This has been a season full of resets for the New England Patriots.
Training camp brought the first chance to put a dismal 2022 campaign behind them.
A win over the Jets in Week 3 was also supposed to serve as a restart following an 0-2 start.
Hopes of yet another mulligan came after a Week 7 win over Buffalo that stopped a 1-5 start.
But Sunday’s 10-6 loss to Indianapolis in Germany not only gave New England its second three-game losing streak of the season, it also is the clearest sign yet that this team’s issues may not be fixable at this point.
The back-footed, severely underthrown interception that Mac Jones tossed in the red zone late in the fourth quarter didn’t just rob his team of a chance to take the lead.
It also brought a season’s worth of futility by the third-year quarterback to an international audience, raising questions about who will have the starting job when the Patriots emerge from this week’s bye.
“We’ll look at everything,” coach Bill Belichick said Monday. “We’ll look at everything across the board.”
While Belichick made clear those assessments would include every position on the roster, the fact that Jones was benched after his pick in favor of backup Bailey Zappe was an indication that Jones’ status as the starter is tenuous at best.
“We’re not there yet, but I always use the bye week to evaluate myself and the team and everything I can do better, and there’s a lot of things clearly I need to do better,” Jones said. “I’m always going to work. I know that.”
The same scrutiny is squarely on Belichick, whose team is last in the AFC and 2-8 for the first time since finishing his first season in New England 5-11 in 2000.
WHAT’S WORKING
If a complete overhaul of the quarterback position is what’s on tap this offseason, the Patriots continue to be in position to land a high draft pick. If the season ended today, the Patriots would select third.
WHAT NEEDS HELP
While Jones’ play and injuries haven’t helped, the offense has…
Source link : https://www.foxsports.com/stories/nfl/bill-belichick-hints-at-changes-to-patriots-roster-well-look-at-everything
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Publish date : 2023-11-13 23:01:43
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