The San Francisco 49ers have been lucky to have Mac Jones as the team's backup quarterback this season, but a lot of the chatter from earlier in the year about him being better than Brock Purdy has quieted down.
Jones had a rough game on Sunday against the Houston Texans. He completed 19 of his 32 passes for 193 yards with two touchdowns and one interception. He is not the only reason San Francisco lost the game, as the defense struggled mightily as it dealt with countless injuries, but it seems abundantly clear now that he is not superior to Purdy, who continues to deal with his toe injury.
It would have been difficult for any quarterback to go up against a stout Houston Texans defense. Add in the fact that you are missing your top wide receiver in Ricky Pearsall and several members of your offensive line are missing or banged up, and it becomes an even taller task.
The offense did almost nothing in the first half and only salvaged things with a late score to tight end George Kittle to make the game a lot closer than it should have been.
However, whatever momentum that score gave the 49ers did not translate to the second half, as the struggle to move the ball consistently continued. Jones also had to deal with drops from some of his receivers, which did not help matters at all so not everything was his fault.
Mac Jones is proving he's not the superior option to Brock Purdy
The last two weeks have shown that despite the redemption arc this season has been for Jones, he is not going to take the starting job from Purdy. As great as he looked against the Los Angeles Rams in a huge overtime victory, his last three starts have been much less impressive.
Over the last three weeks, Jones has completed roughly 65 percent of his passes for 692 yards with two touchdowns and four interceptions. Not all of those picks have been completely his fault, but the numbers do not lie, and he has also been hampered by some injuries.
It remains to be seen how much longer he will have to be the starter. The Niners have clearly tried to be cautious with Purdy's toe after he reaggravated it in a start versus Jacksonville, but if he can get to a point where he can play with reasonable confidence that he will not re-injure the toe, then he will clearly be the superior option over Jones.
That does not take anything away from the tremendous job Jones has done filling in for Purdy, but it does show that those who were quick to proclaim that Jones is just as good as, or even better than, Purdy were clearly in the wrong.