FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — Cam Newton likes to have fun. You can tell by the way he dresses and the hats he wears. You hear it in his voice and see it when he's celebrating or dancing on the football field.
Mac Jones might like to have fun, but right now, the Patriots rookie is all business. He's working hard to learn a difficult offense and acclimate to the NFL.
The veteran and rookie quarterback are certainly different in their current approaches to the game of football, but their relationship and bond seem strong. After Thursday's preseason game against Washington, Newton talked about how he's tried to get Jones to laugh a little and also gave high praise to the rookie for his work ethic.
"For him, man, for him to come out there, I know he came to me and talked to me and we talked it out about just his expectation. Every young quarterback goes through it, the excitement, the anticipation. He wants to be so perfect, and I see his preparation is always pristine," Newton said. "That's what I admire about him, being at such a young age he knows how to prepare and knows when Josh asks quick questions or when a person asks quick questions he knows how to kind of have answers for it.
"Everybody is different. Everybody learns different. But for him and today's performance, he's just going to keep getting better, and we're going to be here for each other along this whole process, and that's what we're here for."
Jones finished 13 for 19 for 87 yards in five total series in his preseason debut. Newton finished 4 for 7 for 49 yards in two series.
Newton, who used to call Jones "Mac and Cheese" said his new nickname for the rookie is "McClennan."
"He's relatively quiet sometimes, and I try to crack the DaVinci Code of the seriousness," Newton said. "He got a lot of — I'm not going to say it, but yeah, he's serious sometimes for no reason. I'm like, Mac, so what does Mac come from, is that your first name? He's like no, that's actually my middle name. I didn't know that. I said, what's Mac — he said McClennan. I think he said that's his mom's maiden name. So there you go."
