Shocker, what a shit season for injuries though, it seems to get worse season on season. I guess these guys are just getting so big that their bodies can't take the pressure and blow.
Easy to say now, but from what read there were no good offers. Maye is highly paid this season and will be FA next year. Age for a long contract is also not in his favor. I highly doubt any team would part with a decent draft asset for renting him, given these factors. If anything, this justifies JD not signing him for a long term deal at a very high price, and shows his agent really messed up not taking smaller, but longer offer from JD. If anything, this injury showed how JD's strategy actually paid off by avoiding a large CAP spend for multiple years for Maye.
Injuries from contact are always a crapshoot and just bad luck - you never know when someone is going to happen to hit a player the wrong way. This kind of injury is different - he was untouched, making a normal football move (in fact, a normal human move - he backed up a couple of steps, and then started to step forward). This injury was inevitable - his Achilles was obviously a tear waiting to happen. The Jets dodged a massive bullet when he refused to sign a longer-term deal. I wonder if players who are about to negotiate deals think about taking an intensive physical, complete with scans of every important ligament or tendon, to try to make an educated guess about their chances for this kind of injury? Of course, I also wonder if this sort of a ticking time bomb in your tendon can even be detected ahead of time?
Good point! You'd think they would get everything checked out. In Maye's case, I think I saw that this was the 3rd time this season Maye's achilles tendon was bothering him. If that is accurate, then in his case, I would think it would be something that would show. It may have been partially torn already or strained. We have a doctor or two on here. They could answer more definitively.