FOXBOROUGH — In a no-point, zero-trip-to-the-red-zone day for the New England Patriots offense, Bailey Zappe turned in one of the top five Patriots’ quarterback performances this season.
Yes, folks, it’s that scary. Beyond painful, in fact.
Mac Jones’ replacement was 13 of 25 for 141 yards in the 6-0 loss to the lifeless Los Angeles Chargers here on Sunday.
And the only questions that resonated were:
What if Bill Belichick, Bill O’Brien or Bob Kraft – whoever is the one making that decision — initiated the move sooner than Week 13?
Could Zappe have saved the season or at least made it a tad more watchable?
Why the heck did you wait so long?
Belichick – the only one of the potential decision-making triumvirate to take the podium postgame on Sunday – continued to grouse about his doing what he thinks is best for the time. Nobody expected anything different.
Zappe offered a sense of normalcy on Sunday. Call it competence. As he said, there were issues – top to bottom issues – with his performance.
“No excuse, I have to play better,” Zappe said.
No Patriots fans would disagree. But there was no immediate doom, no disastrous flip to the other team. Just 60 minutes of mediocrity. Don’t you get the feeling the Patriots could work with that?
Or at least, they might have been able to … say, after Mac had dropped successive 38-3 and 34-zip losses to Dallas and New Orleans way back in the first two weeks of October.
Zappe gave the Patriots a chance on Sunday. In falling to 2-1 as a starter, he took the same kind of brutal shots that Jones has, five sacks in all.
He watched his receivers drop good balls at huge times, none larger than second-year man Tyquan Thornton’s drop on a sure TD bomb.
Zappe made no nationally televised gestures to the sidelines. He didn’t call out the receivers and didn’t beg officials.
He tried his best, without the histrionics. It’s something this franchise needed before the leaves turned. and Bill, Bill and Bob blew it, sticking with Jones.
When asked why he went with Zappe this week, Belichick noted, “I thought he deserved it.”
He actually deserved it back in October when something needed to be done to prevent this mess.
What happened up front?
Belichick wasn’t asked about it, but perhaps the Patriots media will get the opportunity to speak with either acting offensive line coach Billy Yates or O’Brien via assistant coach Zoom calls on Tuesday.
The Trent Brown/Connor McDermott rotation at left tackle just isn’t working out.
Please, I’m begging you to tell me that the team doesn’t have Brown on some kind of pitch count to limit his snaps and therefore cost him some incentive money.
Khalil Mack’s sack on McDermott – he had one off each edge – was ridiculous. For some reason off the snap, McDermott looked to help inside, ignoring Mack, the guy with seven Pro Bowls and 97.5 career sacks, in a sprinter’s stance just across the line with the No. 4 on Zappe’s back in his crosshairs.
That’s coaching, folks. Every offensive line meeting the Patriots had this week needed to begin and end with Mack. Zappe deserved better, and so did the 30,000 or so Patriots fans who actually showed up in that monsoon.
There were some brutal coaching looks — 12 men in the huddle is never a good luck. It appears the coaches failed on Sunday.
Also, while talking about the line, Mike Onwenu had an absolutely brutal day at right tackle.
A ton of it was Mack, who is a beastly havoc-wreaked. Onwenu, who is in the final year of his rookie deal, is one of a couple Patriots, who get superstar treatment in the media.
Over the past few weeks, as the ineptitude on offense has reached epic lows and the losses pile up, Onwenu and defensive tackle Christian Barmore continue to get praise heaped on them.
We heard plenty, as in too much, from Onwenu on Sunday. and we didn’t hear nary a peep from Barmore, who finished with one tackle.
Sorry, folks. But the truth is the truth.
The streak is over!
We’ll work out the math and get the official numbers, but the snap count looked to reach about 150 before Hunter Henry hauled in an 9-yard catch, ending a tight-end-reception drought that lingered all the way back to the Colts’ loss in Germany.
Henry is a captain and a pretty standup guy. The media likes him because he shows up in postgame at the podium.
But he’s making $12.5 million a year, and he’s got 72 catches over the last 29 games.
Henry got a bit snippy when asked if he felt guilty about the offense’s performance.
“Yeah, it’s frustrating. Very frustrating. I’m frustrated, I know we’re all frustrated. We’ve just got to keep going, keep competing. I’ll tell you one thing, I’m going to keep competing and keep trying to be my best, keep trying to be better and try to be the best version of myself I can for this team,” he said.
The best version of himself is as middle-of-the-pack – ok, lower middle – as it gets. “I’m going to tell you one thing, is I’m going to go out there and compete the same and give the same amount of effort that I would no matter – if we were in first place,” Henry said.
Watch his performance in this skid. Over the last eight games, he’s got 15 catches for 139 yards. That’s unacceptable.
Yesterday against New Orleans, Detroit rookie tight end Sam LaPorta had 9 catches for 140 yards.
Quite a contrast, no?