Bill Belichick holds his cards close to the vest.
The legendary Patriots head coach spoke to reporters at the NFL owners meetings in Phoenix on Monday and Belichick was asked if Mac Jones and Bailey Zappe would have a quarterback competition to be anointed the starter.
“Everybody will get a chance to play,” Belichick answered. “We’ll play the best player.”
He said that was the case with every position on the team.
That may be the case, but Belichick never would’ve said Tom Brady was in a quarterback competition in training camp, and after Brady supplanted Drew Bledsoe nobody would have ever asked.
It is the second time this offseason that Belichick has declined to commit to Jones as the starting quarterback.
Jones led the Patriots to a playoff berth in his rookie season in 2021, but his sophomore campaign was disappointing.
The Patriots went 8-9 — 6-8 in games started by Jones, 2-0 in games started by Zappe and 0-1 in a game started by veteran backup Brian Hoyer but finished by Zappe — and missed the postseason.
There were times during the season in which Jones had poor body language, and he was skewered for it in the media.
Also speaking to reporters on Monday, Patriots owner Robert Kraft indirectly addressed the failure of the offense when it went from being run by Josh McDaniels to presided over by Matt Patricia.
“I’m a big fan of Mac,” Kraft said. “I think he came to us as a rookie, he quarterbacked his rookie season and did a very fine job I thought.
“We made the playoffs, I think we experimented with some things last year that frankly didn’t work when it came to him in my opinion. And I think we made changes that put him in a good position to excel.”
Kraft, who also reveled rapper Meek Mill texted him to express Lamar Jackson’s interest in the Patriots, lauded the move of bringing back Bill O’Brien as the team’s offensive coordinator.
“For me, I think I see him as a very hard-working young man. He’s in the stadium almost every day now in the offseason,” he said.
“Bringing in Bill O’Brien I think will work to his advantage. I’m very positive and hopeful about this upcoming year, and I’m personally a very big fan of Mac.”
