Yeah, I think so. Besides the fact that usually teams don't let their very best players hit free agency, older players are more likely to decline and are more likely to get hurt. The Jets were unexpectedly good in 2009, and the repeat performance in 2010 - it just felt inevitable that the Super Bowl was about to happen. We went all in, and later in 2011 the wheels fell off and things got ugly. Then in 2012 we dug in deeper and it was time to move on from Tannenbaum and seek out a new strategy, and a new approach to how we build teams. We don't know how it's going to work yet, but the big splash free agency strategy just doesn't work for the Jets. If we're disciplined, we can come out of free agency with some lower-risk deals that should improve the team, and then continue to build the core of the team through the draft, and hope to find more diamonds in the rough like Snacks Harrison along the way.
That's what the Raiders do. Building a team fast is not the way for long-term success. You end up overloading your team with older guys, like the Raiders. The teams that focus on the draft more tend to be better- we can still be "win now" in our mentality during the season, but the team-building phase should aim for the best team long-term, and not just go all-in every year. When you go all-in, the salary cap makes you unable to move on from lousy guys and you have to keep paying them for a couple of years longer because you converted salary into a signing bonus so you could sign some other free agent that year.
I wouldn't. Yeah, it should be great in the upcoming season, but what about next year or the year after when Manning retires and they have all those older players under contract with guaranteed money still on the books and they wind up in cap hell?
That's immaturity pure and simple. I've endured as much of the Jets' embarrassing history as many if not most Jets fans. I've been a fan since 1964. You can't count the past when the Jets had a totally clueless owner, and equally clueless GMs and HCs. Things should be done the correct way. We just tried it the way you're advocating and are bearing the fruits of it now. Did you sleep through Tanny's entire reign of error? Even if the Jets could win a SB that way, they'd be back to being mediocre again within a season or two. I'd rather have sustained success over a 10 year period where they're always in the hunt and a perennial playoff team than have one great season and then a bunch of sucky ones. They've never had a sustained period of success in their entire history, unless you're counting the years with Parcells, Groh and Mangini, and that's hardly a shining example of success.
I wouldn't group TB and PHI together. From 2000-present, PHI made the playoffs 10 out of the 14 years winning playoffs games 7 out of those 14 years. The Bucs made the playoffs 5 times in that 14 year span winning playoff games in 1 out of the 14 years and on a 6 year no playoffs appearance streak. Spot on with the middle part. They don't want to go on the roller coaster, they want to find some sense of consistency within the roster. The down years would be due to injury, bad luck, etc instead of no cap room, limited draft picks, and self inflicted mistakes.
It's a risk you take. Denver is going all in with their team in the current state. If you win the SB, your plan succeeded. If you don't win a SB, your plan failed and you suffer the consequences with a failed goal. It's a huge risk to take because you're creating a small window and hoping you get the goal. If you don't get it, there is a high chance the FO/CS will be overturned when the restock/rebuild phase occurs. I think it wouldn't matter if you won the SB for the plan going forward. The plan doesn't change. The FO would still want to succeed, they wouldn't be happy with a huge drop because as you said the SB is the ultimate goal and now you are far away from that goal. The SB buys you job security though allowing you to go through the rebuild. Granted if you are really prepared, there is no rebuild. The roster has young players ready to go and the team takes a slight dip then becomes a consistent team in the WC hunt or better.
You took the thoughts right out of my head, the draft is about keeping you from completely sinking to the bottom of the league, and it keeps the team young.
You can't compare the Jets to the Broncos or the Pats in terms of FA strategy. The Broncos and Pats have elite QB's towards the end of their career. They have defined windows and they know that once those QB's are gone in the next three years their team can fall apart. The Jets don't have an elite QB and don't have a defined window so they're trying to create sustained success despite their bottom level QB.
We were good in 2008 until Farve began handing out interceptions like party favors. With that in mind, why do you feel it was unexpected? The Super Bowl is rarely ever inevitable in the age of free agency. We went all in in 2008. 2011 was the beginning of the all out which Tanny completed in 2012. It almost worked in 2008.
The money is just going to be more carefully spent with this regime. The new CBA allows teams to get talent on the cheap through the draft. I believe you will see a bunch of B type signing (Decker) than A type premium priced signings as he knows that this is a team game and throwing a ton of money at one player (who will pass his prime by the end of the contract) is just not a good idea. I believe if Tanny were at the helm we probably would have signed Byrd or another high priced piece. Don't get me wrong I would love to have Byrd in that secondary but not at 10 million a year. Also, compensatory draft picks are thrown into the equation. Idzik does not want us to lose those comp picks as they can turn into a star (for cheap). The Broncos will not get anything for losing Decker because of all of the signings. There needs to be a bottleneck of talent aged 24-28 that are in their prime and we are stepping closer to that which makes me feel good.
Don't want to toot my own horn too much but I called re-signing Cumberland, signing Decker, and attempting to sign Howard (before the Raiders overpaid), and bringing back Pace. With Vick we will see what happens, but I think he is still a legitimate option for the Jets. We are likely still looking to sign a guard on the cheap, and another WR like James Jones since Sanders and Maclin are gone. We could grab DRC but I still think the Jets will end up bringing Cro back in like I predicted. I think it's possible we could sign a guy like Kenny Britt to a very low cost one year type deal; We have Decker who will be WR 1 for us but if Britt doesn't step up we have the group of Kerley, Nelson, Hill, and the 1 or 2 drafted WR's. I'd rather have James Jones than Britt but it all depends on what James Jones is willing to take for a contract.
Also don't be surprised at all if Holmes signs with the Pats on a one or two year deal. I see that coming a mile away.
We were good in 2008, but after Favre got (unofficially) hurt (and continued to play), he was lousy, and the promising 8-3 season turned into a massively disappointing 9-7 season, leading to Mangini being fired. Favre re-retired (and then the Vikings later convinced him to un-un-retire) and we got Rex and traded up for Sanchez, aka "the Sanchize." When he ate a hot dog in the game against the Raiders I thought that was hilariously great. I say the 2009 Jets were unexpectedly good, meaning... better than expected. You subtract a future HoF QB, add in a rookie QB, and a first-time head coach, and the team was pretty different. The initial plan with Sanchez seemed to be, let him take his lumps and go for it, learn as much as he can, and then we can make the playoffs in 2010. As the season wore on, they realized "oh, wait, we could do it right now!" and they pulled back on Mark a bit more, leaning on the run game more. The core of the team was strong, and with Rex's defense bringing a huge upgrade using mostly the same guys Mangini had in 2008, you could do well even with a rookie QB. That's the part that I think was unexpected- that the team could possibly be AFC Championship Game good. The 2009 really team could have made it to the Super Bowl. I know Rex was talking Super Bowls, but that was roundly dismissed by most people, yet it almost came true. The Jets weren't one of those 5 - 6 teams, at the beginning of the season, that people would have ranked as contenders, that's what I mean. They were viewed as a pretty good team, but they were actually very good, almost great. The Super Bowl is never inevitable, period- no matter how good your team is, you have to rattle off a bunch of consecutive wins against good to great teams, and there's just too much that can go wrong. But after two consecutive AFC Championship Games, it felt like it was going to happen. (Feeling and being are very different.) It felt inevitable, at least to Tanny & Co, and that's what mattered, that's what influenced their decisions in my opinion. The powers that be felt like, "okay, we've got a great team here, our QB is improving and we still almost made the Super Bowl twice, if we can get a few extra pieces that'll push us over the top." I felt that way too, I thought for sure we'd at least make the playoffs in 2011 with probably 10 - 12 wins, and I think most Jets fans did too. Those were reasonable expectations at the time, but they turned out to be wrong. The all-in / heavy free agency strategy / constantly trading up for that "missing piece", had caught up with the Jets and by 2012 the team was just bad. I think that the best strategy, broadly speaking, is to re-sign all your good players, don't go nuts in free agency (don't overpay, don't go for the headlines), and hang on to your picks (and trade down sometimes.) It is okay to trade up for a QB if you are sure you don't have one, and you truly think he could be your franchise QB, but that's not a regular thing. I think Idzik has a lot of potential, and we'll have to see how things shape up with the rest of free agency and the draft. It looks like we're going to have plenty of money to keep our entire d-line, and that is a big deal.
All this bs talk about free agency and who we are gonna sign and blah blah blah.None of it matters because Geno Smith won't end up being the answer,We need a real franchise QB not a cornerback or whoever.None of it matters until we figure out that part.Does anyone truly see Geno Smith raising and kissing the lombardi trophy?If we get there its gonna be because of Rex Ryan not Geno Smith its the Sanchez situation all over again ,rinse wash repeat,rinse wash repeat.I say we trade our entire draft or whatever it takes to get Manziel
If you name just about every FA in numerous posts saying the Jets may be interested chances are you are going to be right about some.
