Patriots in unfamiliar territory amid rare quarterback controversy
November 2001. Tweeting is something only birds do, Billie Eilish hasn’t been born yet, gas is $1.15 a gallon, and 49-year-old, second-year Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has no idea who he’s going to start at quarterback for the rest of the season.
Does he go with proven, occasionally inaccurate veteran Drew Bledsoe, who has successfully recovered from a severe Week 2 chest injury suffered at the hands of Jets linebacker Mo Lewis? Or does he side with second-year phenom Tom Brady who, in Bledsoe’s absence, has stepped in and turned an 0–2 team into a 5–5 playoff contender?
But we already know how that story ends. Now, six championships and almost 20 years later, Coach Belichick is in a somewhat similar situation.
On one hand, Belichick has the luxury of Jarrett Stidham, an SEC-groomed, 24-year-old signal caller who had the benefit of learning under Brady last season. Stidham had his share of struggles in what little playing time he saw in 2019 (an ugly pick-six against the Jets in garbage time was the highlight) but the mood around the Patriots’ locker room is that he’s made serious strides between Year 1 and Year 2. Which, funny enough, is exactly what was said about Tom Brady as he matured and adjusted to the NFL.
Then came July 8, when former league MVP Cam Newton signed a 1-year-deal with the Patriots. It’s safe to say things were shaken up a bit.
Newton, 31, is the obvious choice for the starting job. Over the last decade, it’s hard to think of a more dynamic player who has maintained the same style of punishing play, while also continuing to strap it up every week. That’s right, believe it or not, Newton only missed seven starts over his first eight seasons (2011–2018) due to injury. That’s durability.
But 2019 was an ugly year for Newton. A Week 2 foot injury eventually sent Newton to injured reserve as the Panthers plummeted to a 5–11 finish. The injury sent questions through the league. Could Newton be a viable roster piece deep into his thirties? Or would he fizzle out, as so many dual-threat quarterbacks have in the past?
When Brady jetted off to Tampa Bay in search of a fresh start, Belichick must have seen an opportunity, and went out and pulled off the football equivalent of buying the worst house on the nicest block. No one’s doubting Newton’s status as one of pro football’s premier players over the last ten years, but the future is more than a little uncertain. Belichick is willing to take the gamble of putting in a little TLC, in hopes that Newton can return to the spark plug he was for so many years in Carolina.
In the wake of a leg injury Stidham apparently suffered at Friday morning’s padless practice, Newton figures to be in line for the starting job, though Stidham plans to continue to practicing through the pain.
Maybe there’s no contest here — maybe Newton is the clear-cut starter and the Foxboro regiment is just playing with our heads as per usual. But one can’t help but speculate about what kind of consequences this late-summer quarterback competition might mean for New England’s future, both in 2021 and beyond. Do they still believe in Stidham as the long-term replacement to the greatest quarterback to ever lace ’em up? Or are they willing to dump the Auburn product, Jimmy Garoppolo style, and see how long they can keep Cam Newton upright?
Much like the Garoppolo dilemma, the Patriots won’t be able to sit on this forever. Though Garoppolo hasn’t exactly turned out to be the lightning in a bottle the 49ers anticipated when they traded for him in 2017, he still didn’t deserve to sit through the prime of his career waiting for Brady to slow down. The same might go for Stidham as well. If the Patriots are willing to invest the next few years in Cam Newton (another Auburn alum, fittingly), they might have to bid farewell to Stidham and accept the fact that nothing lasts forever.
