Jets Continue Tradition of Not Taking Care of Their Own By Joe Caporoso | February 17th, 2008 E-mail | Print | Share I really want to give Mike Tannenbaum and Eric Mangini the benefit of the doubt. They impressed the hell out of me in 2006 by taking a team with 5-11 talent into the playoffs and by making a handful of shrewd moves to allow the Jets to contend. Yet they misjudged their talent level last year and did an awful of job of handling the contract dispute with Pete Kendall. Kendall was an offensive captain who played through injuries and took pain killing shots during the team?s abysmal 2005 campaign when they went 4-12. This wasn?t enough to convince the Jets to re-negotiate and allow him to finish his career with the Jets. Instead they went with Adrien Clarke at guard and watched their starting quarterback get hurt in week one. The team?s offensive line was terrible all year and without Kendall?s veteran leadership, Nick Mangold and D?Brickashaw Ferguson took step backwards in their second year. All in all, not re-doing Kendall?s deal ended up being the first in the line of bad decisions that led to an embarrassing season. You would think Tannenbaum and Mangini would learn from their mistakes, right? Wrong! Laveraneus Coles was an offensive captain who played through injuries and took pain killing shots during the team?s abysmal 2007 campaign, when they went 4-12. Sound familiar? It is only February and Coles has already went public with his frustration of being strung along by the Jets front office and their lack of desire to give a new contract so he could retire with the Jets. This is mind numbing to me. You don?t gain the respect of your team by treating one of your leaders like garbage. I watched L.C. play on one foot for the Jets in meaningless second half games against the Dolphins and Browns. There was no reason for him to play and yet he toughed it out for his teammates and found a way to still contribute despite barely being able to walk back to the huddle after each catch he made. Coles is everything a football player should be and was having a career year before getting hurt last year and the Jets can?t give him a new contract with the amount of cap space they have? The Jets are continuing the tradition of being a poorly run organization. They are a team who tells a player like Coles that his production is down and doesn?t give him a new contract when he scores 6 touchdowns in 5 games before getting hurt and then continues to play when he is hurt. Are they going to do what they did last year with Kendall and trade him away for a 4th round pick? You can almost see it now?the Jets holding on to Coles while he bashes them to the media day in and day out, and then finally trading him in August for a mid-round pick. Followed by some press conference thanking Coles for his contributions and saying they think they got fair value for him. Then we can watch Tannenbaum take Coles money and re-sign people like Justin McCariens and David Barrett. If I have to watch Kellen Clemens start next season with Jerricho Cotchery, Brad Smith, and Wallace Wright as his top three receivers, my head might explode. Is Tannenbaum saving the money to go out and make his ?big? move by signing another team?s backup for starter?s money, like he did last year with Kenyon Coleman? I can already see him signing somebody like Justin Gage and saying he is Coles replacement, just like this organization did when they signed Curtis Conway to replace Coles last time they let him go. Coles is a warrior. Give him his money. You don?t get better by releasing one of your few playmakers and one of the most respected players in the locker room.
Haha so the FO standing firm in the Kendall situation essentially sends no message to the players and the following offseason the Captain of the offense holds out. Brilliant.......... let's get something of value for Coles while we can. I have no problems dumping Coles, Cotchery is younger, better and basically the same type of player.
if edwards had actually PLAYED cotchery and let him develop, knowing that coles and he are basically teh same type of player, we woulda never traded for coles back in exchange for moss, and right now, we'd prolly have a nice balanced combo at WR with moss's speed and gamebreaking ability and cotchery as a possession receiver...........wow herm
the fact is that we will never sign anyone important if CAPTAINS are taken care of like this.. players see this as not getting their just due after sacrificing themselves for the team and then being screwed over by management... we will enjoy plenty of mediocre seasons if this trend continues... dont ever count on a big FA coming here
Well, if anybody has read any of Coles comments I've posted, this position is clear. Still, until we get some commentary from the FO and from the HC, I think we got a lot of 'one hand clapping' going on here...! So, I'll chill on it, until...
Cotchery is also allergic to the end zone. Thomas Jones seems to suffer from the same affliction. You do not throw away your only threat to score TDs. The Jets let Coles leave before and the outcome was a disaster. Coles, our first rounder, and our fourth rounder for D-Rob. How did that trade work out? Coles is the least of our problems on offense. Letting him go would be a bigger mistake than the Kendall debacle.
Cotch had 6 TDs in 2006, not a bad amount. This season though the only play we ran in the red zone was a fade to Coles. I don't remember seeing Cotch on the field in the f'n red zone.
Pardon my language but, ARE YOU FUCKINHG KIDDING! cOTCHERY WILL NEVER IN HIS LIFETIME BE THE MAN LC IS. JC is a good receiver no doubt, but he will never be LC. I love JC, but lets be real. He'll never be LC.
he plays 100% every play no matter what...i would want him back just to set an example of how to play football no matter what your record or anything...you play hard
Here's my take on the deal... Manweenie looks to be a short-term coach if he continues to treat the team leaders in this way. Who wants to bust their butt for a guy who treats people (like LC) like dirt--especially when they work on a 4-12 team? Would you go all out for a coach who cuts all of his most dedicated performers? Would you work hard for a coach who turns in his former boss for videotaping stuff? (Not that this was important six months ago, but still--now you gotta think about it.) If you were the world's best football player, and your choice for where to play was restricted to the AFC East... Who would you play for: New England? Miami (under Bill Parcells)? Buffalo ( a team on the rise)? Or the New York Jets? (A team that has no tradition of winning and looks like it is going nowhere anyhow). Well, anyone who reads my posts knows that I think Manweenie is the WORST Jets coach in NYC history. I can't wait to see him fired.
I would just like to thank you for visiting MVN and someone actually posting something from there...kudos to you. NExt time make sure its my article :wink:
What a terrible article. It completely ignores the fact that the Jets have offered LC $11m guaranteed. It completely ignores the fact that LC came out after last season and said that he understood he might not get a new deal and if that happened he'd not complain and play for the deal he has, which would be fine. Coles is the hypocrit here. He's also greedy. I blame the agents.
Exactly. I'm really surprised at this board lately...Coles pulled the same thing with the Redskins when he was there. There seems to be alot of blind hate towards our FO...which I guess should be expected after a 4-12 season...but *blind* is the key word there...theres no real reason or logic just a "something needs to be done for the sake of doing something" feel to it.
From what i understand the jets are offering to guarantee all the numbers in Coles final 2 years...they are just standing firm ontheir stance of not negotiating contracts w/ 2 or more years left. It makes perfect sense to me. Especially considering we're dealing w/ a WR in his 30's w/ a history of injuries... This is a long sighted FO.. Kendall wasn't getting an extension/raise b/c he didnt fit into the long term plans. The fact is...even w/ kendall...our Ol wouldve struggled last year...and if anything we may have had one more win at best.he didn't help his cause by going to the media and creating a disruption.. Why sacrifice precious cap space and hold the team back in the middle of a youth movement for a player that doesnt fit in long term, plays a non impact position and frankly would've only improved us by 1 win at best? The Coles situation is alittle different...however...I believe the Jets should stay strong on this...b/c giving Coles a 3 year extension and a boatload of cash at his age, playing style and history of injuries has bradway written all over it.
Sucks cause they have to deal with the most short sighted fan base in the country...being a GM or a coach for a NY/NJ team has to be ridiculous. Completely agree on everything else. Coles is fucking Mangini more than Mangini is fucking him...way more actually. The media seems to respect Mangini, but is still unsure of whether he is the answer for the Jets or not. Running to them and making Mangini look bad after a 4-12 season AND the Kendall situation (after the OL sucked so bad) is a very smart move on Coles part. The shortsightedness of the fanbase is perfect for such a move because after going 4-12 many fans have made Kendall out to be some former hero lost by our bumbling young coach...and they don't want to see something similar happen to one of our best players. So of course, the Jets FO is the problem. BUT the fact is, Coles is over 30, has taken a beating, and just isn't a great long term investment. Guaranteeing the last 2 years of his contract seems very fair considering he'll be 32 with alot of wear and tear on him at the end of it. Most players would kill to have their contract guaranteed like that.
Then let Coles go. I love the guy, but injuries must have taken a huge toll on him. Letting him go now shows foresight, something we haven't seen from a Jets FO recently. If he takes 2 years for $11 million, fantastic for both sides. But I'm not giving him more years than that with guaranteed money.
This is a very good post. Coles should be happy the Jets would even guarantee him two more years at his age and present injury history. If he was on the Pats they would dump him and would not think twice about it. It's better to get rid of him a year to early as opposed to a year to late so I say trade him now while we can still get something for him instead of having to watch him age before our eyes and not have a backup plan for a 30 year old who is on borrowed time anyway.
