It’s that time of year once again! Football Absurdity will bring you a breakdown of every notable fantasy football-relevant player throughout June, July, and August. We start off with the quarterbacks. Mac Jones had the best rookie season of all the quarterbacks taken in 2021. But, that’s not hard. Trey Lance played 2.5 games, the Bears threw Justin Fields to the wolves, Trevor Lawrence’s coach was going around kicking guys, and Zach Wilson got Jetsed pretty hard. But, for fantasy football purposes, can we trust Mac Jones and his bevy of weapons headed into 2022? Let’s take a look.
Mac Jones ADP and AAV:
Average Draft Position: QB23, 174 overall
Average Auction Value: $1
Mac Jones Statistics:
| Year | G | GS | Att | Comp | Comp% | Yds | TD | Int | Comp/G | Att/G | Yds/G | TD/G | INT/G |
| 2021 | 17 | 17 | 352 | 521 | 67.6% | 3801 | 22 | 13 | 30.6 | 20.7 | 223.6 | 1.3 | 0.8 |
| Year | 4 PPTD | 6 PPTD | 4 PPTD/G | 6 PPTD/G | Year | Att | Yd | TD | YPC | Att/G | Yd/G | |
| 2021 | 224.9 | 268.9 | 13.2 | 15.82 | 2021 | 44 | 129 | 0 | 2.9 | 2.6 | 7.6 |
| Year | Air Yards | aDOT | aDOT+ | Y/A | TD% | INT% | Sacks | Yds/Sack |
| 2021 | 3684 | 7.74 | 7.74 | 7.30 | 6.3% | 3.7% | 28 | 8.61 |
aDOT+ represents a player’s depth of target compared to the league average for that season. Air yards data is from FTNFantasy.com/air-yards
2022 Mac Jones Fantasy Football Overview:
Mac Jones was really good as a rookie! He was tenth in intended air yards per pass attempt among quarterbacks with at least 450 pass attempts last season, tying him with Kyler Murray and Teddy Bridgwater. Teddy Bridgewater is an apt comparison for Mac Jones in fantasy football. Teddy is a good and proficient quarterback, and he has been for a long while. What he hasn’t been is horribly fantasy relevant. He’s a smart field general who can distribute the ball to his weapons, but who isn’t going to do much for fantasy football squads. And that’s fine; Bill Belichick doesn’t care about your fantasy football squads (as evidenced by his handling of running backs). He cares about winning, and Mac Jones does that for him.
Before the Bostonians come at me because their hackles are still raised from losing to the Warriors, I think that Mac Jones is a perfectly good real-life quarterback. I acknowledge he has a good deep ball and plays well under pressure. I also acknowledge that the Patriots aren’t going to run their game through Mac Jones this season, not with Damien Harris, Rhamondre Stevenson, Kevin Harris, James White, and Pierre Strong all on the roster.
The Patriots threw the ball the seventh-fewest times last season, and they added guys to indicate that Bill Belichick wants to keep that train rolling this season. I can’t see a lot of fantasy football upside for a guy who doesn’t run the football and who is likely to be in the bottom quartile in pass attempts. There’s just nothing there for Mac Jones based solely on how Bill Belichick operates his football team.
2022 Mac Jones Fantasy Football Draft Strategy:
Mac Jones Auction Value: $-
Draft Ranking: Find out for your league settings in a Beersheet! (coming in early July)
Mac Jones has a capped upside thanks to team construction and strategy, and people will try to tell you he has a solid floor to make up for it. He doesn’t. Mac Jones ranked 25th in fantasy points per game his rookie year and ranked 23rd in PlayerProfiler.com’s expected fantasy points metric. He basically maxed out his expected fantasy points last year, and he was still a below-average second quarterback in a 2QB league. The Patriots added Tyquan Thornton to their passing game, and that’s the one change. It’s going to be a lot of underneath stuff, a lot of dinks, and a lot of dunks, and a lot of eyewash for fantasy football purposes.
Mac Jones is undraftable in 1QB leagues and is merely a fallback option in 2QB leagues. The draft price bears this out, as he is $1 in salary cap drafts and QB22 in snake drafts. He’s just a bump on a log for fantasy football purposes, a guy you can reliably get 14 fantasy points per game from. Just don’t expect much more than that; Jones had just two games over 22 fantasy points last season, and both were less than 22.5 fantasy points. He’s there to win football games, not fantasy football championships. Treat him that way.
Best Case Scenario:
Mac Jones clicks with all his weapons and finishes as QB11.
Worst Case Scenario:
Mac Jones fails to click with all his weapons and Bill Belichick literally abandons the pass, instead choosing to run the football 75 times per game.
Check out all our 2022 player profiles, here.
If you would like our $7 Draft Kit, then follow this link!
For more analysis like these player profiles, check out these links!
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