Thomas moved inside in a 3-4 from outside. Position changes often change a player's production in negative ways. Scott, BTW, made the Pro Bowl one year, in 2006, while Thomas was having his big season next to him. Thomas BTW had 5 sacks and 8 passes defensed last year in 9 games. That pretty close to equals what Scott did in 32 games not next to him in 2007 and 2008. The Jets make such stupid moves with value. It's part of our culture at this point. If there's a David Barrett or Kenyon Coleman or Bart Scott out there to overpay to underproduce we'll do it. We spend ridiculous sums of money to bring in a 32 year old guard the season after we let two 26 and 27 year old guards go by us in free agency because they were asking too much. We sign average free agent safeties to long-term contracts and then wind up replacing them within a couple of years. We trade up in the draft incessantly, creating shortages down the road that can only be filled by signing other team's leavings and then we complain when the Jets are just another team again. This is the age of sports information. There's no excuse for doing things that bad and mediocre teams over the years have done to maintain that status. If the Jets aren't improving on a year over year basis and always seem stuck on a treadmill it's only because the management on the team is unable to do anything else.
I'm convinced that no matter who we signed you take the negative angle. Rex Ryan was the coach that designed his defense. I tend to think that Rex Ryan has more knowledge about his abilities and how he fit in with the Ravens defense then you do.
Thomas like every player on NE plays inside, outside and is used as a pass rusher and pass defender in one of the most complex schemes in football. He is also playing behind one of the great NT and DE in the league. His production dropped and NE D wasn't as good as Baltimore's ranking 10th vs Baltimore's 2nd that's after Thomas left and Scott's role changed. Your argument is simply based on one set of stats but in a team game where the team D improved and the role changed, I don't think your argument has merit. It's simply a negative spin on a move the Jets felt they needed to make to improve the over all D.
It's hard not to put a negative spin on moves the Jets "feel" they have to make to improve, because so many of those "feelings" have been wrong recently.
The fact that Rex still wants the guy is the ONLY reason to really get excited about him. The price tag that comes with him is ridiculous compared to the stats that he put up. And I know that Stats don't say everything, I understand that. But how many of you have watched half or more of the ravens games in any of the past years that he has played? No one here has seen nearly enough of his play to give an accurate judgement on his ability.
Using statistics to evaluate defensive players in football is an absolute joke. This isn't baseball. Very little is actually measurable.
We clearly had need, we are going to put Jenkins in a one gap scheme which I suspect is likely to crush the middle of many of the teams we play next year and having two solid ILB like Scott and Harris both of whom have all pro potential makes us a far better D than we were last year. That's if Jenkins and Harris stay healthy. Pace and Jenkins were both great pick ups last year they along with Fanecca made a tremendous improvement in our team. Not every thing we did worked but those three FA's did work.
Rex Ryan knows more about football than any of us. He loves Bart Scott. That is good enough for me...
I think the Jets have been intelligently aggressive over the last two off-seasons. In terms of acquisitions, I really don't have a problem with anything they've done.
Eric Barton was just fine in the middle last year. We filled a hole we didn't need to fill while others were left open. And the "Scott is hard-hitting" argument is irrelevant because Barton was the hardest hitter on the Jets the last few seasons.
Because stats certainly say everything about the quality of a football player. Name the linebacker that could cover a TE or RB in last year's defense, because if you were watching the games, you would notice it was often the Jets' achilles heel. You can't have Anthony Fasano put up 100 yards on you in divisional matchups. This guy is a good cover linebacker. Fills a serious need for the Jets. I'm sure Ryan knows what he's doing.
Rich Kotite knows more about football than any of us also. This is a relative argument you are making. A terrible Pro Football coach likely knows more about football than any poster on this board.
We were outright killed on third down last year because we couldn't cover a RB or a TE in third and short. NE has Faulk and Watson, this move was clearly needed. Scott is far better than Barton covering the RB and he is younger, faster and stronger against the run at this point and Barton was no bargain. This was a solid and necessary move.
Okay, that's understandable, but can you quantify him any other way? Like with your own eyes? The only thing that you can possibly quantify or measure about Scott's play as of right now is that apparently the Jets feel that he is worth $48million over the next 6 years. I would love to just say "Hey Rex likes this guy. So you know what? I love him too." But something is keeping me from doing that for now.
Bart Scott is not that good a pass defender. He's average and nothing more in that role. Barton would have had to be really bad in that role for the addition of Scott to have any real impact.
I need to agree. If Mangini was making this move I'd question it. But if anyone knows this player and his capabilities, it's Ryan. Not trusting this move is not trusting our new coach. As for over paying... OF COURSE we over payed. Baltimore was willing to match (which again should prove his value) and while we were lucky in the fact that Scott WANTS to play for us, if we didn't make the offer, someone else would have. We overpay FAs and we overpay Draftees. It's just the way this system works. The guys that are blue chip hard workers have to stick with what they get paid until they get to Free Agency and then they have to hope they are a commodity enough to get overpaid. In the end it balances out much better than most draftees.
I have to admit there is a voice in the back of my head saying, I hope this isn't Edgerton Hartwell part 2. But in fairness to Scott he has had a more impressive career to this point than Hartwell did before leaving the Ravens. I think Scott will fit in well here, I just don't expect him to be this superstar type player.
2005 16/10 119 4.0 0 1 0-2 2006 16/16 135 9.5 2 9 0-0 2007 16/16 131 1.0 0 5 0-0 2008 16/16 104 1.5 0 5 2-0 Career 109/58 489 16.0 3 22 2-4 These are his stats from the Jet web site 4 straight years with 100 tackles this is a great move.
