FOXBORO — Bailey Zappe wasn’t ready to fully reflect on what’s been a very strange season in the Patriots’ quarterback room, but he did talk about his progress as a second-year pro on Thursday.
Zappe was cut after struggling in the preseason and training camp, leaving then-starter Mac Jones as the team’s only quarterback. Zappe was brought back to the practice squad and then signed to the 53-man roster before Week 1. It took nearly three-quarters of the season, but Zappe eventually surpassed Jones on the QB depth chart in Week 13. He’s since gone 2-3 as a starter.
“Yeah, I mean, it’s come a long way, I guess,” Zappe said about his progression since September. “Still learning, still fixing a lot of things. I’m never going to be in a situation where I think that, you know, ‘Hey, I’m done. I don’t have to fix anything.’ But, I mean, I’m always going to view myself as somebody that, you know, ‘I need to continue to fix this, continue to work on that.’ So, I’m always going to keep trying to improve. Always going to keep trying to help the team win games for as long as I’m here. So, I mean, I think every game and every day I’m looking at it to improve and try to get better every day.”
Zappe was asked a follow-up about how much he feels like he’s improved since the Patriots had joint practices with the Packers in August.
“I would say, of course, there’s definitely things that I’ve improved on, of course, throughout experience and this being my eighth start,” Zappe, who was 2-0 as a starter in 2022, said. “So, as experience goes by and games go by, of course, you start learning things. You start seeing things. The game kind of starts slowing down for you.
“But, I mean, I would say there’s a vast improvement. But there’s a lot of things that I have definitely improved on since then that I wish, of course, I knew then. But now I know, so I’m glad that I figured it out. I’m ready to kind of improve on that this week again and get ready for the Jets.”
Zappe is signed through the 2025 season, so chances are he will be back with the organization next season. But he found out at the end of the summer, when he was available to the rest of the 31 teams on waivers, that nothing is guaranteed in the NFL.
Zappe has seemingly improved as the season has progressed, but he also threw three interceptions in the first half of Sunday’s loss to the Bills. It wouldn’t be prudent for the Patriots to even depend on him as a bridge starter for a rookie unless they could count on dramatically more improvement before next season. If the Patriots can’t select or trade up to take one of the top quarterbacks in the 2024 NFL Draft, then there should be veteran options available with more consistent starting experience.