I know this is the time of year that all fans want their teams to sign big name free agents, even though year after year it never proves to be a winning formula. My belief is that signing a couple big name players is for teams on the cusp of making a deep playoff run, and just have a couple holes to fill. Generally, free agents tend to eat up a ton of cap space, and never really have the impact that many believe they will have. Does anyone here really think Mike Wallace deserves to be the 3rd highest paid WR in the NFL? I sure don't. Anyway, as for our Jets. Mike Tannendouche created a nightmare, in both cap space and a void of quality talent. This mess has to be cleaned up before we can move forward. Signing a big name player not only isn't feasible, it isn't even warranted. We need to dump or restructure the contracts that are killing us, and have a couple good drafts to rebuild the core of this team. I believe we have a good core of players on defense, but the offense is simply horrendous. Next year it will make sense to sign some young free agents to reasonable contracts, and if we can get a couple of solid, sensible drafts under our belts (by sensible, I mean not targeting specific players and giving up half our picks to get them, and not falling in love with combine "workout warriors"), then the following year we will be in an excellent position to grab some free agents and even pay them big if they fill holes and get us over the top. Unfortunately, this mess created by our last GM is not only gonna cost us a couple years of being able to watch quality football, but it's gonna cost us some of our best players who we cannot pay right now. I know it's painful, but it's the business of football. Mike T fucked up bad his last few years of running this franchise, and we have to pay the price for that now. It sucks bad, but it's unavoidable. Please try and keep these things in mind when you're posting "OMFG, team X just signed player Y! Why didn't we sign all the free agents that were available! ARRRGHHHHH!!!!" This simply isn't the year for it, and it was actually do us more harm than good at this point. Just my 2 cents, anyway. Feel free to disagree, but I have a feeling many of the long time posters on this site will agree with this assessment.
I don't want any big named signings, I just want us to sign someone. Get Butler in here and Goodwin. Just give us someone to get excited over.
I haven't seen too many "OMG TEAM X SIGNED PLAYER Y, FIRE IDZIK!" posts (yet). Think people are willing to be more patient given the team's situation. As they should. We're not signing any huge free agent contracts most likely. And while I think a Mike Wallace or Dannell Ellerbe would be good, neither is worth the money Miami gave them, and they'll end up cutting/trading both players in a few years most likely, just like they did with the last big name WR and LB they got (Marshall and Dansby). The draft is where this team will primarily be built. We will sign some free agents, especially now with this newfound cap room, but they'll be low-mid-level guys with some upside. And I'm quite alright with that after making unsuccessful FA splashes for years.
spot on and we all need to realize its gonna take a couple years to unwind the balls to the wall approach from 2009 to 2011....... all bubbles burst and while the jets were wowing us back in 09/10 by making 2 consecutive runs - these things more often then not come back to roost. easy to say now but the conservative days are upon us and ultimately thats a good thing.
Jets are going to lose FA's sign some low cost guys and pick up comp picks for next year. Rex is likely done. Anyone know what the max is on comp picks because I think when it's all said and done the Jet's will be there.
This makes no sense. Would you rather be excited in March, or January? Remember how excited Washington Redskins fans were in 2000? I do. Remember how bummed they were in December? I'm sure they do. If they can find a quality player at the right price to fill a position of need, they should sign him. But you don't sign a guy to excite the fans. You sign a guy because the team needs him.
I think the most is a 3rd. Someone should make a list of our FAs and what they might bring in next year.
OMG im watching mr T on the NFL network as a talking head talking about free agency with a big chalk board in front of him
The Jets wouldn't be signing Butler or Goodwin to excite fans. They are 2 guys at 2 positions of need who should come cheap. Its not like they're signing a big name corner or position that were good at. A FA signing, no matter how low level the player is, gets fans excited for the future. It gets them hoping that this player may tear it up with a change of scenery.
u get the feeling watching him that he just wants to say "hey - we went all in and came close but ultimately didn't win the big one, so i got fired; so what?"
Yea you do kinda get that, it is nice to hear him talk and not sound like a robot,im surprised he ran into TV so fast after getting fired
I completely agree with the philosophy of not signing unnecessary big names. As pointed out by the OP and others, our team needs time to financially recover from its missteps. Herm, Mangini, Tomlinson -- it's where all Jets go when they're done being a part of the game.
He'd be right in saying that. In truth though every GM gets fired when the team he has assembled collapses, even if he won a Super Bowl. Bill Polian is testament to that fact.
Same here. I will give Idzik some time so he can build his team. Big free agent signings won't get me as excited as a successful draft would.
You know that's not what I was saying, for Christs sake. Did you read my entire post? This is NOT the year for the Jets to be signing any big name FA's. This is the year for ridding ourselves of bad contracts and over the hill players, and concentrating on drafting quality players that will be making an impact in a couple years. IF we can string together a couple solid drafts and make some smart FA signings, then making a couple big name signings would make sense. This year it would hurt more than help.
Sucks that this year there are alot of big names in key postions that would have helped. I am a big on mendenhall and some of these other CB's available. Too bad we will stink up 2013 and probably make an impressions in 2014 with signings and good drafting.
We shouldn't be signing big name free agents just for the sake of signing someone. What I don't understand though is our signing of David Garrard who has been away from the game for a year, while there is someone like Jason Campbell on the FA market still.
Garrard is the signing you make if you're moving on at QB because he doesn't muddy the waters at all for anybody you happen to draft. Campbell is the signing you make if you want a real competition in training camp among veterans to be the QB for a couple of years or more.
