We’ve heard the New England Patriots rookie quarterback Mac Jones compared to a lot of people: Tom Brady, Chad Pennington and others, but a Star Wars character is a new one.
Jerry Thornton of Barstool Sports believes Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has been handling the development of Jones well up to this point.
He sees Belichick as a wise old Jedi (Yoda or Obi Wan Kenobi) while Jones is the apprentice, among other things. Thornton wrote:
Even with a relatively small sample size of practices for the media, you can extrapolate from those and see a bigger picture emerging of a mentor-mentee relationship between Bill Belichick and Jones. Obi Wan to Luke. Yoda to Luke. Miyagi to Daniel. Morpheus to Neo. Stifler’s Mom to Finch. Granted, that last one isn’t entirely applicable. But you know she taught him technique, ball security reading defenses, going through progressions, when to improvise and so on.
Belichick as Stifler’s mom? You’ll probably never hear that comparison ever again.
What Other Patriots Think of Mac Jones
Jones has had some expected struggles during training camp, but he’s also shown his maturity and upside.
Take a look at what some of his teammates have said about him through OTAs and minicamp:
Mac, he’s a young guy, but you can’t really just refer to him as a young guy. You can tell that he’s been at a place where he’s got some coaching. And I think he’s going to be special here in the future.
I could say Mac is way more confident than I was my rookie year. He’s picking up on the plays. Really all the quarterbacks out here doing good. It’s just good to be able to learn from each quarterback.
He’s pretty cool, he’s quiet. I think he’s trying to figure everybody out and I’ve been there before. I’ve been a rookie and I’ve been a first-round pick where it’s just like so much is asked from you. Coming from a situation where you have a lot of people that are your peers, your same age group and now… What is Mac 21, 22? I’m 32 and Hoyer is 35, 36? It’s tough, he’s doing a great job with being everything as advertised. From a leadership perspective, he’s holding himself accountable and that’s all you can ask from a young player.
Confidence and maturity seem like common themes in the takeaways from everyone who speaks about Jones.
2021 isn’t Return of the Jedi
Luke Skywalker came into his own in Return of the Jedi, but it is important to remember, he got smacked around a bit in the original film.
Luke thought he was ready for the big time in Empire Strikes Back, and got his hand chopped off by his father.
However, in ROTJ, Skywalker was a bad dude ready to take on all comers. If we had to use a Skywalker-esque analogy to gauge where Jones is in his career, he’s definitely in the New Hope stage. In fact, I think he’s still on Tatooine.
If he develops enough to be eligible for his hand to be hacked away during his rookie season, that would be an acceleration. Under no circumstances will he be able to use the force in his first year.
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Patriots Mac Jones Compared to Iconic Star Wars Character