Matt Rhule and the rest of the Panthers’ coaching staff had a chance to get an up-close and personal look at quarterback Mac Jones during the Senior Bowl in January.
While Rhule came away impressed with the former Alabama passer, the Panthers elected to trade for quarterback Sam Darnold and select cornerback Jaycee Horn at No. 8 overall.
Now Rhule will coach against Jones in Sunday’s matchup between Carolina and New England. He told Patriots reporters on Thursday that Jones handled everything well at the Senior Bowl and it took about 10 minutes to see he could be successful at the highest level.
“To me, no matter where Mac ended up, I knew he was going to be a longtime pro, because he just has all the right qualities and all the right things that are essential to being a great player,” Rhule said, via Zack Cox of NESN. “That was evident to me from the very beginning.”
Rhule noted that he’d spent some time trying to recruit Jones while at Baylor. And when Rhule coached Jones in January, he saw solid traits.
“He’s just got juice,” Rhule said. “Spending time with him, you could tell he loves football. He just won the national championship game and he’s out there practicing with us.
“You could see how intelligent he was the first day. We put a lot of install in, a lot of words in, just to see if they could recite it, and you could see pretty quickly he had a feel for the game. He had some moxie, and he was really, really intelligent and accurate and could throw the deep ball at a high level.”
Jones has piloted the Patriots to a 4-4 record, completing 68 percent of his passes for 1,996 yards with nine touchdowns and six interceptions.
Darnold, who may not play this week with a concussion, has completed 60.8 percent of his passes for 1,814 yards with seven touchdowns and eight interceptions.