Mac Jones on Saturday played well in his first playoff appearance as his Patriots, thanks to their defense, got blown out by Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills.
Less than two days later, Colin Cowherd is ready for the Patriots to trade Jones.
Cowherd's take, delivered during Monday's "The Herd with Colin Cowherd" episode, is less about Jones and more about some of the AFC's top quarterbacks. Basically, the FS1 personality believes Bill Belichick should consider trading Jones as part of, or after, a deal to acquire a player such as Russell Wilson or Deshaun Watson in an attempt to accelerate New England's return to contention.
Cowherd undermines his own take from the get-go by calling the Patriots defense "great." New England's defense is not great, and fixing it needs to be the top offseason priority -- not trading Jones.
Alas, Cowherd spend roughly 10 minutes talking about the possibility of trading a player who just put together one of the best rookie quarterback seasons in NFL history.
"Josh Allen in the last two games has been so devastating, unstoppable and jaw-dropping," Cowherd said, "could Belichick -- and this was a great defense -- be thinking, 'I probably gotta trade Mac Jones, because if this is a gunfight, I'm not sufficiently armed'? That was the best cold-weather performance I've ever seen by a quarterback. ... And Mac Jones, by the way ... Mac wasn't terrible. But the league has changed. Belichick is 70. Mac Jones has value. He is a free player for three years at the most vital position. You can win with Tua (Tagovailoa) and Mac Jones. And, for some organizations, that's what they're looking at.
"Belichick wants Super Bowls. (Patrick) Mahomes, (Justin) Herbert, (Joe) Burrow, Josh Allen -- good luck. Be absolutely a tier below. ... We talk Saints, Bears, Raiders. Is Belichick this morning, who has a history of moving off popular players, he would've moved off (Tom) Brady, looking at this and going, 'OK, I gotta face (Allen) 10 times in the next five years, minimum'? This isn't the Brady era where all of the quarterbacks and most of the coaches were stiffs."
Cowherd added: "Does (Belichick) look at that and think, 'I have created value for Mac Jones'? There's nine teams that need a quarterback. We're talking about where Russell Wilson's going -- nobody mentions New England. I'd like to have that defense, that offensive coordinator and that head coach."
Now, this take isn't unique.
In fact, early in the season, Chris Gasper (then of WCVB-TV, now of The Boston Globe) presented the same idea while getting awfully close to indicating Belichick was/is of a similar mindset. It was a hard story to get a good read on.
Make of all that what you will, but you probably don't need to worry about the Patriots trading Mac Jones anytime soon.
