When evaluating preseason New England Patriots roster battles, it can be instructive to see which players are on the field together at a given time.
Is a player running with the first team or the second team? Is he playing alongside established teammates or ones who likely will be cut in a few weeks’ time?
At quarterback, for example, Cam Newton took nearly every rep with the Patriots’ starting offensive line during Monday’s joint practice. He also was working against the Philadelphia Eagles’ first-team defense.
Rookie Mac Jones took a few snaps with the top-choice O-line but mostly played behind and against reserves. (Starting receivers and running backs played with both QBs.) This setup clearly showed Jones, who’s in the midst of a strong rookie camp, has yet to pass Newton on New England’s QB depth chart.
Head coach Bill Belichick, though, bristled at a question about QB/O-line pairings Tuesday morning, saying he’s instructed his players for months not to worry about such things.
“Look, we’ve told all the players from back in May when we started — which is the absolute truth — not to spend a lot of time worrying about who else is out there with you,” Belichick said before the second Patriots-Eagles joint practice. “Worry about what you’re doing and try to get it right. I think that’s the most important thing for each and every one of us, if we would focus on what our job is, how to do it well, how to do it better, how to improve on it. Again, that’s all of us — coaches, players, everybody.
“That’s really what we’re trying to do, and spending a lot of time worrying about who else is doing something else and who else is out there or not out there or whatever is honestly a total waste of time and energy. And it’s not productive, so we don’t really worry about it.”
In last week’s preseason game, Newton played both of his series with the Patriots’ top offense and against the Washington Football Team’s top defense. Jones got one series with the offensive starters (excluding tight end Jonnu Smith and running back Damien Harris, who’d already exited the game) and four with the second team.
“I think it’s a lot more important for the offensive linemen to play with the offensive linemen than it is for the quarterback to play with the offensive line,” Belichick continued. “The same thing on defense: It’s (more) important for the linebackers to play with the linebackers than it is for the linebackers to play with the secondary or whatever, and you just keep going. The punt team, those guys need to be ready to work with each other, but at the same time, if somebody else is in there for whatever reason, then the most important thing is for them to do their job properly and work with whoever it is next to them. That’s something they can’t control.
“If we start worrying about all the things we can’t control, I’d say it’s going to be a long year.”
