Patriots notebook: Mac Jones vs. Buffalo weather is more intriguing than Mac Jones vs. Bills Mafia – CBSSports.com
The New England Patriots are gearing up for what will be the biggest game of the season to this point in the year when they travel up to Buffalo to face the Bills on “Monday Night Football.” Of course, this game is big for …….
The New England Patriots are gearing up for what will be the biggest game of the season to this point in the year when they travel up to Buffalo to face the Bills on “Monday Night Football.” Of course, this game is big for what it will mean for the AFC East standings and the current playoff picture. At the moment, New England sits in first place in the division at 8-4, but Buffalo is only a half-game behind at 7-4, and earning the first of two head-to-heads left on the schedule could prove to be critical in tiebreaker scenarios.
So while we’ll be looking at this game from that very basic point of view, there’s also a fascinating side story that is worth watching: Mac Jones in the cold weather. On Monday night, the temperature is forecasted to drop to 25 degrees in Buffalo with winds coming in at 20 to 30 mph. That’ll be a big challenge for the Jacksonville native in Jones, who played his college ball at Alabama. With him now situated in New England for the foreseeable future, playing in these sorts of conditions — and playing well — will be key.
Jones has already started to get a taste of the northeast weather over the last few weeks, including during the Week 12 win over the Titans in Foxborough where there was even a few snow flurries coming down at times. Jones — who threw for 310 yards in the win — noted that he wasn’t impacted much by the weather, but did highlight how he likes practicing in the elements to get a better feel for what it could be like on game day.
“It’s going to get even more cold, so just getting ready for that,” Jones said on the Wednesday leading into the Tennessee game. “I mean, you can’t really predict or prepare, it’s not like you can go throw it in a refrigerator or something or freezer. You just got to go out there and do it, and it is what it is.”
Monday’s matchup does promise to feature raw conditions, which Jones and the rest of the Patriots will need to deal with.
“I don’t think there’s too much we haven’t seen,” Belichick said Friday of the weather. “We haven’t seen a lot of snow this year, but I don’t know what we could do about that. We practice in wind. We practice on sunny days, cloudy days, windy days, calm days, hot days, cold days, wet days, dry days. What’s it going to be? Whatever it is, it is, and if we haven’t done it, then we’ll adjust to …….
