Jerod Mayo made waves following the New England Patriots' Week 7 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars in London, saying that they are "a soft football team across the board." That drew the ire of the football world at large, including from former coach Bill Belichick, who later defended the players. Mayo himself sort of walked back those comments on Monday, acknowledging that the team isn't soft, but "we're playing soft."
That sentiment was echoed by cornerback Jonathan Jones, who was asked on Tuesday about Mayo's comments during an interview with WEEI.
"That's his opinion," Jones said, via NFL.com. "I always take the opinions of what our coaches say to heart. The opposite of a soft team is a tough team, and we pride ourselves around here on being able to stop the run, run the ball, and cover kicks. If you look at our last game, we didn't do any of those."
The Patriots jumped out to a 10-0 lead against the Jaguars on Sunday but were blown out the rest of the way en route to a 32-16 defeat. Throughout that comeback by Jacksonville, the Patriots gave up a 96-yard punt return for a touchdown and allowed the Jaguars to rush for 171 yards (121 coming in the second half).
Jones wouldn't go so far as to say that the Patriots are soft -- and barely uttered the word itself -- but did say that New England doesn't have much to stand on following that performance.
"I don't think we have any space to call ourselves a tough team based off our last performance," Jones said. "We weren't able to stop the run, we weren't able to run the ball, and we weren't able to cover kicks."
The Patriots have indeed struggled mightily this season, dropping six games in a row after an upset win over Cincinnati in Week 1. However, Mayo's public comments calling out his team are a risky maneuver. While he is within his rights to call his team out, it may have been best to keep those thoughts in-house to avoid players needing to answer questions about their toughness outright.