That could be an excellent argument for drafting Cam Thomas in rd 2... he can play NT and DE in a 3-4 (Mayock's words).
Devito is a pretty good 3-4 end in the respect that he is powerful and holds his block well, freeing up the LB's. What he does not do up to this point is add to the pass rush. If Devito can get that part of the game, great. If not he is still prety good. Unfortunately Ellis is 33. Ellis in Ryan's 3-4 hybrid would be a beast. A young Ellis in this system is a monster. He is just good/great all around De and very underrated (not necessarily by Jets fans). Douglas is a serviceable starter. He is similar to Devito but I think a little more one dimensional. He provides 0 pass rush. (Yes, I am fully aware of a DE's role in a 3-4.) I am not too worried about the age on OL. I am more concerned with the D-line and OLB's. The Jets need to infuse some young talent in the defensive front 7 without a doubt. The Jets need to stock the trenches first and foremost. Lets face it the Offensive line was the engine of the team. It kept the Defense off the field and Sanchez upright for the most part. They allowed the Jets to get as far as they did and gave Sanchez the ability to grow into the job. This team could really have been a disaster this year.
Yeah well euthanize me then......never heard of the word. Besides euthanize is infinitely funnier, I am going with that.
I've been torn over which position I'd like to see the Jets take first, but I'm definitely leaning towards NT now. You're right, it would definitely allow the DL to hold for one more season (in which we'd probably see a lot of rotation among the DEs) and then we could grab a DE in 2011.
Let's not forget that some of the replacements for our "Golden Oldies" may be on the roster already. It may be guys like Slauson (the G we drafted last year who played for Callahan in college) or Westerman (thinking Bryan Thomas replacement more than DE). I'm not saying they'll definitely make the step up, but the coaching staff probably has an idea of who has the potential to be a starter with a little more seasoning and time to pick things up. My point is, we may have some young depth where we don't know what we have yet. To be honest, I think we could feasibly take just about any position in the draft and you could make a case we need one, with the possible exceptions of Running Back, Tight End, or Quarterback. That puts us in a place where we can just focus on getting the best football player we can and fill in the holes with what depth we have.
