A number of us were disappointed that Douglas didn't take more than one WR in this deep WR class. Several of us have been really upset and been critical of Douglas and are concerned about our WR corps. I think that's fair. Well, I just read an article on the Star-Ledger site that helps answer why Douglas didn't take another WR, and it makes sense, but in all fairness, since Douglas was able to swing tradebacks, he could have traded back to where one of the WRs was the BPA, and with needing to make sure that Sam had plenty of good receivers, I think Douglas' decision was a mistake. https://www.northjersey.com/story/s...s-takeaways-including-joe-douglas/3030279001/ NFL Draft 2020: NY Jets takeaways including why Joe Douglas took only one WR Andy Vasquez, NorthJersey.comPublished 4:00 a.m. ET April 27, 2020 | Updated 9:14 a.m. ET April 27, 2020 The most impactful stretch of the NFL offseason is over. And the Jets are a much different team than they were a few weeks ago, but are they better? General manager Joe Douglas said after the draft that he believes the Jets have improved themselves. And we happen to agree with that. Douglas completely revamped the offensive line, adding six players in the draft and free agency. One of them, first-round pick Mekhi Becton, could be clearing space in front of quarterback Sam Darnold for the next decade. And he proved that he can work the rest of the league to improve his team’s ability to acquire talent. Douglas made three trades during the draft, allowing them to add draft capable and a player who could potentially help: Douglas traded his final sixth-round pick to the Colts for cornerback Quincy Wilson. Douglas did a good job in his first draft as GM. He deserves a lot of credit. But there are also a few questions that must be answered, and some trends to be broken. Here are some thoughts and takeaways from the Jets’ draft. No WR bonanza for Jets The Jets made a huge potential upgrade to their receiving corps when they took Denzel Mims lint he second round. But that’s all the Jets did at receiver in this draft, which is a pretty big surprise considering their massive need at the position and impressive depth at receiver in this draft class. The Jets had plenty of options to draft a receiver at other points in the draft, but they didn’t and Douglas admitted that the temptation was there, but that the Jets didn’t want to risk reaching because of need. “I wouldn’t say the [receiver] talent fell off a cliff [after the second round],” Douglas said. “We just took what the board gave us, how certain stacks fell, I think in each scenario we were able to go with the best player available and it was able to help us with a need as well. Often times, there were situations where there was a wide receiver within a couple of players of what we were discussing, but we felt as a group, let’s take the best player available.” The Jets did add help in the secondary, offensive line and at edge rusher — all needs that had to be addressed — but they also added a quarterback in the fourth round and a punter in the sixth — neither a big need. Why the QB so early? Given the Jets’ other needs, the decision to draft FIU quarterback James Morgan in the fourth round was a little hard to swallow. UCF’s Gabriel Davis was taken by the Bills three picks later at 128 overall with the Jets about to pick at 129. Perhaps the Bills blocked the receiver-needy Jets, perhaps they didn’t, but Jets could be haunted by it if Davis goes on to burn them regularly in the division. Meanwhile, Antonio Gandy-Golden was also still available when they picked Morgan. Both Davis and Gandy-Golden are big receivers who could have potentially fit into the Jets’ system and contributed immediately. But Douglas said that adding Morgan was the right thing to do. “We had a real comfort level with James,” Douglas said. “This is a young man that’s extremely intelligent, has the physical tools you’re looking for. And I know you guys have heard me say it before, quarterback is the most important position in professional sports. So here’s an opportunity, we felt, to get a young quarterback that could develop behind Sam. You need to have depth at that position especially, as we found out last year. So we felt it was the right opportunity.” We think the Jets would have been better off with another receiver, but also find a lot of sense in Douglas’ explanation. The Jets are obviously confident they can get by without many proven receiving weapons. We’ll see if they’re right. Trends to watch Becton was the first offensive lineman taken by the Jets in the first round since 2006 when they took tackle D’Brickashaw Ferguson and center Nick Mangold. Those two picks ended up stabilizing the offensive line for most of the next decade. And the Jets are hoping that the addition of Becton, along with the other offensive line changes, will have a similar impact. Also, good luck to Mims, the second-round receiver who will hope to break a couple of ugly trends, First, the Jets have had terrible luck with second-round picks. Only one second-round pick since 2008 has stuck around with the team for a second contract: offensive tackle Vlad Ducasse (2010). Their last three second-round picks have all dealt with some major adversity: receiver Devin Smith (2015) suffered multiple torn ACLs and never became a contributor. Quarterback Christian Hackenberg (2016) wasn’t good enough to play in the NFL and never appeared in a game and Marcus Maye (2017) missed most of his sophomore season because of injury. And second, the Jets’ curse on drafted receivers seem to be even worse. The Jets selected 14 receivers from 2005-2017 before adding Mims this year. Only one of those receivers had more than five touchdown catches in their career: Jeremy Kerley (2011). The Jets haven’t drafted a receiver who caught more than 30 career touchdown passes since Jerricho Cotchery (34 career touchdowns) in 2004. And they haven’t drafted a receiver who caught 30 or more touchdowns for them since Laveranues Coles (37) in 2000. Mims will have the chance to break a lot of streaks. Adding on The Jets added several players in undrafted free agency, including Lamar Jackson. No, not that Lamar Jackson. (Check our tracker here.) The Nebraska cornerback could have a chance to make the Jets’ roster, because depth is so thin. Georgia’s Lawrence Cager, a big receiver who should have a chance to make the roster because of the lack of depth there, too. The Jets have had free agents help before. Including Robby Anderson who in 2016 began his rise from unknown to Jets’ top receiver before leaving in free agency. Now the Jets must try to replace him.
You can’t force a trade back to where a WR is BPA because you don’t know who will be there when it comes back around to you. If you say hey, here we are in the third let’s trade back because WR is not currently BPA. What if when you get there, WR is not BPA again? You have to take the board as it falls to some degree.
The Morgan pick was a good pick. The Jets backup QB's all sucked and the 4th round is where you take a backup QB. I have no idea if Morgan is a good QB or not but he's likely better than the trash the Jets have typically filled that slot with in recent years. The lack of a second WR pick is better than taking a lousy prospect just to say the Jets took 2 WR's. I was happy with the OT they got late and the punter was highly rated, moreso than any other punter in the draft. The thing to realize about the Jets going into the draft, and even now after it, is that they have so many holes that they need to fill. This roster is still one of the worst in the NFL and nothing Joe Douglas did in the 2020 draft was going to change that very basic fact. The inability to find a 2nd WR they wanted was more than covered by the fact that anybody they took who was a good prospect likely filled another hole. When Cimini goes off about how the Jets *had* to find another WR he omits the fact that they also had to find a backup QB, another CB, another OL, a safety with some speed, a RB to go into the committee with Bell and Powell, etc. The great thing about this draft was that the Jets had so many needs that as long as Douglas kept taking guys with upside he was fixing problems. Trying to pigeon-hole slots and picks is how you screw up a draft. The other thing that is not inconsequential is that the Jets still have some flexibility in third-tier free agency, which starts this afternoon and will extend into whatever training camp looks like this summer. By then the Jets will also have a much better read on whether they can afford to keep Jamal Adams or whether it is better to get value for him now. I'm pretty sure they're not going to let a holdout become a meme around the Jets this off-season.
I wanted multiple receivers in this draft as bad as anyone but you certainly can’t force that, that’s where GMs make bad mistakes when it comes to the draft. It’s no surprise that WR dried up after the Jets picked Mims as their was a run on WRs the entire 2nd rd with some going higher than expected. Anyway we knew this roster couldn’t be completely rebuilt in this one offseason. JD definitely upgraded the talent level at the WR position and next draft shapes up to be extremely talented at the WR position again.
It was a mistake by Douglas. First off you could've had Morgan later in the draft. Secondly if Morgan is ever playing any meaningful game snaps the season is already over. Thirdly our WR corps is still extremely unproven and lacking. There were some really good WR prospects on the board there that he overlooked.
Maybe he has an eye on the WR's in next year's draft who might be better than the ones taken this year. As much as we wanted at least 2 WR's from this draft, forcing it is not the right move. This roster wasn't going to be fixed in one offseason. https://www.profootballnetwork.com/the-top-2021-nfl-draft-wide-receivers-prospects-to-know/
So that means Foles winning the superbowl as a backup meant the season was over. Oh and when Bledsoe went down Tom Brady ruined the Pats. Also when Bridgewater took over the saint last year they had no chance of playoffs. Fact is having a quality backup is VERY important. If we had one for 4 game last year we may not have been 1-7. Your logic fails. This was a very solid draft. We got a few udfa wr right afterwards that have potential. I think our receiver core is better now. We won't just be relying on Crowder. Anderson was way overrated by jets fans.
But taking another WR in this draft doesn’t change your mind that they were extremely unproven and lacking...
How do you know this? Weren't the Patriots and Bills both looking for backups? Bills specifically in the same round?
Gase alluded to Douglas still making some additions to the WR group on this mornings conference call with the media. Not many FA options out there so I’m assuming Douglas is going to wait it out and see who shakes free over the next couple of months. Or he’s going to try and work out a trade (Gase said Douglas isn’t hesitant to trade for someone he wants). Either way, I would have gone AGG over Morgan 10 times out of 10 in the fourth but whatever. Is what it is.
LOL I stopped reading after you started comparing Morgan to SB winning QB's. Fact is your argument falls short because you're comparing a Jets franchise who is in complete rebuild mode to 3 of the most sound, well run organizations in the league. The Jets are not. Now maybe it changes under Douglas but it's way too early to say. How do you know he's a quality backup and not another Hackenberg? The answer is you don't. However I do know that this roster being so devoid of talent at WR needed all the help it could get. Moreso than backup QB? You better believe it.
How do you know the Pats and Bills were going to draft Morgan there? You don't. Furthermore why did they draft a project backup QB there when there were good WR's still on the board? Do you think Morgan is going to play meaningful game action next year?
I agree. We have 14 WR on the roster. He may trade for a vet on a short deal or even Bring DT back. But we already have Veteran leadership at the position (Crowder anyone?) and a TON of youth that needs a chance. We needed a backup QB that can give us a chance if Sam has further issues (knock in wood). Morgan has immense upside and could develop into a starter. We made the right choice IMO.
This is probably my only complaint from the draft. I know we have a ton of holes to fill to become a competitive team but the primary focus of everyone in this organization should be to surround Sam with talent and give him every opportunity to succeed. To that end, I could've done without Zuniga in the 3rd. I would've felt a lot better about this draft if you sub either of the Raiders picks immediately after him for him. Bowden or Edwards > Zuniga for me. Give me AGG instead of Morgan in the 4th and I feel a lot better too. Again, at the end of the day I think JD had a great first draft and maybe all these guys end up having great careers for the Jets and make this post look foolish (I sincerely hope they do). I just think when you have a QB who you think is your FQB, you do whatever you can to help him succeed even if that means bending the BPA mantra a little bit.
Those 3 franchises didn't know what those qbs would be either. They rolled the dice and it worked. Yeah I'm comparing the Jets to 3 franchises that are proven. Because that what we need to be. We need to be more like winning franchises. Not the losing ones that don't get good backups and just keep throwing picks away. If we had a decent backup last year we may have had more wins. We didn't.
Yeah you don't know if they would've picked him if he were available. Outside of Tyler Johnson, I didn't see many options. They needed some sort of developmental QB with upside, if Darnold gets hurt you never know ...
We knew there’d be some unfinished business w how many needs the team has. We’re definitely in much better shape in alot of aspects That said it always seems to be WR that gets kicked down the road.I thought Douglas would realize that & make a statement.In 3 drafts since Sam became a Jet theyve taken 1 WR for a unit that has consistently been bottom 5 for those 3 yrs. Unacceptable. it behooves me how jet fans yr after yr can de prioritize offensive weapons in the draft given how long its been an issue. The “we can get one later” crowd is proven wrong yet again;Course it has very little to do w talent pool depth but rather just a mechanism to rationalize taking other positions Ive said it many times.Until this team makes offensive skill a true priority we will continue to be a subpar team.
How do you know? Firstly - The word out there on draft night was we took him before Bill the cheat nabbed him. Secondly - So do we just put out a traffic cone and lose or develop a back up that come in and do a job, like so many other teams had last season. I'm going to add a thirdly - He didn't overlook them he looked and choose not to select them. I can't believe people are still bitching away about our draft, take a bloody look at the last 10 years and then this one and give your heads a wobble. Just because he didn't pick what YOU wanted doesn't make it a mistake.
Perfect assessment of what transpired in my view. I’m loving this draft. “ Had” to find another receiver is a nice little catchy term by Cimini But can not be expected in a vac, not if you stay true to the board for best value in a position of need.
The rumor was the Cheats wanted him, and had the very next pick iirc. They interviewed Morgan and Bell mentioned they had someone in mind, but he wasn't there
