Seriously, if Fitzpatrick had a fastball like Vinny he wouldn't be dangling out there on the market with nobody making offers above the Jets offer. Fitzpatrick isn't quite as ancient as Vinny was when he had his career year with the Jets. He's 33, not 35. I wouldn't be down for spending a lot of cash on any QB at either age unless they were clearly a very good QB with some prospects to rebound. The reason Bill Parcells committed real money to Vinny when he did was he thought the Jets were going to win a Super Bowl with Vinny in 1999. Absent that thought I doubt Parcells would have spent any significant money on the extension. Parcells always wanted to know who his QB was but he didn't do nutty things to make that happen. If the Jets had looked like an 8-8 team going into 1999 Parcells probably would have offered Vinny a decent but not great contract, as the Jets have done with Fitzpatrick, and then let the chips fall where they may. As it turned out Parcells gave Vinny the big deal and then watched the 36 year old nightmare happen with the season ending injury and the failure of the Jets immediate prospects. His response was to relinquish the head coaching position in 2000 and prepare for his exit from the Jets.
In all fairness, Vinny rebounded and led the Jets back to the playoffs in 2001. And if a more competent coach than Al Groh had been in charge in 2000, the Jets probably would have made the playoffs then too.
I disagree. It's a pretty well known fact that Parcells disliked QBs in general and disliked rookies. He blew the Jets' only chance over the last 20 years or so to have a legit franchise QB when he screwed the pooch on Peyton Manning. He screwed the team and the fans when he pouted like a little girl after Vinny went down with an injury in the first game of '99. He blew chances at our getting not only 1, but 2 HOF LTs, so he could draft a bunch of busts and jags. Fuck Parcells. If I never hear his name mentioned again, it will be too soon. At this point I have close to zero respect for him and any decisions he made.
I think Fitz gets us 8 games this year, but he might be a valuable role model for Hack, as far as prep for games and such. I do not care about Fitz next year. I firmly believe hack will be starting next year at the latest. This year if Fitz stinks or goes down
Parcells inherited a 1-15 team and gave us the second best season in franchise history. He made some bad choices, but he deserves a lot more credit than you're giving him.
I have given him plenty of credit over the years. I never liked him when he was with the Giants. In fact, I despised him. I tried to like him when he came to the Jets, and succeeded to a large extent, but I knew that he'd eventually screw the Jets and walk away before the job was finished because he only cares about himself, and he did that. He brought respect to the team, got them started in the right direction, and gave us some exciting moments and the '98 season, but imo his screw ups outweigh the good he did. As I see it, his screw ups are as follows: 1. Costing us Peyton Manning; 2. His grocery shopping - it was terrible - he gave us such great talents as Rick Terry, Terry Day, Lamont Burns, Ray Austin, Tim Scharf, Chuck Clements, & Steve Rosga, and took James Farrior and the rest of that sorry lot while passing on both Orlando Pace and Walter Jones - Farrior was good for the Steelers but only pretty good for us. The best player in that draft for the Jets was Jason Ferguson - among the other players he passed up to take that sorry lot was Tony Gonzalez, Jamie Sharper, Sam Madison, and Adam Meadows. To his credit, he passed up a lot of equally bad players. LOL In '98 his draft consisted of Dorian Boose, Scott Frost, Kevin Williams, Jason Fabini, Casey Dailey, Doug Karczewski, Blake Spence, Eric Bateman, Eric Ogbogu, Chris Brazzell, Dustin Johnson and Lawrence Hart. He traded several picks for CuMar, I believe. I won't even go into the players he passed up by trading for Cumar. I believe the '99 draft was his also. He took Randy Thomas, David Loverne & Shirley, Jason Wiltz, Jermaine Jones, Marc Smegma (Megna), J.P. Machado, Ryan Young, and J.J. Syvrud.; 3. Did I mention Peyton Manning? 4. Costing us Bill Belichick; 5. Sticking us with Terry Bradway as GM; 6. Costing us Peyton Manning; 7. Sticking us with Al "Doh" Groh as HC; 8. Going into the 1999 season without a backup QB, then signing Rick Mirer and sticking with him; 9. Having a pity party for the first half of the '99 season before he pulled his head out of his ass and started coaching, only to screw the pooch again with a halfback option pass in the playoffs; 10. Having the offense centered on CuMar, and being too conservative and predictable on offense.
We're in an era in which 1st rounders are vastly over-valued. Fans of every franchise envision every first rounder as their "savior"...franchises fall in line with that logic. No one wants to give up that lifeline & give an interior DL a massive long term deal when he truthfully isn't a game changer. From the Jets perspective anything less than a 1st rounder or a multitude of early rounders likely doesn't equate the return of simply keeping Wilk on the roster. W/ the year to year proposition the NFL is evolving into combined w/ players retiring so much younger..blockbuster long term deals will likely be much less prevalent in future years. Wilk may very well fall victim.
