{Sarcasm font on}
It’s oh so obvious.
How could we have missed it?
The Patriots’ post-Josh McDaniels plan for coaching potential franchise QB Mac Jones isn’t ill-conceived idiocy but rather old-school genius!
All it took to calm our apparently unfounded concerns about Bill Belichick’s offensive coaching staff plans built around former defensive coordinator-turned-failed Lions head coach Matt Patricia and former special teams coach-turned-failed Giants head coach Joe Judge were a few simple words from former Heisman Trophy quarterback and one-time rookie star NFL passer Robert Griffin III.
“The coaching setup will have a massive impact on Mac Jones in a good way,” said Griffin, now an apparently ascending ESPN analyst. “Mac has already spoken about how it has been a collaborative process with the coaches and players talking in meetings, installing the offense. And I believe that will lead to more ownership from him about what is being called and how he sees the game.”
There it is.
Jones won’t be lacking leadership after losing one of the most experienced, proven, successful offensive coordinators of this or any generation but rather he’ll be gaining ownership over his own offense and critical career development.
Of course it took the GOAT Belichick to make this move that’s seemingly so curious to most of the world – both inside and outside the world of football. And it took the great football mind RGIII to interpret his visionary genius for us visionless boobs.
By giving Jones a special teams expert and a defensive mastermind as his developmental sounding board Belichick isn’t hanging him out to dry in his second season but rather putting the young passer in perfect position to succeed!
It’s a move straight out of the hardo Hall of Fame from the Hoodie. A tested, tried-and-true approach, really.
Want to teach a kid to swim? You don’t take him to the local Y for lessons from a certified swim instructor. Heck no. You take him out in a boat in the ocean without a life jacket and throw him overboard.
Same with skiing. All this modern coddling bunk about lessons taught at the base of the mountain are malarkey. Best way to teach someone to ski is to take them to the peak and leave them there. If they have a hint of drive, desire and ability they’ll figure it out.
As Patches O'Houlihan taught us in “Dodge Ball,” the simple fact is that damn it “If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball.”
Even the songstress-turned-talk show host Kelly Clarkson knows that what doesn’t kill you makes stronger. Duh.
Really, what have we all be worrying about since we found out that McDaniels, the guy who led Jones to a Pro Bowl rookie season, was moving on to the Raiders?
All McDaniels was doing was holding Jones back. How could he not be? McDaniels had been in New England for a better part of two decades.
He had way too much experience calling plays and way too many philosophies about how an NFL offense should be run given his years on the job leading attacks to annual spots in the top 10 or top 5 in most meaningful statistical measures.
How restrictive that must be to have a coach with so much input and insight!
Now the Patriots offense is indeed Jones’ offense.
He doesn’t have to worry about some coach with way more than 10,000 hours game planning, scheming and trial-and-erroring his way through practices and games getting in the way. Heck, Jones may not even know at this point who will be calling plays for him or who he’s going to talk to on the sidelines in between series on game days.
Nope, Jones can take full ownership of what New England is doing. Heck, he admitted this spring that he’s spending some of his time having to “teach” his quarterbacks coach Judge.
RGIII has shown us the light. That’s the perfect setup for a young quarterback of Jones’ skills, mindset, acumen and potential. You don’t hone those things, you leave them alone.
Come to think of it, just imagine what Tom Brady could have become had he been able to take early ownership of his offense in Foxborough back in 2001, had longtime NFL assistant Charlie Weis and developing mastermind McDaniels not been in the way.
Oh the records he could have set and games he could have won!
But Belichick and the Patriots won’t make that mistake again.
Jones won’t be hindered the way Brady was by all that guidance.
Jones is going to sink or swim all on his own.
Just the way it should be.
It’s genius, really.
{Sarcasm font off}
