New England Patriots HC rejects Drake Maye-Mac Jones comparisons

The New England Patriots will face an old friend this Sunday as they take on Mac Jones and the Jacksonville Jaguars in London.

Of course, Jones is not a starter for the Jaguars. This title belongs to Trevor Lawrence. However, Jones’ mere presence on the roster immediately conjures memories of his disastrous three years in Foxborough.

The Patriots now have a new young quarterback of their own in Drake Maye, and naturally some have wondered if Maye will suffer the same fate as Jones in New England.

However, Pats head coach Jerod Mayo immediately dismissed those concerns, saying the parallel didn’t even cross his mind.

“I didn’t really think of it that way,” Mayo said, via NESN’s Sean T. McGuire . “I think every situation with a freshman quarterback is his unique situation.”

That may be true, but it’s hard to ignore that many of the same problems persist.

Jones played behind a miserable Patriots offensive line and also had very limited weapons at his disposal, which is the same situation Maye has stepped into.

Now, to be fair, Maye’s physical tools seem to far outweigh Jones’, so it’s entirely possible that Maye will have considerably more success for that reason alone.

Still, the fact that there was so much trepidation about inserting Maye into the starting lineup may be evidence that New England was still a bit shy of the Jones experiment.

It should be noted that Mayo and new Pats executive Eliot Wolf did not draft Jones. That was Bill Belichick’s job, so this is a different regime. However, it seems hard to imagine that the thought of Jones did not enter their minds throughout this process.

Maye will make his second start of the season this weekend.

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