Mac Jones explains why picture from playoff loss to Bills hangs in his locker

BOSTON -- The Patriots' locker room was open to the media last week for the first time since the 2019 season. Not long after, a photograph of Mac Jones' locker made the rounds on the internet, as a picture of a dejected Jones walking off the field after the embarrassing playoff loss to the Bills was seen hanging inside of it.

On Friday, after Jones made his preseason debut in a Patriots victory over the Panthers, Jones was asked why he has a picture of that low moment placed inside of his locker.

"Yeah, I've always been a big fan of having motivational stuff in your locker," Jones answered. 

Jones diverted the answer to talk about two written works that are also in his locker -- "The Man In The Arena" by Theodore Roosevelt and "If--" by Rudyard Kipling -- but did get back to the question.

"I've always done that," he said. "You know, it's last year, but I think it's motivation to just come in here and work every day."

While Jones didn't have much more to say about the Bills picture, he spoke a bit more about the importance of the two written works.

"I do love the two poems a lot, so that that's a big shout out to my dad because he kind of gave me those when I was probably like 6 years old," Jones said. "He kind of explained everything to me. And as I grew, I continue to just enjoy that. Actually, the "If--" poem is in Wimbledon. So that's where he learned about it, in the locker room in Wimbledon. So that's pretty cool."

The Kipling quote in Wimbledon goes, "If you can meet with triumph and disaster and treat those two impostors just the same." 

That line of thinking obviously works with a photo of Jones suffering a football disaster last year in Buffalo, helping to shed a little bit of light of how Jones is trying to motivate himself entering his second NFL season.