JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Mondays were the hardest.

Especially in November and early December. The days after he threw interceptions that were returned for touchdowns for the ninth, 10th and 11th times in his career.

That's when Blake Bortles had to muster up the courage to walk into the Jacksonville Jaguars facility, sit in the meeting room and watch those plays over and over again, and -- toughest of all -- face teammates he knew he had let down ... again.

"It was hard to walk through the locker room and look guys in the eye," Bortles said. "I struggled with that, because I had felt as though I wasn't playing very well and had felt as though I was letting guys down in the locker room.

"I always think that I can win the game, but I thought if I just did a couple more things I could have won, and guys would have been happy. So I felt that I was to blame for a lot of that."

Those were some of the lowest moments for Bortles in a confusing, frustrating and immensely disappointing season that has finally -- mercifully -- ended. The 2016 season was a test of Bortles' resiliency, his mental toughness, and his conviction that he can be, and will be, the quarterback that leads the Jaguars out of a decade of irrelevance and into the playoffs.

There were other low moments, too, and like the anxiety he felt before facing his teammates in the locker room after another poor performance, Bortles kept them to himself. Nobody would care, he said, because he was to blame for the Jaguars' mounting losses.

He was throwing behind receivers, missing wide-open targets and throwing interceptions, including some that bounced off his receivers' hands and, in one case, a receiver's foot. He was the one failing to move the offense in the second half of games, when more than a third of their possessions (36.1 percent) were three-and-outs.

"There's a mental clock in my head, too, that's going, 'They're not going to let you win three games a year forever,'" Blake Bortles said. Zach Bolinger/Icon Sportswire

The offense's problems weren't always his fault. Receivers ran wrong routes, blitzes weren't picked up, protection calls were missed. But Bortles shouldered the blame. Quarterbacks always get too much credit when things go right and too much blame when things go wrong, but Bortles put it all on himself. He believed that if he hadn't made the mistakes he did, then the Jaguars would have won regardless of the mistakes anyone else made.

And it wore on him more and more as the season went along.

"Nobody," offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett said, "has any clue what this guy has persevered through."

Bortles never let on just how much everything bothered him. Not his teammates or coaches, and certainly not the media. He answered every question about mistakes and interceptions and his mechanics and 11 career pick-sixes as politely and as honestly as he could. He never deflected blame and never offered excuses.

He even poked fun at himself. When asked about throwing pick-sixes in three consecutive games against the Houston Texans, he joked: "I've got to be a better tackler." And when he was asked about the rematch with Baltimore in September, he joked about being in the game until the end "and when in doubt, throw your head out there and try to get a facemask."

But when he was alone ...

"There was times where I can remember sitting in my house just thinking, 'Man, is this ever going to end?'" Bortles said. "Or, 'This can't go on forever.' And it was like with every single interception it just continued to grow. Balls are bouncing off guys' feet and hands and helmets, and it's like there's no way this can continue to happen. This is unbelievable."

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And, at times, it was. Such as when Bortles tried to throw the ball into the dirt at T.J. Yeldon's feet because a screen pass was covered. The ball bounced off Yeldon's foot, and Houston linebacker Whitney Mercilus grabbed it. It was later ruled a fumble and not an interception, but it was still a ridiculous, rarely seen play.

Bortles finished his third season completing 58.9 percent of his passes for 3,905 yards and 23 touchdowns with 16 interceptions. He threw 15 interceptions, three of which were returned for touchdowns, in the first 12 games but threw only one in the last four. He also suffered a Grade 1 sprained right AC joint, aggravated that injury five weeks later and also dealt with painful tendinitis in his right wrist.

This followed a season in which he set single-season franchise records for passing yards (4,428) and passing touchdowns (35). Bortles entered 2016 on the rise, but now he enters the final year of his rookie contract (unless the Jaguars pick up his fifth-year option by early May) having to prove he's a legitimate starter and the long-term answer at quarterback-- to himself, the fans, and a new head coach.

"Everybody [was] saying, 'Go do what you did the previous year, and you can go sign this big deal,' and all that, and that sounded good, but I wanted to come here and win and do well, and this year happens," Bortles said. "I don't think about money. I don't think about big picture. I think about winning the football game in the week that we're in. That's all I care about. I could care less about the money they give us or making $100 million dollars or any of that.

"I really enjoy being around these guys, and I enjoy winning football games. I think that's kind of where I'm at now. Let's find a way. You've had two offseasons, so let's make this third one the best one, and let's make sure that these previous three years don't happen [again]."

Bortles has already planned to spent about 10 weeks in California at 3DQB fixing the mechanics that slipped badly this season. But he knows he might be running out of time -- and it might already be up. GM Dave Caldwell said the team's new head coach does not have to be committed to Bortles.

Bortles said he understands that, but that he believes he can overcome what happened in 2016 and prove he is the team's franchise quarterback.

"I think I've always had optimism or whatever you want to call it, and each time I go play I expect that I'll go out there and we'll be successful and do a lot of good stuff," Bortles said. "I take it as, it's a privilege to get to go play every Sunday in the NFL, and I've had an opportunity to do that for three seasons now, and it hasn't been anywhere near what I wanted it to be or what we wanted it to be, but I've enjoyed every minute of it. I think it's the drive and the passion to want the Jacksonville Jaguars to be the New England Patriots, to be consistently winning the AFC South, on why I continue to do what I do and try as hard as I know I can.

"There's a mental clock in my head, too, that's going, 'They're not going to let you win three games a year forever. They're not going to let you win five games a year forever. You've got to win, and you've got to win now. It's time to go.'"