Five years ago, quarterback Mac Jones played for Nick Saban at Alabama. The day after the most significant victory of Jones’s career, Saban expressed pleasure at the development — and took a shot of sorts at his supposedly good friend, Bill Belichick.
“I’m so happy for Mac,” Saban said on ESPN’s The Pat McAfee Show , via Mike Rodak of 247Sports.com. “I think Mac was one of those guys who was in bad situations in New England relative to coaching and all that stuff, and who was the offensive coordinator, and how did he get developed when he came into the league.”
Calling it a bad situation is an understatement. After Jones made the Pro Bowl in 2021 with Josh McDaniels as his offensive coordinator, Belichick decided to put career defensive coach Matt Patricia in charge of the offense. If anyone other than Belichick had done that, the widespread reaction would have been, “Has he lost his freaking mind?”
The situation created significant friction between Belichick and Jones. And Jones, quite frankly, wasn’t inclined to take Belichick’s shit. It ultimately poisoned the entire situation, resulting in Jones being traded to the Jaguars after Belichick was fired.
It’ll be interesting to see whether Belichick has anything to say about Jones or Saban or anything else related to an embarrassing chapter from the tail end of his New England book. If, of course, any of the folks currently covering Belichick’s North Carolina team muster the nerve to ask him about it on Saturday.
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