Can Jones lead Pats to the peak?
Rookie joins small class of 1st-year quarterbacks to start in the playoffs
ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — The chew-’emup, spit-’em-out grind of an NFL season has always reserved a special level of punishment for its newest invitees, a combination of intensity, physicality, endurance and exhaustion that, by the time it is all over, can reduce a rookie to dust. From the end of a college career to the start of a professional one, from the first day of training camp to the final game of the regular season, the nonstop hamster wheel can leave a rookie’s body and mind drained in ways he never imagined possible.
And then, if said rookie is lucky, the playoffs begin and ask for more.
But if the debut NFL season is hard on all, it hits one position harder than most. Rookie quarterbacks are among the rarest of playoff breeds. Of 162 playoff teams in the last 10 seasons, only six started a rookie at quarterback. There were none in the last three playoffs, one (Lamar Jackson) in 2018, none in 2017, one (Dak Prescott) in 2016, and none in 2015, ’14, or ’13.
The class of 2012 was exceptional, featuring three (Andrew Luck, Robert Griffin III and Russell Wilson), and there was one (Andy Dalton) in 2011. Of all of them, only Wilson won a game, when his Seahawks bested RGIII’s Washington.
There is one rookie quarterback this season. And he’s playing for a franchise accustomed to being in the playoffs.
The Patriots’ Mac Jones might have been the fifth quarterback taken in the first round of the draft, but he’s the last man standing on Wild Card Weekend.
But even if the odds suggest the end of the road is nigh, there is a precedent for hope. Though no rookie quarterback ever has reached the Super Bowl, three reached the AFC Championship game — Mark Sanchez with the Jets in 2009, Joe Flacco with the Ravens in 2008 and Ben Roethlisberger with the Steelers in 2004. Could Jones be the one to surpass them? “I think he’s more than capable; what he did this year was amazing,” Sanchez said over the phone this week. “I get that he didn’t have to throw it as many times, didn’t have to carry the team, but I don’t care. That’s the toughest position in all of sports, and he played it beautifully.
“Sure, he had a couple of stinkers; everybody does. But, damn, he is fun. Exciting. Impressive. And what he, Bill Belichick and Josh McDaniels have been able to do is incredible.”
Now an analyst with Fox Sports, Sanchez opened his NFL career with a Joneslike bang when he rolled a final season at USC with an MVP performance in the Rose Bowl into two consecutive AFC Championship appearances under Jets coach Rex Ryan.
It was a brief but glorious chapter in the history of the tortured New York franchise, one that perpetually was in the shadow of what Tom Brady and Belichick were doing a few hours north. Sanchez never could take that final step to a Super Bowl, and the Jets, without a Belichickian structure to hold it all together, fizzled.
“It’s interesting to see some of the new playoff teams who have guys that are not that experienced,” Sanchez said. “You look at the Raiders and the Bengals, that’s a team on both sides where not many guys know what it’s like to play in a wild card game. Those guys are the guys who walk into the stadium filming everything. It sounds funny, but you think Tom Brady is going to film his entrance this weekend? I doubt it.”
Sanchez’s point is important; even without his own experience, Jones has teammates like David Andrews, like Brandon Bolden, like Matthew Slater and Devin McCourty, tone-setters who don’t just verbalize what the playoffs are all about, but live it because they have lived it so many times before.
The formula is obvious, shown across the Patriots’ season. They need to run the ball, with long possessions that keep the ball away from the opponent. They need to protect the pocket so Jones doesn’t get pummeled. They need to play from ahead so Jones doesn’t have to be a savior. They need help from their defense, with bonus points or turnovers. Obviously, it can be done. That it so rarely has been done before underscores how hard it is.
When you’re a rookie, every little bit helps. For Jones, the key is trusting those around him who know more than he does, and then keeping it simple.
“I definitely think it’s not their first rodeo,” Jones said this week of Belichick and McDaniels. “They’ve been through a lot of really close games and these types of situations. I just try to listen to the advice they have, even the older players that’ve done this before.
“It is another game, but there’s more at stake, and you have to realize that there’s not a lot of room for error. That’s kind of what makes it fun. There’s more pressure, and, like I said, you prepare well, you feel comfortable and, at that point, you go play the game that you’ve played since you were little.”
A veteran take from a rookie mouth. Now we see if his actions can mirror his words.
“I think he’s more than capable; what he did this year was amazing.”
former QB Mark Sanchez