New England Patriots quarterback Drake Maye finally got a real opportunity to show his talent off on Thursday night, during Week 2 of the NFL preseason, in a 14-13 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles.
You're correct that if they're being truthful of this being a real competition, it's been very badly botched. This is no Mac Jones (whose rookie offseason was handled very well to make him the starter without guaranteeing it outright). Since playing in the rookie season has no definitive positive effect on QB development, the focus should be on this season, and this one only. Whoever is the better player today should play, and I have a hard time accepting that a rookie in his first start is giving the Patriots their best chance to win.
Even if Drake has played better than Jacoby all offseason (an intentional overkill of an assertion), so what? Vets get outplayed in the offseason all the time. Jacoby Brissett is a better NFL QB today than Drake Maye, simply because rookies always underperform. Always.
This does not change if Jacoby plays badly. However bad he may play for the first half of the season, I'm close to certain Drake will play worse, and there's no guarantee that Jacoby will play badly. The last time we saw Jacoby on an NFL field he was singlehandedly turning around a very bad Washington offence that'd been sitting him all season only because they were trying to lose on purpose, and the last time before that he was looking really good for a Cleveland offence that's looked really bad ever since he left.
I'm not watching Pats' training camp, but either Jacoby has gotten precipitously worse, or he's better than Drake Maye. These things can't both be true at once.
I'm not sure this is the best thing.
You're correct that if they're being truthful of this being a real competition, it's been very badly botched. This is no Mac Jones (whose rookie offseason was handled very well to make him the starter without guaranteeing it outright). Since playing in the rookie season has no definitive positive effect on QB development, the focus should be on this season, and this one only. Whoever is the better player today should play, and I have a hard time accepting that a rookie in his first start is giving the Patriots their best chance to win.
Even if Drake has played better than Jacoby all offseason (an intentional overkill of an assertion), so what? Vets get outplayed in the offseason all the time. Jacoby Brissett is a better NFL QB today than Drake Maye, simply because rookies always underperform. Always.
This does not change if Jacoby plays badly. However bad he may play for the first half of the season, I'm close to certain Drake will play worse, and there's no guarantee that Jacoby will play badly. The last time we saw Jacoby on an NFL field he was singlehandedly turning around a very bad Washington offence that'd been sitting him all season only because they were trying to lose on purpose, and the last time before that he was looking really good for a Cleveland offence that's looked really bad ever since he left.
I'm not watching Pats' training camp, but either Jacoby has gotten precipitously worse, or he's better than Drake Maye. These things can't both be true at once.