Overall talent? Well first off as I have said before CS is much improved with the addition of Marty, as I expected last off season when he was hired, and I think as we all saw last season, despite the personnel issues on O. On D I sometimes sense opposing OC's are getting better at countering Rex than when he first came to the Jets, but imo Rex remains one of the better defensive coaches in the NFL. Other clear positives obviously include and begin with the DL. The starters are very good. Ellis off the bench does not thrill me as much as some others seem to be about him, but Douzable imo has talent. Another positive could be at receiver, with both Decker and Amaro added. I say could because we simply do not know how much better the receivers will be, but I expect the improvement will be real and significant. I am somewhat more confident that RB will be a strong point on the team, but the real improvement of adding Johnson probably comes in allowing Marty more flexibility using him as a receiving back. As long as Ivory stays healthy this should be a strength. I also obviously am on record appreciating the upgrade Vick provides, but it remains to be seen how the Jets manage the Qb situation. I therefore cannot say Qb overall inspires all that much confidence. Once one moves beyond the short term, in any event no one expects Vick to make much difference - imo he's unlikely to be around past 15 if he even comes back for that. It would be great if Smith improved enough to get it done, but I remain a skeptic about him. In addition to concerns about Smith, pretty much the rest of the team is also a source of potential concern. In the short run I am not as concerned about linebacker as I am in the medium to long term. Coples and Davis are significant in that regard. I had more optimism about Davis last off season, and he disappointed last year, so I don't want to get too psyched up about him. On the other hand I expect Coples to show real improvement this year. Let's see if he does. Meanwhile Pace and Harris are aging, Barnes I see is not ready to come back on the field, and MacIntyre is only somewhat promising. This group is still not scaring anyone with its pass rushing capabilities. That leaves OL and the secondary, and both are big concerns. On paper OL should be decent, but it could easily unravel. Brent is probably a decent replacement at RT, but beyond that Ferguson and Mangold are aging, Winters is no guarantee to improve, and Colon's history of injuries is now again raised as a concern. Meanwhile there are a bunch of guys on the bench who have not shown anything. In the secondary I was more or less counting on Milliner to be solid as a starter, but now he shows up in OTA with a sore hammy. WTF? Sure, that doesn't mean he won't be ready on opening day, but you know Rex is not happy about this - Dee needs to not only practice, he needs to be in excellent shape. #2 Cb is a huge question mark. Safety looks improved with the addition of Pryor, obviously, but again that remains to be seen. If Milliner misses any significant time and #2 gets chosen by default, this could be a huge detriment for the Jets. In short, right now I see some potentials for improvement, but nothing is assured in that regard.
I like the way everything is shaping up. QB is obviously a question, but I think one of Geno/Vick will be able to produce within this offense. RB/TE/WR are all improved from last year. We have 4 new WR. Decker will obviously make the team and at least 2 of Saunders/Evans/Enuwa will make the team. Crazy improvement over last year. Amaro improves the TE group big time. Not only is Amaro going to be a good player, but Cumberland as a number 2 TE is a big upgrade as well. Our running game was strong last year, and its stronger this year. OL scares me. I don't think we improved that unit from last year. Hopefully Dozier can get the job done, but I know nothing about him. Winters was bad last year, hopefully he improves. Front 7 is going to be very good. Second year of Richardson, Coples is healthy and ready to go. Barnes will be back and healthy. Even backups like Ellis and Douzable are serviceable. I wouldn't mind drafting an MLB early next year, because I think that unit has a lot of room to improve. Secondary is improved compared to last year. People hate losing Cromartie, but he was terrible last year. Drafting 2 CB's to go along with Milliner/Walls/Patterson/Dowling will give us a lot of options. Not sure who will win the job opposite Milliner, but they cant all suck lol. Having a legitimate FS back there is huge as well. I'm looking forward to seeing this roster after training camp.
Well, technically no one here needs to post anything. But why I felt that way was something I sort of felt served some purpose in stating.
If ten is a homer and one is a darksider, I would say a 5.5 would be right. If one is a sort of homer and each number up makes one more of a homer until at 10 you are the biggest homer ever, I would say zero. Of course that's not really accurate, since any fan can be prone to bouts of excessive optimism. But I do try and control it.
http://espn.go.com/blog/new-york/jets/post/_/id/39611/amaro-down-after-tough-practice I read the other day that Texas Tech last year ran an average of 87 (!?) pass plays (must have been a typo...had to be 87 total plays?) per game. It might take the Seahawks 4 games to run 87 pass plays. The guy is coming off 1 year of inflated numbers in a spread offense where they basically had "one word" plays to having to learn a pro West Coast scheme with lots of verbiage. On top of the physical limitations (notably his lack of speed and athleticism, compared to guys like ASJ and Ebron), this was another reason to believe he would have a steeper learning curve towards becoming an impact player. Amaro may turn out to be a good, productive player (he seems humble, hard working, teachable, etc.), but in my opinion anybody expecting an impact playmaker in 2014 -- something this offense desperately needed to add -- was fooling themselves.
I don't think people are expecting him to be Jimony Grahamzales (the fusion of Jimmy Graham and Tony Gonzales- he is 9 feet tall, has 4 arms, runs a 4.2 40 yard dash, weighs 450 lbs, and has ACLs that fully regenerate in 20 minutes.) He's got potential to be a very good pass catching TE who can help the offense out a lot by creating mismatches, and by being a good red zone threat, which we didn't really have last year. He doesn't have to have an epic rookie season to make a solid impact.
Or the Jets could just line him up in the slot with a relatively simple route tree that both he and Geno have down and let him go try to make an impact. Anybody who projected Amaro to be a plus player playing a regular tight end role is on very thin ice at this point. That's not what he did in college and it's not clear that the role plays to any of his strengths. Just let him go make linebackers and safeties miserable like he did in college.
