I'll zag on the Wilson pick. The vast majority of highly drafted QBs fail, it's just the reality of the position. It's really, really hard to be a good NFL QB. All the guys taken after Wilson have sucked too. Wilson was widely considered the 2nd best QB in the draft after Lawrence. I think the pick made sense at the time. Has it worked out? Absolutely not. But decisions are made without the benefit of hindsight. The Wilson pick wasn't like the McDonald, Mims, Becton, AVT, etc picks, where it was obvious they were bad picks the second they were made. When you don't have a QB, you have to keep taking them high in the draft. Most won't work out, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't take them, because the payoff if they do work out is so massive.
Yeah…I don’t really blame the pick as it was at the time (even though I wasn’t a huge fan even then)…but to me, the continued reliance and defense of him is really wearing thin right now I’d much rather have them do what SF did…jettison his ass outta here and take the stance that we demand better from our players, and if you consistently show you can’t do, you’re not going to be on the team Cut our losses
That's definitely fair, and highlights another of JD's weaknesses - the inability to admit he whiffed on picks. We've seen it with Becton too. The higher he drafts a guy, the harder a time he has admitting he was wrong. A smart organization (like SF) knows whether a guy is good after 1.5-2 years and cuts their losses to recoup at least some value.
I previously had been a big JD supporter, but I can no longer be in his corner. The failure to address the O Line and the backup QB positions in the off season are huge shortcomings. This is not hindsight talking, but the result will be another garbage season, one that should have been a playoff year at least regardless of the Rogers injury. It was an odds on bet that a 39 YO QB would miss several games at some point, though the entire season less four plays in just reflected usual Jets luck. A competent backup QB was necessary. Even in the pre-season with Zach's alleged improvement he really couldnt string together two or three first downs in a row. Why was this not seen and understood ? I saw it and I am no guru. Why cant they admit what everybody knows...................Zach sucks, he is not salvageable, and he has no NFL future with any real team ??? So, he made a bad pick, even if it was #2. Why the double down and triple down of that pick costing us season after season ??? Even now with a slight chance to salvage this season if he can find the least bad of the remaining scrap heap QBs, he goes with Simian, a washed up never was. This is about the worst of the scrap heap dredge ups. Why, to enable Zach to keep going for two or three more games on the absolutely desperate 1 in a billion chance that he turns things around. Joe just doesnt get it. Yeah Zach has amazing physical skills, but he is empty between the ears in terms of football recognition and intelligence, and that gets combined with bad techniques. Now, Joe you made your bed, and barring a miracle turn around you will need to go at year end. Saleh will probably have to go to. That is too bad because we will never know if he might have been a decent coach had he been given a QB. Sorry, it worked out that way for you. Your inflexibility ruined what might have been an otherwise solid job.
The most damning factor is JD built up the most resources in the league in high picks and salary cap space. His decision making with both were mostly bad and that's why we haven't got a winning team. He didn't land nearly enough weapons drafting and squandered to much of the record cap space on the likes of Lawson, Corey Davis, Tomilson, etc. He also didn't understand how to build a team from the ground up. He cobbled too much and locked in on players to many times when he had the tools to build a great, almost dynasty, foundation. I'll give one example that will be controversial, but only because the player became a media darling. Sauce was a stupid pick that only playoff teams can get away with. A 4-13 team facing one of the best linemen drafts of the last decade should never use the 4th overall pick on a CB. Especially in our system where corners don't play man to man. Sauce is a good CB, but he isn't really an integral part of our defense and may not even be the best CB on our team. Getting a top linemen with the 4th pick is a rare opportunity. In the meantime corners who were almost as good as Sauce were taken in the late rounds. Its just bad team building. He also falls in love with players and isn't flexible in the draft. This causes him to trade up too much. Trade ups cause more destruction then most realize at the time. IMO rebuilding teams should never trade up, they should trade down.
many thoughtful and good responses here. particularly on 2020 and 2021 drafts which have had literal nightmare results. and of course 2022 draft has been great, but i wouldnt overly credit him for sauce and wilson - he was almost picking to chalk there - they were consensus picks at those slots and fit our areas of needs - werent necessarily strokes of genius - altho obtaining the additional first rounder was obviously great.
JD has been a rollercoaster. Some fantastic moves, some abysmal ones, but I'm not judging him based on this season when the entire thing was predicated on Rodgers starting with Zach learning in the background. Many people are angry because Rodgers went down and now they are picking apart everything else he did over a couple bad games with a backup QB. People try to blame the oline but Zach actually had more time in the pocket last week than almost every other QB in the league, you can look it up. It's not the oline, Zach was sacked by an invisible man last game. He misses open receivers, he makes bad reads, he stares down receivers making it obvious where he is going with the ball, he holds the ball too long, stays in the pocket too long and his footwork and thus timing is still really bad. He makes the same mistakes from his rookie year. It's pretty clear he wouldn't be able to handle a pass heavy game plan or win a game that requires more than 2 TDs. I get that it's not all Zach Wilson, but it mostly is. I can understand criticizing Douglas for the pick, but everyone knew that the talent drop off after Lawrence was huge that year at QB, and there wasn't a clear cut obvious #2 QB. People make it sound like Douglas should have known in advance what he would become and that's preposterous. Jets really screwed themselves winning that meaningless game the year before. Yes, there was a debate between Fields and him, but there was no real consensus on that, although I think most had Wilson mocked at #2.
Zach was one of the stupidest picks we've ever made. He had red flags all around him and literally nothing suggested he would succeed in the NFL,accept the Jarmucus Russel standard. He has a big arm. It was also a stupid pick because we had a 2-15 team and could have cashed that pick out for a lot of high picks, built a real foundation, and still grabbed a QB better than him. Instead he takes one of the stupidest gambles ever with one of our most valuable picks ever.
Fair but who are you taking? Evan Neal has been a disappointment and Ikem Ekwonu has struggled mightily this year. It was not the great lineman draft you’re hyping it up to be.
To be fair, it wasn't as obvious as you are stating and most Jets fans on this site (based on the polls) preferred Zach over Fields. Acting like that choice was obvious, is flat out silly. Hindsight is always 20/20, though.
At the time it was a great linemen draft, and both of those players would be extremely valuable on the Jets right now. We'd be a much better team.
Who cares what most fans, or media celebrities think. When you really dug into who Zach was it was a train wreck of fools gold. Smart GMs should be able to recognize that. And at least be smart enough to not be suckered into spending all the gold for it.
Thats a pretty ignorant comment to make. and i'll explain why. I was high on zach. I loved his film, i was wrong. I was also high on josh allen, and most here loved mayfield over allen and made the same comments you just made about zach. all i heard was how innacurate he was (based on his college completion % of 55% but the film to me showed otherwise) how he didn't win in college, how he had all these red flags and offered nothing but a strong arm. before we traded up in the darnold draft i said we should trade back for more picks and take lamaar jackson and was called an idiot because he's not a real QB etc etc. or we should stay at 6 and take allen and was again called an idiot as most people were convinced we needed darnold or mayfield. now hindsight is always 20/20 but the reality o fa QB is tough. zach like allen, in a bubble in college show all the skills and arm talent needed. the issue is the jump mentally into the NFL and that can't really be scouted. some players get it, some don't. allen got it and by the end of year 2 was a top QB already. zach isn't going to get it and isn't a starting QB at this point in year 3. The point is you can't call a pick "stupid" with no basis. by all metrics zach was a top 5 pick in the draft and QB2 on pretty much every draft board. it was the right pick, it just didn't pan out.
I don't even understand how this is a discussion, 5 years is half a decade, every year has been a rebuilding year with him. He drafted enough busts to prove he is a moron and the Jets have regressed this year as they will not win 7 games. The not having a competent backup this year is maybe even dumber than drafting Zach wilson and not trading the pick. 5 years in we still don't have a capable quarterback or offensive line.
Saying you we're high on Zach because you loved the film is an ignorant comment. You have to dig into prospect, especially QBs, and find out how they got from point A to point B. When you did that with Zach is was easy to recognize it was all smoke and mirrors. At best he should have been a late first or second round project.
I don’t watch college football, but aren’t there sone schools that you just don’t pick a qb early in the draft from? Or qb at all?
yes he did and because of that we added rodgers a HOF QB, extended Q a top 3 DT in the NFL, and have some major talent on rookie deals with sauce, GW, AVT, Breece, etc he found some gems later too like MC2 who is the best Ni back in the NFL. and found great discounts on top players like DJ reed and whitehead. not to mention stealing quincy off waivers who has been an above average starting LBer for us since then and this year has played great and JFM as well. you are being very 1 sided here. sure JD has made some mistakes but he's also done a great job turning around what was the worst roster in the NFL when he took it over. we had nothing at WR a failing high pick QB no pass rush no CBs no o-line all we had was Q and adams and he kept Q and flipped adams into 2 high picks that he nailed in the draft. sure the o-line isn't fixed yet but he fixed 4 out of those 5 major issues and tried to fix the 5th one just hasn't panned out.
This is an interest point. Are we actually a worse team than last year, or was last year a lot of over rated success against backup QBs? Can we win 7 games this season or are we going backward?
care to elaborate then? i'm willing to hear why you think that. same stuff was said about josh allen. the 2 of them were very similar as prospects. zach was taken 2nd and allen 7th.
