We know Bill Belichick will be making sure the Patriots themselves keep their focus on this week’s game against the Saints, but with Tom Brady’s return to Gillette Stadium now less than two weeks away, it’s hard for the rest of us to not peek ahead a little bit.
Making his weekly appearance on The Greg Hill Show on Tuesday, Patriots Hall of Famer Ty Law discussed how he thinks New England and rookie quarterback Mac Jones should approach the big Week 4 showdown with the Buccaneers.
For starters, he wants to see the Patriots open up the offensive playbook and take more chances. While Bill Belichick and Josh McDaniels have done a good job not asking Jones to do too much so far, Law doesn’t think the relatively conservative approach will be good enough against the high-flying Bucs.
“We can look at what the offense is doing right now and say, ‘OK, you’re gonna have to do more,’” Law said. “You know you’re gonna have to do more when you’re playing against Tom Brady. … If you’re gonna go toe-to-toe with what they’re showing right now with their offense, being conservative, you’re not gonna win that game.
“Maybe that’s the game where Josh McDaniels decides to open up the playbook and says, ‘Hey Mac, you’re ready to roll,’ and you go for it. Because that’s what you’re gonna have to do. They’re not gonna be competitive with how conservative they’re playing right now.”
That said, Law doesn’t think that asking Jones to do more is the same as putting more pressure on him. In fact, Law believes there should be no pressure on Jones, and he used an example from his own career to explain why that is.
“You’re expected to lose the game anyway, so what do you got to lose?,” Law said. “Let the man go out there and play, swinging. Really, the Patriots have nothing to lose. I guarantee that 1,000 percent of the people out there, the analysts out there, outside of New England and that locker room, are expecting them to lose.
“I’ll give you an analogy: It’s like when I played Jerry Rice for the first time. Everyone expected me to lose. I took the approach that, guess what, if I lose, I’m supposed to lose. But if I win, I’m the damn man. So I was the most comfortable I’ve ever been on a football field when I went against Jerry Rice, because that’s the GOAT and everyone’s expecting him to do what the GOAT does, and I’m just a young guy out here playing.
“There is no pressure. There should be no pressure on the Patriots. There should be no pressure on Mac Jones, because no one is expecting you to go out there and beat Tom Brady right now. So go out there and have fun and let it hang.”
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