Denny Thompson had seen that face from Mac Jones before. Following Jones’ tipped-ball interception against Texas A&M last week, the camera panned in on the Alabama quarterback, revealing his frustration.

“They went to him, and you could see that pissed off look on his face,” said Thompson, the owner of 6 Points, a quarterback training facility in Jones’ hometown of Jacksonville, Fla. “But then the camera stayed on him, and then he was fine. It was almost like you could see him gather himself. He’s realized ‘I’ve got a bunch of people expecting something out of me.' He knows he has to stay in the moment and perform for them.”

That mental progression is emblematic of Jones’ emergence as the leader of Alabama’s offense. In the past, the redshirt junior would have stewed over such a mistake, allowing it to fester in his mind while prompting further errors on the field.

Thompson remembers a training session with Jones this offseason where the right-hander worked out alongside other top passers, including Pittsburgh Steelers backup quarterback Joshua Dobbs. During one particular drill, Jones went through a short series of misses, causing him to boil up.

“After about the third one, I hear him over there like kind of yelling at himself a little bit,” Thompson recalled. “It wasn’t that dramatic, but you could tell he was disgusted and upset with himself.

“I remember Josh Dobbs looking over to him and being like, ‘Dude, it’s OK. Just throw the next one.’ Sure enough, that next one came out perfect and he was good to go.”

Jones didn’t need Dobbs’ or anyone else’s reassurance following last week’s interception. After quickly recollecting himself on the sideline, he went on to complete nine of his next 11 throws en route to passing for a career-best 435 yards and four touchdowns.

“There’s nothing to it, you can’t go in there being emotional,” Jones said following the game. “Just do your job. That’s what I tell everybody, just do your job every play.”

When asked about Jones earlier this week, Nick Saban attributed his quarterback’s increased mental fortitude to confidence gained over experience. The Texas A&M game was Jones’ sixth career start after the right-hander filled in for an injured Tua Tagovailoa late last season.

Once the forgotten member of an Alabama quarterback room that included two eventual Heisman finalists in Tagovailoa and Jalen Hurts, Jones oftentimes found himself stressing over ways to stand out to his coaches earlier in his career.

“It’s a lot more difficult when you know you don’t have very many rep opportunities,” explained Joe Dickinson, Jones’ longtime quarterback coach and a former Oklahoma offensive coordinator. “When he comes out there and Tua is getting all the reps, he knows his reps are limited, so he’s pressing. I think that was probably more of it than anything. I think he feels more at home now. He knows he’s the guy right now. When you feel like you’re the guy, it’s easier to not labor over every little mistake.”

Through two games this season, Jones leads the nation with a 222.07 passer rating, more than 20 points higher than Joe Burrow’s NCAA-record of 201.96 set last season. The Alabama quarterback ranks third in the nation with a 74.5 completion percentage and has already piled up 684 yards and six touchdowns through the air — a pace that would put him at 3,420 yards and 30 touchdowns by the time the Tide wraps up its 10-game conference schedule.

However, don’t expect recent success to alter his critical nature.

“Mac’s a perfectionist,” Thompson said. “If you look up perfectionist in the dictionary, there’s Mac. That isn’t going to change.”

Perfectionist is a word commonly used by those who have worked with Jones. Following every game, the quarterback obsesses over his film, breaking down the most minute details of his performance.

“He overstudies the game in a good way,” said Ryan Walker, a longtime mentor of Jones who now serves as the tight ends coach at Grambling State. “He understands how to watch film. When he’s fine-tuning his game, he’s very serious and very calm. He just understands the big picture. He knows what he did wrong and he knows how to fix it.”

Walker broke down film with Jones shortly after last season, focusing on the Auburn game where the Alabama quarterback’s two pick-six interceptions proved costly in the Tide’s 48-45 defeat to the Tigers.

“Going back and looking at the pick-six when he was throwing to Najee (Harris) against Auburn, that’s a six-inch miss,” Walker said. “If he puts it six inches in front of Najee, that’s a touchdown. He just looks at the little things and breaks down how his positioning was, his wrist angle. It’s not so much that he harped on it but he’s a perfectionist. He just doesn’t want to make the same mistakes twice.”

Despite posting a passer rating of over 150 in each of his six starts, Jones is just now beginning to receive recognition on a national stage. Before last week’s game against Texas A&M, Alabama released a hype video of the quarterback, including an audio clip of ESPN personality Stephen A. Smith questioning his ability to run the Tide’s offense.

This offseason, Jones took those remarks to heart, something he alluded to last week when asked about them following the game against Texas A&M.

“All that stuff just fans the fire,” Dickinson said. “That’s human nature, right? When people doubt you, that just gives you a hotter flame to prove them wrong.”

What seemed to really bother Jones was the assumption Alabama would experience a dip in performance with him behind center. This offseason, he set out to make sure that wouldn’t be the case.

Over the summer, Jones bulked up nine pounds up to his current weight of 6-foot-3, 214 pounds, giving him the lower-body strength to improve his pocket mobility and add power to his throws. Those efforts are already paying dividends as he is currently 7 of 11 (63.6 percent) for 366 yards and four touchdowns on passes that have traveled 20 or more yards in the air this season.

Jones also focused on building chemistry with his current receivers, even going as far as attempting to schedule a meet-up in Jacksonville this offseason before the pandemic complicated his plans.

“A lot of after hours,” receiver DeVonta Smith said of his time with Jones during fall camp. “Not just me, but me, Mac, and the rest of us recording a lot of after hours, getting the connections down, getting the timing down. He understands the importance of being the starting quarterback and the things he has to do.”

That chemistry extends off the field where Jones has earned the nickname “Joker” both for his high-pitched cackle of a laugh and his tendency to crack jokes in the locker room. Before games, the quarterback can be seen doing dance steps in between throws during warmups. He even broke into a little shimmy following a touchdown pass to John Metchie III last week.

“Mac’s a very fun guy to be around,” said cornerback Patrick Surtain II. “He jokes around now and then, but he’s also very dedicated in his work ethic. That shows on the practice field in his habits. He’s been building tremendously as a player and as a leader.”

Added Walker, “It doesn’t matter who’s around him, he’s still going to be the same Mac Jones. Other guys just feed off of him. I think the Joker nickname is perfect because a lot of times he’s the life of the party, and he’s always smiling.”

That’s a look Alabama is expecting to see more of from Jones this season.