Mac Jones Reveals ‘Coolest Part’ About Working With Coach Bill O’Brien

The New England Patriots made shocking decisions about their coaching staff last season. They gave Matt Patricia a big role in a relatively unknown field for him. It was an experiment and didn’t work. Players had hard time coping with the new offensive mechanism. Bill O’Brien got the keys of the offense this time and Mac Jones seems to be happy to work with him.

The third-year quarterback has nothing but words of praise for O’Brien. He respects his experience and the overall impact he had on the team. Yes, head coach Bill Belichick knew what he was doing when he added O’Brien to his squad.

“He’s super real,” Jones said in his interview with Albert Breer from Sports Illustrated. “A straight-up guy, not only as a coach but as a person. He’s going to let you know, ‘Hey, you’re not doing this right. Hey, you’re doing this really well.’ Some coaches will tell you, but then they don’t give you a plan to fix it. I think the coolest part is he gives you the plan, and then from there, you got to go out and execute it. Something might pop up in OTAs where I did something wrong. He’s like, ‘Well, do this throw instead of that throw.’ Next thing you know, it comes up today at practice.

“It’s just little things like that. … I think the unit, most importantly, feels the same way as I do in that we have a lot of trust in him to work things out throughout the season.”

Jones and other Patriots players saw a huge shift in the offensive part of the game. The quarterback had other visions about his plays on the field and this didn’t really match Patricia’s demands. We all know what happened last season.

Jones could thrive better with O’Brien as OC

O’Brien knows the Patriots really well. He knows their system and has an experience with Belichick. Jones worked well with former Patriots OC Josh McDaniels and O’Brien will provide similar support in 2023.

“Yeah, for sure, there was a lot of crossover,” Jones said. “We speak the same language. He used to coach for Belichick and Saban, and I played for Belichick and Saban. We understand that it’s a tough place to play. In practice, everything’s going to be hard. You’ve got defensive head coaches, so they’re trying to make it hard on you.

“We love the challenge. We speak the same terminology. Sometimes I’ll bring up an old play, and everyone’s like, ‘What’s that?’ And O’B’s like, ‘It’s this.’ We’re talking the same language. It’s fun.”