https://nypost.com/2022/01/05/the-free-agent-lessons-jets-cant-ignore-this-offseason/ Good read. No cut and paste so click it if you want. Article goes into Mac's spending spree and lack of a ROI. Makes some valid points and observations about prior efforts for a quick fix to help a drafted QB. Also provides a window into what it might take to get "name" FA's to even consider the Jets..
Jets get players through the draft, free agency, and trades (was there ever a walk on?) Can’t say Zack had a fair trial. How can a mechanic fix a car with a box of worn out, broken, and incorrect tools? Coaching needs to be fired up, scorching, flame throwing motivators. Saleh and his band of bros is not that. We got draft picks that should give us some needed youth and talent. JD better jump on Free Agent availability early and not accept scraps. Round pegs in the vacant gaping round holes Jets have.
Not sure I'd class Mossley as the success they claim, virtually two seasons on his arse and in his prime. Can't complain about his effort when on the pitch though.
The best teams don't splurge on FA's. They build from within and supplement their cores with FA's who fill whatever holes there are. Good players rarely become FA's as teams will extend or tag them before they hit the open market. We need a group of homegrown players to extend one day.
Parcells used poison pills to sign Curtis Martin and Kevin Mawae and then the NFL outlawed poison pills. Rex used veteran free agency to import 3 guys that knew his schemes, one at each level in Marques Douglas, Bart Scott and Jim Leonhard. Those coaches on the field helped everybody else get up to speed on what was going to be a hellbent high pressure blitzing scheme with players flying in from all angles. It's not going to work with this regime unless some 49ers that know the defense become available and that is unlikely, particularly at all 3 levels. Rex got lucky and the Jets were able to overpay for 3 guys to glue that defense together quickly.
Agreed on most of it, but Marques Douglas was sort of a lame example considering that level of journey-man player is will most likely be relatively easy to come by coming from San Francisco.
Mawae wasn't a poison pill guy. Martin while coming at a humongous cost was 25 and Mawae 27. As for the Rex 3, Scott was really the only big money guy. The others were slight overpays for guys that had little in the way cap ramifications (Leonhard's contract was 3 years, $6 million total). Scott was an overpay, for a very good, but not great and older free agent, but was a lot more forgivable since he fit the time table of a team that was ready to win now. Moseley is tricky because of the injury and Covid opt out. The overpay is less forgivable because they weren't/aren't in a position to win and as a result, paying a ton of money for a guy that doesn't really move the needle. Johnson was an older FA as was Bell (by RB standards) and two guys with very questionable character. Johnson in particular, reeked of a total lack of homework, while Bell is just an all-time shake your head decision when you factor in the market and Gase not even wanting him. While they have not had the ideal results, Douglas' signings have been on younger guys and have not been the "All-In" deals that littered MacCagnan's resume.
A poison pill was a provision that made it harder for the team losing the player to match. For instance, Curtis Martin's contract offer from the Jets had a sizeable roster bonus due when the player played his third game in Foxboro, Massachusetts in the 1998 season. For the Jets this was no problem because C-Mart would play one game there during the regular season and then at most one in the playoffs and the bonus would never trigger. For the Patriots the bonus would trigger on the third home game of the '98 season. This made it very unlikely that the Patriots would match the offer and indeed they decided to take the Jets 1st and 3rd round picks as the compensation for signing a restricted free agent.
It's not about overspending, it's about character guys. Mosley: High Character Trumaine Johnson and Bell: Low Character. JD should know this or players should know this about FA. No problem spending but don't spend on someone who is known to be a diva.
How did signing Mosley work out? It's about not putting all your eggs in one basket and when you sign a top of the market free agent that's what you're doing. If the guy can't go for whatever reason it is crippling to the team as a whole.
Joe's plan is to define a value to a position and player. What I mean by that is he sets a market value for a position with a low-high range and then assess what players are available at what price point. Having said that, he has signed middle of the road players at a competitive price, offer 1-year deals as prove it type contracts, tried to backfill holes as best he could and has tried to sign some higher end players who chose other teams. I don't see that changing because there are still too many holes to fill. I can see him going after dallas TE if the price is right or a RG... but I really do not see the MAC or tanny type spending because he is too disciplined.
When bad teams sign free agents it generally does not improve the team's performance. Very few free agents are actually impactful enough to raise a team up. Thinking about it some it is very rare for a team at any level of competition to raise their prospects by signing a free agent. The better teams that sign free agents are generally filling holes that opened up and replacing similar caliber players when they do this and so they stay level in the process. This is why the free agency winners every year tend to be the regular season losers. They sign lots of free agents but they don't make themselves better in the process and so they're just spinning their wheels.
The Jets put a poison pill in the contract that Martin could opt out as FA after one year along with a roster bonus that would have caused NE salary cap problems. NE had a choice of matching the contract and then Martin leaving for nothing the following year or taking the draft picks.
It's about both. Ideally you want good football players who are good people too. Teams have had success both ways - forgoing character in favor of raw talent and forgoing raw talent in favor of character and smarts. Generally forgoing character only works if you have a coach and/or QB who are hugely respected due to accomplishments though.
Eh. Mosley effectively missed two entire seasons in his prime as the highest paid middle linebacker in the league, even if his salary was deferred in the second year. If you overpay for a middle linebacker like that, they need to be Patrick Willis or Luke Kuechly. Not anything less.
Trumaine Johnson was a legit POS who was benched due to attitude. Just awful example. Mosley got hurt and then Covid. People can say what they want about Covid. People are nuts. Idk. He was a class act this year.
