Jets Sign Izzo

H to tha Izzo, V to tha Izzay...

 

Have fun getting beaten out of a spot by Wallace Wright and Brad Smith you steroid loving patsy fucker.

 

I'm right there with ya. Sickening.

 

I need to pick up the first JB album. Great stuff!

 

Good signing, I think Westoff really likes this one.

 

yep, I and began to think - Bowens was the Jets' special teams captain last year... he is now a Cleveland Brown... I wouldn't be surprised if Izzo takes over that role.

 

This signing as Westhoff's endorsement all over it. Kudos to Westhoff for being alert and probably giving our team the heads up on him.

If Mike thinks he's got some gas left in the tank, that's good enough for me.

 

Strange signing.

Another older vet who's main role is only on special teams. That doesn't seem to be a great payoff. I'd much rather have young guys on ST who might turn into something. Izzo is one year from retirement.

 

He's replacing Bowens. This is a Westhoff pickup. He wants STs leadership.

 

We lost both Bowens and Cody Spencer, who was primarily special teams.

 

I'm not that familiar with the FA but i'm guessing now is the time to sign the veterans we will need doing the season. For all of you waiting for the young players just wait for the draft and training camp where out of all the undrafted rookies and the practice squad players Rex will find someone young to coach up...

 

http://www.newyorkjets.com/blog/posts/966-newest-jet-izzo-is-a-specialist-first-class

Newest Jet Izzo Is a Specialist First Class
Published: Wed, March 11, 2009 - 4:45pm ET

By Randy Lange
03/11 ? The envelope, please. And the newest Jets unrestricted free agency signing is ... Larry Izzo.

That's correct. Izzo, NFL special teams royalty who has worn the aqua and coral of the Dolphins and the red, white and blue of the Patriots, will be donning green and white this season.

This news flew under the radar, but it's an interesting transaction just the same. We'll venture a guess that Izzo is not coming to the Jets to start at linebacker, his defensive position ? not with him entering his 13th NFL season, set to turn 35 after the start of the 2009 season, and with zero pro starts to his credit.

But Izzo is a specialist first class. He's a three-time AFC Pro Bowl special teams player, not to mention a three-time Super Bowl contributor with the Pats.

By New England's reckoning, he has 257 special teams tackles in his career, plus 23 more in the playoffs. By the more conservative calculations of Stats Inc., he has fewer total tackles, 199, but that is still the most by any NFL player since the stat service began tracking ST tackles in 1994. Here are the top three tacklers of the past 15 seasons:

Player Teams Years Games UT-AT-TT
Larry Izzo MIA-NE 1996-2008 188 155-44-199
Keith Burns DEN-CHI-TB 1994-2006 197 154-43-197
Gary Stills KC-BAL-STL 1999-2008 133 142-13-155

What's more, he's reunited (and it feels so good) with Mike Westhoff, his original ST boss for his first four pro seasons with Miami (not including '97, which he lost to an Achilles' tear). And he's leaving New England, for which he served the last eight seasons as teams captain.

Also, the Jets lost a teams captain of their own to free agency with Cleveland's signing of David Bowens and have suffered at Izzo's whirling-dervish activity over the years.

He's played 23 games against them over the years and recorded 19 of his ST tackles. But possibly his biggest play vs. the Jets wasn't a tackle but a block ? on Ellis Hobbs' NFL-record 108-yard kickoff return, which opened the second half of the Jets' 2007 season opener vs. the Pats.

Away from the field, Izzo, like so many other players on the Jets and around the league, is a major player in the community. Much of his charitable work is done with members of the U.S. Armed Forces. He's visited 8,500 crew members of the U.S.S. Carl Vinson at Pearl Harbor during Pro Bowl week in 2002 and visited troops in Afghanistan, Iraq, Kuwait and Qatar on an NFL-sponsored USO tour in '05.

And the last three years in Boston he has hosted a celebrity karaoke night that has benefited a half dozen veterans causes. The name of the event: "Larry-oke."

The man's a natural performer. And he has the track record to marshal the Jets' special teamers in Rex Ryan's first campaign as Jets head coach.

 

OK - Makes much more sense now.

I guess there's a reason why Westhoff is one of the best special teams coaches in the game.

 

I'd buy an Izzo jersey haha

 

Funny that Lange reported all those facts about Izzo but left this little nugget out. Wonder why?

http://patsblog.projo.com/2009/02/lb-izzo-expecte.html