Also, as much as I like Williams, he isn't even a top 5 pass rusher in the league and he is going to want to be given a contract that rivals the biggest contract ever handed out to a defensive player in NFL history. He would clearly improve our defense but I'm not sure blowing our salary cap load on him would be prudent given our numerous weaknesses and deficiencies.
I hear you, but I don't know man. We'll see when Tuesday rolls around. Rex may say he will be more humble, but its hard to change who you are. Same goes for Tanny. I think this team needs to make a big splash to get the confidence back up. Get people talkin' about the greatness of the New York Jets roster rather than the weaknesses. I'm actually surprised Braylon isn't on the roster. He should gotten a physical and been signed by now IMO. It jusst seems weird that we haven't shown as much interest in him as we should have.
There is a part of me that agrees with you and I'm certainly cognizant of the reality that I could just be plain wrong. Tanny is inherently aggressive and Rex is inherently brash and usually overbearingly so. And I agree with your general point, it's extremely difficult to change who you are. You are who you are and the Jets are a bold, aggressive, self-assertive organization. So it could definitely be argued that they need to just continue to embrace that even more when times are tough and that a splashy move in free agency will afford them the opportunity to get back to being what they are comfortable being: confident and un-apologetic about being confident. But I just get this sense from them that they have made this collective decision to suppress all of that for the time being. Obviously, I could be totally wrong and there is a lot of speculation in what I am suggesting.
^and I agree with you about Braylon. The two things I suspect are that there are potential concerns over his knee injury and that he may have burned some bridges with us when we wouldn't offer him the big contract we gave Santonio.
I would love for the jets to pull an eagles on Williams this year. Seems like everyone knows what moves we are going to make before we make them. It would be great to sneak in and steal him. Of course I don't want them to overpay for the guy. He's more of a 10-15 sack player than a 15-20. With Williams in there I think our D would have a great chance of being tops in the league again. I also think it would open things for Maybin in those obvious passing downs. Could be a very nice one two combo in those situations. Also keep in mind that there really aren't any good right tackles out there in free agency so unless a someone gets waived last minute it looks like we will not have to spend free aGent money on that need.
You never want to overpay for anyone but sack monster is one of the positions you don't mind doing it so much for. Williams is a 3 down guy and is very good against the run too - if you get 10-15 sacks of a guy like that it's nice. It seems we can't afford him though because we have too much tied up in a position you shouldn't be overpaying for.
Has Williams come out and say he wants a lot? With his injury, I don't thonk he will demand more than 10 mil a year. Its not like his sack numbers are off the charts either. He isn't going to want Revis money. He just isn't THAT good, but he is a very good player. He's just not elite. Tanny can get it done if he wants him that much.
When he plays a full season he averages 10+ sacks a season which would put him in the top 10 year and rank in terms of sacks '07-3rd '08-7th '09-16th '10-24th (13 games) '11-only played 5 games, but had 5 sacks
Are you really looking at statistics to quantify Mario Williams' impact on the game? You ever hear the saying numbers don't lie? The saying is a fallacy. Numbers do lie, and it happens all of the time in football.
I thought if they can squeeze WIlliams in this year we may be able to afford him in future years. Pace(11mill) and Scott(8mill) are on the books next year for 20 million. Neither of them will stick around for that salary and very little of that is guaranteed so cutting them loose would let us save 15 million against the cap. But taking a closer look it looks like we are in worse shape for next year. The main guys take up about 76 million against the cap this year while next year it's closer to 85 even after the savings for pace and Scott. will be interesting to see how they handle not only this free agency period but next year as well.
i would hope someone snatches Aaron Maybin away from the Jets this year instead. Jets can then draft 2 OLBs with 1st round picks. But then, if you can draft an OLB, why would you sign Maybin in the first place?
While this may be true, there is a projected bump in the cap next year by at least 8 mill or so if the numbers come in as expected. This will help relive the bulk of what our top players are getting. This was an odd year with the ap only going up about 225k.
I think this whole idea of depth versus superstar is frankly absurd. If you get a Nicks or especially a Williams (who is simultaneously fulfilling a position of dire need in his hiring) then all you need is one extra veteran minimum signing in FA. Then you trade back your first round pick assuming there isn't another blockbuster acquisition there at 16 and you get 3 picks in the first two rounds instead of two. You use each of those picks to try to acquire a day one starter and you're set voilah. Try to get one more starter out of rounds 3/4 and add quality backups with the other SIX remaining picks. You'd be adding 5 immediate starters in five areas of need by doing this. Presumably getting 3-4 immediate quality backups as well. Acquiring a guy like Williams gives you the freedom to not go chasing superstars in the draft. You play it conservative and just get solid guys that you know will fill a needed role on your team. If you can afford them, you get your cake and eat it too.
If Ben Grubbs can be had with reasonable deal, that's where the whole FA should start. Once that happens, then Slauson will be kicked out to RT - I believe Slauson will provide much better protection than Wayne Hunter anyway. Braylon Edwards' knee situation needs some observation - if he can come in healthy, he should be signed too (or so I hope) since that would radically cut down the ice breaking period between QB and WR. (i.e. once they get acclimated to Sparano's system, they should be both good to go.) Then the front office can concentrate entirely on defense throughout the top part of the draft. (I have a gut feeling that, if Jets do go with Grubbs/Edwards route, they will come a shade below 10M, allowing the Jets to spend 5M on the rookies)
If slauson is really going to handle the shift to RT and man then yeah that's a nice ace in the hole. It also makes a guy like DeCastro a much more potentially valuable commodity for us. You could also just trade back super happily knowing that you can add any LG or RT in the 1st round that you know is going to start from day one and have an immediately complete OL. Ducasse could hopefully even develop into a killer backup in that scenario. I'm saying I don't see how that argument really hurts the case for Mario (or Nicks) I guess.
