Bill O’Brien was supposed to fix the New England Patriots’ offense. The former Penn State and Houston Texans head coach returned to Bill Belichick’s coaching tree as the team’s offensive coordinator this season. He’d been hired to clean up the mess Matt Patricia and Joe Judge had left behind, as young quarterback Mac Jones regressed mightily in 2022.
Things haven’t gone as planned. Jones remains a bottom-five quarterback and the Patriots slumped to an uncharacteristic 2-7 headed into Week 10. A road trip to Frankfurt, Germany allowed a change of scenery and, maybe, a chance to engineer a turnaround. But that’s not what happened for a team that scored just three points in the first three quarters against the Indianapolis Colts.
O’Brien wasn’t happy about that. And he let his quarterback know it.
Bill O’Brien PISSED at Mac Jones pic.twitter.com/AclbRTblL7
— Michael Hurley (@michaelFhurley) November 12, 2023
Jones was ripe for some verbal abuse. He’d converted just two of seven third downs in the first half and had been sacked on all five of his failure. While he’d been efficient, he’d also been low impact and low excitement; he hadn’t attempted a single pass that traveled more than 10 yards downfield in three quarters.
Fans took notice — and took the opportunity to rip into a Patriots team that appears to be falling apart under Belichick.