AFC Notes: Bill Belichick, Mac Jones, Aaron Rodgers, Bills, Jets, Patriots

Bills

• Bills S Jordan Poyer was fined $10,927 for unnecessary roughness stemming from Week 17.

Jets

Jets OT Mekhi Becton isn’t happy with his performance during his time in New York so far and is unsure what his future will be with the team that drafted him. 

“I didn’t play the way I wanted to in my head, like I did my rookie year,” Becton told The New York Post. “But I played a whole season after everybody thought I wasn’t going to. It was a positive season for me.”

“It’s definitely something I can build on,” Becton added. “The last two years I really didn’t have anything to build on. I was just going off my rookie year. It’s definitely something I can go into the offseason and build on. I had a lot of pre-snap penalties. I had a lot of sacks. I mean, it just wasn’t like I wanted it to be. I was battling a lot, but that’s the least of my worries right now. I just pushed through the whole season.”

• Jets HC Robert Saleh said he’s evaluating the staff but is not expecting any significant changes. (Zack Rosenblatt)
• Saleh said it will be “very important” to find another threat to take some attention off WR Garrett Wilson in the passing game. (Rosenblatt)
• Jets QB Aaron Rodgers on the prospect of QB Zach Wilson being traded: “I love Zach and want what’s best for Zach … sometimes a change of scenery can be a breath of fresh air.” (Rosenblatt)
• Rodgers noted that he wants to play for the Jets beyond next season but knows he needs to prove he can still play: “I’d like this to be more than just next year.” (Andrew Siciliano)
• As for OL Alijah Vera-Tucker, Saleh said the team wants him to remain at one position next season instead of moving him around. (Brian Costello)

Patriots

Patriots HC Bill Belichick said QB Bailey Zappe approached him during training camp about ways he could improve and thinks the quarterback has worked hard to fix his issues. 

“In August or September, whenever it was, during the final cuts, I talked to Bailey and I thought he had a great attitude and outlook on the situation. ‘What do I need to do better? How can I do it? How can I improve?’ And he’s worked very hard to address those, and it’s shown up in his play and his performance, not just recently but going all the way back to day by day through September, October, all those days. You just take it one day at a time, and I think he really tried to embrace that,” Belichick said, via Zack Cox. 

Belichick praised Zappe’s toughness and resiliency. 

“It’s a big credit to him — his mental toughness, his resiliency and his attitude toward competing.”

• Belichick had the following comments after the season ended with another loss on Sunday: “I’m under contact. I’m going to do what I always do, which is every day I come in, work as hard as I can to help the team in whatever way I can. So that’s what I’m going to continue to do. Today was kind of the wrap-up day for us with the players — we’ll have a meeting with them and then go from there…As far as any decisions or direction or anything like that for next year; it’s way too early for that. End of the year process, I don’t think will be fundamentally different from the standpoint of how it’s done. The decisions — that’s a whole another conversation…But how it’s done, I’ll meet with Robert [Kraft], like I always do. Meet with the staff. Meet with the personnel department. Kind of recap the season. Look at the big picture and then look at some of the individual situations that are looming one way or another…But that’s obviously a long way off from where we are right now. So we’ll start, at the end of the day, putting the pieces back together of setting things up to go through a good, detailed analysis – to kind of start reconstruction, if you will.” (Mike Reiss)
• Patriots QB Mac Jones feels that he let people down with his poor play this season: “A lot of that stuff’s in my control, and some of it’s not. I’m going to do everything I can for my next opportunity, whether that’s here, and really just push forward and continue to be Mac. That’s what it’s all about.” (Zack Cox)
• Jones also noted that he has added around eight pounds of muscle during the final few months of the season. (Mark Daniels)