th, there was a lot of buzz coming out of Patriots rookie minicamp about how well Jones was doing.
Justin Ramos of Patriots 247 news tweeting, "Patriots QB Mac Jones is having an “amazing” Rookie Mini Camp, per source
Coaches & teammates have been “blown away” at his leadership, knowledge, accuracy, film study, and decision making”
What did Belichick have to say about Jones? After the media got to watch Jones, Belichick said, “Mac dove into the playbook and continues to do that, like everybody out there. We all have a lot of things we’ve got to work on. That includes everybody. So that’s what he’s doing. That’s what everybody’s doing.”
Mac Jones is giddy about just being there, so Belichick doesn't have to sugarcoat his words or shower Jones with praise to keep him happy. The rookie is just there to work hard and knows he has to be at his best to take the job from Cam Newton.
On May 27, Phil Perry Tweeted about Jones, "Mac Jones, to me, was as advertised. Consistently accurate, putting the football on people’s faces. Threw with anticipation. Moments where he had the football on targets as soon as they came out of their breaks. Caught Matt LaCosse by surprise with one up the seam."
As Mike Reiss said the quarterbacks worked on 7 on 7, 11 on 11, and other passing drills. So we know Cam threw four passes during the 7 on 7 but how did he look for the day as a whole?
Phil Perry tweeted, "Know folks are interested, but hard to ID much in the way of mechanical changes from Newton. Not a QB coach or kinesthesiologist. Throwing motion looks similar to what we saw last year. Not many opportunities for him to open up and rip it today so we’ll see as OTAs roll on."
Greg Bedard said about Cam, " Throwing mechanics, I don't think they're a whole lot better. Um we talked about in the last podcast about the picture we posted. It looked exactly like Cam from last year and he threw it like Cam from last year. Sloppy foot work..."
Bedard continued about Cam, "They would each take three or four reps throwing to different parts of the field (bucket drills) and when it got to the sidelines, that's when cam got a little bit squirrelly. You know, especially to his right which is what we saw last year because he steps left, he throws right. And when you do that, hell I'm a soft ball and a baseball coach. I know what that does, I coach my kids on this all the time. If you step towards, if you're looking at home plate from the pitcher's mound, and your pitching home and you step towards the first base side, you know either your balls gonna fly to the right or you're gonna pull it into the ground. And that's what Cam did last year, and it's what he did yesterday. It wasn't as pronounced, it was okay."
That's two saying Newton looked the same from last year, and I'm sure you can find a handful of other sport media people that were there, that will say the same thing. There's also three that are saying how impressive Jones has been thus far in quarterback development at a Patriot. I'm also sure you can find at least a handful more that will collaborate what people saw about Jones.
Here's what Belichick said about Cam, notice the tone difference from Jones.
"“Cam’s been here all the way through,” Belichick said. “He was here at the beginning and has been a consistent participant, continues to give us the usual leadership and energy that he brings to the field and to the workouts and practice.
Cam’s very professional, and I’m sure that he’ll continue to work hard and do his best out there like he’s always done for us. It’s never been anything but that from the day he got here.”
Belichick's comments look like one they're trying to quiet the criticism towards Cam down in the media but it also comes off like he's trying to stroke Newton's confidence. With Newton, Belichick's always gave more praise than he normally would with any other player.
Whether it's so Newton continues to put in the effort or it's so that there's no issues at camp, that's unclear but the way Belichick always seems to shower praise in Newton's direction since coming to the Patriots, even with the other guys on the roster doing well, is uncharacteristic of Belichick over the last 20 years.
With the early praise which is to be taken with a grain of salt because there's only been a limited amount of practice, Jones has a fair chance to beat out Newton for the job. What makes that chance a little more fair is when Belichick said, "we’re starting everybody at the same point like we always do at this time of year.”
Now if Tom Brady was here, nobody would believe that but the one thing Newton supporters have reminded the rest of the fan base time and time again is, "Newton's not Brady!" And with that very comment from Cam's supporters mouths, is why when Belichick says "everyone is starting at the same point," even though he said Newton is the starter until he's beaten out; Jones is right there with Newton at this point of Camp with a reasonable chance to beat him out.
No matter how good Cam can run but inaccurate quarterbacks with bad mechanics will normally get replaced with the more accurate passer. Newton must show drastic improvement this offseason.
Although Tyrod Taylor doesn't have Newton's arm strength or willingness to throw the ball into coverage downfield, if Newton was as good a passer as Taylor; Mac Jones wouldn't be a threat to Newton's job this season.
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