If he was making 650k a year and taking up that kind of cap space I'd have no problem keeping him around as depth. He'd represent no real investment and there'd be no expectation he was going to play except in the event of an emergency. The problem is that with his contract there's no way at all he sits on the bench and there's no reason to believe he'd be any better at 3-4 DE than he was at 3-4 NT. The guy is basically a fairly elusive short defensive lineman with short arms and a low center of gravity. That's a 4-3 3T tackle. It's what he was drafted to be, sitting next to a real NT in Jason Ferguson in the Jet's 4-3. Expecting him to fit anywhere on that 3-4 front is a little bit like expecting Jonathan Vilma to fit anywhere behind it: a pipe dream that smart professionals would have avoided in the first place.
Anyting besides your wild speculations to back up the "must win" season claims? I have not read anything on where Woody has come out and said that. Under Woodys ownership: Parcells quit, Belichick lasted one day before leaving, Groh resigned, Edwards left us. I don't exactly see a whole lot of coachs getting the ax there? Groh is the only one you could argue was run out even, but that seed to be more the players than Woody's doing. So again I ask, besides in your mind, why is this a must wins season for Mangini?
Because he'll have had 3 seasons to improve the team from the 4-12 mess he took over. If he repeats that kind of season again it'll be pretty clear evidence that he's not able to do the job. I think a bad season by the Jets costs him his job and might well cost Tannenbaum his as well. Of course we don't really know all that much about Woody as an owner at this point. The Jet's successes in the early part of his ownership were built on the foundation that Bill Parcells left him. It's possible that he's just as bad an owner as the guy in San Francisco. In that case he might well keep Mangini around for a few more 4-12's. If he did that for long enough he might even be as bad as the guy in Arizona. My guess is that he's better than that though and that he would punt if 3rd down turned into a disaster this year after 2nd down gave away all the momentum of the 1st down trick play.
The 3 million bonus he's due + a 2 million salary would be too much for the Jets to pay a backup. There's no way that D-Rob on the field is going to help the Jets next season. He might well be better than a no-talent backup if an injury caused the brown stuff to hit the fan, but that's the level at which he might contribute.
I agree your stance seems logical. I highly doubt we go 4-12 again, but is 7-9 enough to show improvement or does he need to make the playoffs again? I guess that is a question for another thread though. There seems to be alot of the "must win" season mentality, and I just don't see the proof to back it up. The Jets really look to be adding parts both for today and tomorrow. Yes we should be improved, but its not a break the bank to win type of season comming up.
The 3 million is already gone so we might as well forget about it. Why does it matter if he's getting paid $2 million as long as we have the cap space to do it? What's the point of having extra cap space that you aren't going to use? If it were a matter of signing another starter or additional quality depth instead then I can see the point, but as of right now it seems as if we're pretty much done with FA and only need to worry about DRobs contract and signing rookies.
This is a buiness, and in buisnesses people want returns on there investments. Would you pay a mechanic a 100 dollars an hour if you dont think he can fix your car. Its essentially the same thing. Why pay him 12 million to not do a job. CUT HIM and get rid of this disaster.
I do not think next season is a "must win" situation for the Jets and their management team, far from it in fact. I do think it's a "must not lose badly" season though. 4-12 doesn't buy you that much rope. I think 7-9 buys the current regime one more year to demonstrate that they can find a winning formula for 2009. I think they might survive 6-10. I don't think they survive 5-11 or less, and certainly Mangini is not likely to survive it.
As I understand it, and I might be wrong, the 3M roster bonus is due on June 1st. That's the date the Jets have to make the D-Rob decision by. I'm guessing that if the market for him stays all glued up that the Jets will wait until they see what the draft brings before they make the final decision on him. I expect them to cut him in the week after the draft though. They won't want to pay 3 million dollars to maintain the option to keep him on the roster, not after all the cash they shelled out in free agency.
Don't overlook the obvious too. If we rework his contract he may become much more easily tradeable. That Denver deal apparently fell apart not because he failed his physical , they were willing to overlook that, but because they couldn't reach a new agreement with him. Of course, for that same reason, I can't see any way in the world he would negotiate with us either. In the end he will just be cut.
If Denver couldn't reach an agreement with him what makes you think that the Jets can? D-Rob's absolute best option right now is that the Jets pay out the 3 million dollar bonus on June 1st and then are forced to keep him on the roster without renegotiating after that because of the money already invested in him. His next best option is to hit the market as a UFA and make his best deal. Both of those scenarios are pressuring the Jets at this point and I don't see how they get out of the trap, other than by cutting D-Rob as late in the process as they can to keep some pressure on him as well. The time to trade him was last season. They missed that window and none of the other windows are opening out on anything that looks much more promising than a dark alley.
Haha..funny, I thought about that and edited my original post while you were probably writing this one.
I was under the impression that we got hit with that $3 mill against the cap regardless of whether we cut him or not, but that could be wrong. I hope you're right. If that is in fact the case, I agree with you that he'll be cut. edit: we could then sign him back for a reasonable salary.
Agreed. Can can certainly back-up all 3 DL positions if need be. Cuts down on the head count that we would have to carry for depth. Plus I really don't get the hate for DRob. The guys has been a good soldier regardless and an adequate hold-the-fort guy at NT. He has been put into a lose/lose situation and never bitched and maoned about it. Granted that we may have moved one season too late in trading him for the best possible return. But if we can't get fair value in a trade and if he's willing to take a pay cut then why not keep him around for depth?
Woody may not have to pay it, but I'm pretty sure we still take the cap hit. I could give 2 shits what Woody has to pay, though I'm sure he's not in agreement. I got this from wiki, but I remember reading similar text from more reliable sources before. Take it for what it's worth. "if a player retires, is traded, or is cut before June 1st, all remaining bonus is applied to the salary cap for the current season. If the payroll change occurs after June 1st, the current cap is unchanged, and the next year's cap must absorb the entire remaining bonus."
