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The New England Patriots will be expecting a lot more from Mac Jones in 2023 but one NFL insider believes that the Patriots could be interested in replacing the quarterback.
According to ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler, New England is a “wild card” to land former NFL MVP Lamar Jackson.
“Right now there’s no real firm offer sheet for Lamar Jackson that I’m aware of,” Fowler said. “Teams are probably slow-playing this. The draft could be a good indicator because you have a team like the Colts at No. 4. If they feel like they can’t get the quarterback of the future they wanted to draft maybe they pivot to Lamar Jackson. The Jets, if they strike out with Aaron Rodgers, certainly that’s not expected, but they could pivot. And then you got some wild cards like Tennessee or New England. Teams that like to run the ball. You never know.”
In 70 career games, Jackson has thrown for over 12,200 yards, 101 touchdowns, and 38 interceptions per Pro Football Reference. The quarterback has also rushed for 4,437 yards and 24 touchdowns.
Former Patriot Devin McCourty Believes the Patriots Shouldn’t Acquire Lamar Jackson
While signing a former MVP might seem like a no-brainer, one former Patriot believes New England should stay away from the quarterback. The recently-retired safety appeared on WEEI and gave his thoughts on the Patriots acquiring Jackson.
“I don’t know if I would do that,” McCourty said regarding a possible acquisition of Jackson. “Because once I give Lamar Jackson that money, we don’t have enough right now, to me, that would be like ‘This team is going to win a Super Bowl if we just put Lamar Jackson here instead of Mac (Jones).’”
The former player also added that he thinks Mac Jones receives too much criticism.
“I don’t think he should be subjected to as much displeasure and scrutiny as he gets,” McCourty said. “We sat here his rookie year and said, ‘Hey, I’m with this! I like this new era.’ We go to the playoffs and it’s like ‘Here we go!’ Then what happened this year from an offensive situation coaching-staff-wise ? He needs to have some consistency (around him).”
Patriots Insider Doesn’t Believe Team Will Trade Mac Jones
While the Patriots might be interested in Jackson, one insider in New England doesn’t see Jones leaving the organization.
NBC Sports Boston’s Tom E. Curran doesn’t think Jones will be traded this season. He said as much when making an appearance on the Rich Eisen Show.
“Absolutely, positively not,” Curran told Rich Eisen. “That would happen over Robert Kraft’s dead body. We’ll talk about that in 2024 if it’s another mediocre season, but this notion that the Patriots would move on from Mac Jones after last July at the outset of training camp, when Bill Belichick talked about Mac Jones making drastic improvements from an already highly-impressive rookie year…
“If they now want to move on from him and his ($ 4.25 million) salary because of what happened in 2022? Well, who’s holding the smoking gun for what happened? The coach!” Curran added.
Jones is coming off of a difficult 2022 season. The quarterback threw for less than 3,000 yards while also recording 14 passing touchdowns and 11 interceptions per Pro Football Reference.
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