It was a myriad of emotions for Gus Bradley and the Jaguars after losing to the Patriots and looking at how it happened. Discouraged, disappointed and frustrated is what Bradley talked about in the 24 hours following the blowout.

“There’s some frustration, I would say.” Bradley noted on Monday. “I told the team that’s a good thing and shows that they’re invested. Attitude is great, but just wanted to get it right.”

After three years of building the roster and declaring it “built” going into 2015, everybody, inside the organization and out, thought the team would be competitive in any situation this year. Obviously that didn’t happen against New England as the Patriots scored on nine consecutive drives and did not punt once during the game.

“I think we have to get back to who we are, and I think that’s the biggest thing that we talked about. We tried to do too much. Guys were trying to make plays, trying to overanalyze things. I think when you start doing that, you try to make plays, you do things that are uncharacteristic that you don’t do normally, that’s when the score can get like it is.”

Maybe that’s a hallmark of a young team. Maybe the Patriots and Tom Brady are just that good. But whatever it is, the Jaguars have to figure out how to not let it happen again. Too often in the last three years the score was so lopsided it appeared the Jaguars were out of their league. With the draft picks selected, the experienced gained and the free agents acquired this off-season, that kind of rout shouldn’t happen. Bradley’s coaching style, allowing the players to be empowered, somehow hasn’t translated across the whole team in big game situations. Blake Bortles interception under two minutes before the half was a turning point in the game but it shouldn’t have lead to the runaway final score.

Bradley agrees. “I think what’s disappointing is that we didn’t go out there and play up to our capabilities and make plays when we had opportunities. Things were falling into place that kept us in the situation where we were in striking zone. Then, it fell apart at the end of the first half.”

Still, the Jaguars Head Coach is unwavering in his conviction. “Stay true to the principles. Stay true throughout and let’s see what takes place. Once we see that, now we can fix some things.”

In the comparison between Blake Bortles and Tom Brady, the 16 years of experience in the same offense for Brady was evident. Maybe to compare the two is unfair. Perhaps comparing any quarterback to Brady is unfair. He was precise, decisive and accurate against the Jaguars.

Bradley is confident in Bortles and likes everything about him: his toughness, his willingness to learn and his physical ability. But he also knows Bortles is a second year player.

“I think sometimes what we have to guard against is keep the simple things simple. I think that refers to him (Bortles) mostly when I’m talking about the offense. He needs not to make it as complicated as he wants to make it. I think some of the reads he’s just got to trust his progression, simple things like let’s get the tight end involved, let’s get Marcedes more involved; OK, he went away from his reads and really honed in on getting Marcedes the ball. Those lessons I think he’s learning right now is to say, ‘although we make an emphasis let’s try to get the tight ends involved and take pressure off the offense you’ve still got to follow through with the progression,’ and I think that’s what he learned with this game.”

And Bradley also knows his team is still searching for an identity. In his mind, he knows what he wants it to be.

“I think we want that personality an as offense, defense and special teams to be aggressive. Aggressive doesn’t mean on defense zero pressure or on offense ten shots in a row. It just means be aggressive, show faith in our players and stand behind them. It was similar last week and in this week.”

In his 16th year in the league and in the same offensive system, 38-year old Tom Brady is better than ever. Have you noticed when Brady goes back to pass that when he throws the ball, you’re expectation as somebody watching is that a Patriots receiver will snap it up. There are few quarterbacks in history that you have that feeling about when the ball leaves his hand.

That’s why it was no surprise when Brady took the Patriots on their first possession down the field for a TD, making it look a little too easy to grab a 7-0 lead. The Jaguars started three-and-out with the opening drive and Brady mixed the pass and run against the Jaguars defense to take an early lead.

Watching the Jaguars they looked a step behind on both offense and defense but it was more about the veteran status of New England and their ability to react to situations rather than bad play by the Jaguars.

While the defense made a couple of good stops, the Patriots running game gashed out big chunks of yardage enroute to a 10-0 lead after a field goal.

What the Jaguars needed was a ball-control drive to slow down the Pats offense and they got that. 17-plays and a field goal by Jason Myers to pull within 10-3.

But again Brady went to work, marching the Patriots right down field, using Rob Gronkowski up the seam in the middle of the field to grab lots of yardage. Another FG gave NE a 13-3 lead.

Blake Bortles and the offense went to work, gaining some yardage behind T.J. Yeldon and a couple of nicely designed plays by Greg Olsen, looking sharp and moving into good field position before the half. But Bortles overthrow to Marcedes Lewis lead to an interception and the 2 minute drill by Brady and company .He finished it off with a TD pass to Eric Amendola to take a 20-3 halftime lead. It was the 400th TD pass of Brady’s career, 4th all-time.

Receiving the second half kickoff, the Pats when right back to work scoring again on a FG to take a 23-3 lead. And when the Jaguars couldn’t do much with the football, Brady and company scored on their sixth straight possession, all of them into the third quarter to take a 30-3 lead. Two long pass interference penalties accounted for most of the yardage. The Jaguars were playing with all backups at that point in the defensive backfield. James Sample and Peyton Thompson were getting a lot of playing time because of injuries, and then add Nick Marshall to that group and Tom Brady had a lot of places he could attack.

Finally the offense got untracked, scoring on a 59- yard seam pass from Bortles to Allen Hurns. Nice throw and catch for Hurns first TD of the year. Six plays, 80 yards and the Jaguars were down by 20, 30-10.

You don’t think of Brady as much of a scrambler but he does create time in the pocket while he’s looking for receivers. The Patriots scored on their 7th straight possession, another TD pass for Brady for a 37-10 lead.

Oftentimes, Gus Bradley talks about it being a “precision league” and that’s what it takes to win in the NFL. While the Patriots and Tom Brady looked very precise, the Jaguars were anything but. Bortles wasn’t sharp and that hurts when you know you have to respond to what the opposing offense is doing. They didn’t do that across the board. Some of it is personnel, some of it is veterans on the field but somewhere, the Jaguars have to find some of what the Patriots seem to bring every week.

Without much offensive production in the second half, the Jaguars tried some trickery with a fake punt but New England was waiting for it and took over inside the Jaguars 30. Three plays later the Pats scored to make it 44-10, almost exactly the opposite of what the Jaguars were trying to accomplish going on the road after the home win last week.

A late score made it 51-10, with the Jaguars responding in the final 2 minutes with a TD to Clay Harbor to make it 51-17. A complete blowout and perhaps a few more questions raised than answered for the Jaguars. While they have their share of injures, the Patriots scored on all NINE possessions against the defense, perhaps the most unexpected result of the day.

Coming out of New England without further injuries could be called a small victory. If the Jaguars get a bit healthier with Julius Thomas, Luke Joeckel, Jonathan Cyprien and most of the defensive backfield returning, it’s probably best to not dwell on this game and look forward to the next two weeks at Indianapolis and Tampa Bay.

The only thing we learned this week is that New England is very good.

Perhaps no coach will ever be as proficient at pumping up the upcoming opponent than former Georgia Head Coach Vince Dooley. “Western Kentucky has a very good long snapper,” Dooley once said, looking at the strengths of the Hilltoppers, the next team on the ‘Dogs schedule.

And while no coach will ever top that assessment, Patriots Head Coach Bill Belichick wasted no time pointing out how good the Jaguars are in his conference call today with the Jacksonville media.

Offensively, Belichick said the Jaguars can be as good as they want to be.

“They have a very good mix, balance offensively, like they did last week against Miami with the running game and the passing game, getting the ball down the field, moving the pocket, staying in the pocket, play action, drop back, deep balls, like I said, catch-and-run plays. So, there really is a lot we have to defend. They do a good job.”

At their best, the Jaguars offense is all that. What was impressive is how the Patriots head coach was already clued into even the smallest nuance the Jaguars might bring to the table.

He immediately noted that Jared Odrick, somebody he’d seen in the division with the Dolphins in the past, is now playing on the outside as well as the interior of the defensive line.

“He’s a great player, and we had a lot of problems with him in Miami. I was glad to see him leave the division,” Belichick recalled. “We only have him once a year now instead of twice this year. He’s very disruptive, and he’s given us a lot of problems through the years.”

While his ability to analyze the opponent is legendary, Belichick’s recognition of where the Jaguars strengths are was apparent. He’s clearly impressed with Telvin Smith.

“This guy can run sideline to sideline, makes plays all over the field. Nobody is going to really outrun him. He, along with [Paul] Posluszny in their nickel defense gives them a lot of speed. They play a lot of zone defense, obviously, but they can break on the ball and close down that space in a hurry, along with [Aaron] Colvin when he’s in there as one of the inside players, so those guys all play good.” Notice that Colvin left the game against the Dolphins and Belichick said, “When he’s in there.”

But when asked to assess the Jaguars improvement through the years, he summed it up like this:

“I’d say first of all just overall this team has really improved over the course of last year and then from ’14 to ’15, you can see it in preseason. Against Detroit, the first half of that game was a lot of the frontline players on both teams into the third quarter … I thought that they moved the ball very effectively. (Blake) Bortles creates a lot of problems for you. I thought last week against Miami was another good example of the overall effectiveness of the offense, decision-making, no sacks, no turnovers. He’s able to make plays with his feet. He’s able to make plays in critical situations – third down, two minute – and then he’s able to make plays when he has a chance to get the ball down the field, which we saw a couple of those last week with [Allen] Robinson.”

Pretty honest and pretty spot on.

And don’t think anything this week will sneak up on the Patriots. Although the two teams haven’t played since 2012, Belichick knows the young players on the Jaguars roster having looked at them as draft prospects in the last couple of years. ”

Those players, we did a lot of work on in the last couple years coming out and it’s a very talented group. I think Lee has the ability, as does Robinson and [Allen] Hurns for that matter, have the ability to affect all three areas of the field. They can go deep, they’re good intermediate players and they’re dangerous on catch-and-run plays. They’re hard to tackle, and Lee is particularly elusive. He’s had some very explosive plays in college, and he’s hard guy to tackle and get on the ground. [Bryan] Walters has played well for them.”

So it was funny to hear another coach talk about how good the Jaguars can be, simply because we’ve seen them at their best, and at their worst in the course of just two weeks.

Maybe Gus Bradley should have his team read what Belichick thinks of them. Maybe it would build their confidence. Maybe Gus’ “Race to Maturity” would get a boost. Maybe they’d believe it.

After yesterday’s loss to the Panthers, Gus Bradley said several times that they would “tell the truth” on Monday as they assessed what happened and maybe more importantly, what went wrong.

If there’s any positive to take from the opening day loss it’s that the Jaguars mistakes were apparent. If they hadn’t dropped key passes, given up points on offense and missed kicks, a win was possible.

“The truth is also this,” Bradley said today. “I thought that as an offense we played very cautiously. We didn’t want to make mistakes. I thought that some of the things we saw in practice carried over to the preseason. Our hope and our thought is that it would carry over to the regular season and it didn’t, it didn’t carry over to the game.”

That is what’s most frustrating since the team seemed to build some momentum in the preseason on offense, changing the attitude that seemed to prevail from last year. But whatever momentum they built, or optimism they created in the off-season was lost in one game.

“We definitely went out there anxious, being the first game,” wide receiver Allen Robinson said in front of his locker on Monday. Everybody wants to play well, I know I can pick it up as far as aggressiveness goes.”

All through the offseason and in training camp, Bradley stressed his team’s ability to bounce back from bad fortune during a game. Against Carolina, that didn’t happen.

“Sometimes misfortune happens,” Bradley explained. “But how you adjust and you handle it is even more important. I don’t feel like we handled it very well.”

Even after looking at the game on video today, disappointment was the overriding emotion for the Jaguars. They felt like it was there and they didn’t take it.

Denard Robinson is looking to play with more freedom this Sunday against Miami. “We have to go out there and play loose. Let it go and just make the plays you know you can. They are called routine plays for a reason. We just have to go out there and do it.”

Bradley agrees with that. “We said winning is extremely, extremely important. It’s extremely important but the guys in that locker room are disappointed we weren’t our best and they felt like if we were we would have won that game and that’s what’s disappointing.”

So it’s back to work on Wednesday with the focus on Miami and perhaps a bit of a realistic take on who the Jaguars are from the coaching staff and the players. The promise they showed in the preseason was just promise at this point. Perhaps they had a false sense of how far they had come.

“There are some unknowns going into the regular season, you try to find out things. Now, we know,” Gus said today. “We went through a game and we understand where we are and what we need to do. Now, it’s just a matter of addressing it.”

And going 0-1 might be just one loss in the column but it feels worse because of the upcoming schedule. They’ll be underdogs against Miami at home on Sunday at 4 PM as well as the next two weeks on the road at New England and Indianapolis so if they’re not 0-4 a quarter of the way through the schedule, it’ll be an upset at this point.

Perhaps Roy Miller put the best veterans perspective on it: “Out of the 32 teams, there are 16 that are in our same situation. You can be sad about it, but you know you have 15 games. That’s what we have to look forward to and keep in our minds.”

It won’t take long to see where the battles for roster spots are taking place when the Jaguars take on Washington Thursday night. With 75 players on the roster and cuts to just 53 due by Saturday at 4pm, coaches want to take one last, long look at several positions to determine who will be there to open the season against Carolina on September 13th and who will be going elsewhere.

Not all of the roster moves will involve cutting a player. Some will be stashed on injured reserve, meaning they’re unavailable for the rest of the year but remain part of the team. Others will be placed on the practice squad, meaning staying with the team, practicing and going to meetings every day but at a reduced salary. Those players are hoping for a call up to the active roster and not just to the Jaguars. If any practice squad player is called up, he must go onto that teams active, 53-man roster. That means a chance to play and a real game check. (NFL players are paid 17 times during the season, 1/17th of their negotiated salary)

Other players will be outright released and given a chance to catch on elsewhere. Every team must be down to 53 by Saturday’s deadline, so the Jaguars will be looking at the players cut by other teams to see if they can upgrade their roster. Making it to Saturday doesn’t mean you’re on the team. By practice Monday, the roster for game one should be set.

Against Washington, there are several perceived head-to-head battles that could result in one player making the team and the other looking for work.

At wide receiver, Tony Washington and Bryan Walters seem to be vying for the final spot at that position. Walters can also return punts and as Gus Bradley has said many times in camp, “You know you can trust him.” Washington was on the Jaguars practice squad last year and has been called, “Maybe the best route runner in the group,” by wide receivers coach Jerry Sullivan. This will be a close call.

Two familiar names appear to be competing for the same spot on the offensive line. Austin Pasztor and Sam Young have seen playing time with the Jaguars over the past two years with Pasztor capable of playing guard and tackle. Young was originally a draft pick while Pasztor has fought his way into the league as a free agent. Both are capable backups in the league that are getting better. Both will have jobs in the NFL somewhere, if not here, this season.

It’s a little different at running back where second year player Storm Johnson and rookie Corey Grant are locked in a battle for the final job at that position. Johnson was a 7th round pick of the Jaguars last year while Grant was picked up as an undrafted free agent this season. Prior to camp, General Manager Dave Caldwell said the team could keep five running backs on the roster because they won’t carry a fullback. T.J. Yeldon, Denard Robinson, Toby Gerhart and Bernard Pierce seem to have the top four spots, leaving one for two players. Johnson has had some injury issues in his year with the team. Grant on the other hand, has blazing speed and can return kicks equally as well as Johnson at this point in his career. If the Jaguars didn’t have a draft pick invested in Johnson, Grant would most likely have this spot wrapped up but for now, it’ll be another close call.

Don’t expect to see the starters much, if at all. Bradley has said he’ll know if he made the right decision or not to keep them out of this game “if they’re sharp against Carolina.” Washington has a set of it’s own problems, starting at quarterback where they have $16 million wrapped up in Robert Griffin III for this year but have named Kirk Cousins the starter. Last year the Jaguars gave away their game at FedEx Field, Chad Henne suffering 10 sacks in the second game of the year, a 41-10 loss that dropped thw Jaguars to 0-2.

The game can be seen on Channel 4 at 7:30 with a live pregame show beginning at 7pm.