The New England Patriots got the football at their 25-yard line with 1:58 to play trailing the Buffalo Bills 25-22 on Oct. 22.

New England quarterback Mac Jones completed 6-of-7 passes for 64 yards, including a 1-yard touchdown toss to tight end Mike Gesicki with 12 seconds remaining to rally the Patriots to a 29-25 victory.

Three weeks later, New England got the football at its 14-yard line with 1:42 to play trailing the Indianapolis Colts 10-6. But instead of Jones, who’d taken every snap for the Patriots in the game, New England sent in backup quarterback Bailey Zappe to run the two-minute drill.

Zappe completed 3-of-7 passes for 25 yards, and the Colts sealed the victory with an interception with 31 seconds remaining in the Frankfurt, Germany, game.

What happened to change the circumstances for Jones?

On the previous possession, the Patriots were in position for another fourth-quarter comeback. New England had moved from its 25 to the Indianapolis 13. But with 4:16 left, Jones woefully underthrew Gesicki as he ran into the end zone, and safety Julian Blackmon intercepted the pass.

But when asked about benching the former Alabama All-American during his weekly appearance on “The Greg Hill Show” on Monday on WEEI-FM in Boston, New England coach Bill Belichick said: “I wouldn’t say this is about one play.”

Jones’ final pass also had been intercepted in the Patriots’ previous game – a second-down throw from the Washington 41 picked off with 30 seconds to play in a 20-17 loss to the Commanders on Nov. 5. This time, Jones put the pass on the mark, but it went though wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster’s hands.

In New England’s other game between Buffalo and Indianapolis, Jones threw two touchdown passes, but he had an interception on a first-down throw from the Miami 23-yard line in the second quarter of a 31-17 loss to the Dolphins on Oct. 29. New England trailed by a touchdown at a time.

Belichick reiterated on Monday his Sunday explanation for replacing Jones with Zappe with the Patriots still in the game.

“We just felt like we needed to make a change at that point,” Belichick said.

At his Monday press conference, Belichick was asked which quarterback – Jones, Zappe or No. 3 Will Grier – he anticipated playing the position in the second half of the season for the Patriots.

“We just got back from Germany here, so we’ll work through everything,” Belichick said. “We’ll look at everything all the way across the board, not specifically any one position. Just try to look at everything. Do the best we can here going forward.”

Belichick said he’d do “what’s best for the football team now and the future.”

Pulling Jones with the game on the line could be viewed as a bridge-burning vote of no confidence for the quarterback. But after Sunday’s game, it didn’t sound as though the players in Patriots’ locker room had given up on Jones.

“He’s got to stay positive,” said Matthew Slater, a 16-year veteran and New England’s special-teams captain. “Right now, everybody’s counting him out. I’m sure there’s a lot of negativity. There’s a lot of negativity surrounding our team. We got to ignore all of that because it shouldn’t impact how we operate day-to-day. You can’t let people who don’t know half of what’s going on in the building impact what’s going on in the building, so he’s got to stay positive, he’s got to ignore the noise, keep his head down, keep working just like the rest of us.”

For his part, Zappe said he’s “100 percent” ready to start if that’s the direction New England wants to go after Sunday.

“I’m not worried about me,” Zappe said after the game. “I’m trying to help the team win. I didn’t take advantage of that today. Next time, I will.”

Jones played in the Pro Bowl and the Patriots went to the playoffs in his rookie season. After the 2021 campaign, New England offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels left to become the Las Vegas Raiders’ head coach.

In 2022, former Patriots defensive coordinator and Detroit Lions head coach Matt Patricia called plays for New England, and he got much of the blame for offensive missteps last season.

Replacing Patricia with former Patriots offensive coordinator and Houston Texans head coach Bill O’Brien was supposed to get Jones and the offense back on track. But bringing in O’Brien from Alabama hasn’t had the desired effect, and the offensive coordinator was seen blessing out Jones on bench after a second-half series ended in a short field-goal attempt on Sunday.

The Patriots’ passing stats aren’t too different between 2022 and 2023 through 10 games. Last season, when New England was 6-4, the Patriots had 2,022 passing yards, nine touchdown passes, 10 interceptions and 28 sacks given up. This season, at 2-8, New England has 1,996 passing yards, 10 touchdown passes, 11 interceptions and 23 sacks given up.

The rushing stats are down more markedly with 949 yards, a 3.9 yards-per-carry average and five touchdowns this season after 1,154 yards, a 4.0 yards-per-carry average and nine touchdowns through 10 games in 2022.

In addition to their record, the biggest difference for the Patriots between seasons is in scoring. Through 10 games in 2022, New England had 213 points. This season, the Patriots have 141 points. The 2022 Patriots have two interception returns, one fumble return and one punt return for touchdowns 10 games into the season. This season, all New England’s touchdowns have been scored by the offense.

“It’s what we’ve talked about all year really,” Belichick said on Monday. “It’s consistency. There’re good things. There’re things we can build off of. We’re certainly doing a lot of things better than we did earlier in the year. But it doesn’t take much to stop a drive or to have a bad play, and we just have to do a better job of eliminating those errors, so that’s what we’re working towards.”

Seven of New England’s games this season have had a margin of a touchdown or less, and the Patriots have lost five of them.

“Look, everybody’s working hard,” Belichick said. “We’ve been close. We just haven’t been able to finish enough and make the plays we needed to make in critical situations to win, and so everybody’s committed to working hard to change that. We’ve put ourselves in position multiple times here. We just haven’t had the results here that we’re looking for. We’re going to work hard to get those results.”

The Patriots have an extra week to get ready for their next game, which will match the lowest-scoring teams in the NFL. When New England returns from its bye week, the Patriots will play the New York Giants at noon CST Nov. 26 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.