The New York Jets‘ quarterback situation is uncertain yet again, raising the interesting question: Who is going to be the starter?
At least we know that it won’t be Ryan Fitzpatrick — a huge relief for New York Jets fans who witnessed FitzTragic more so than FitzMagic this past season.Next season, the Jets currently only have two quarterbacks signed in Bryce Petty and rookie Christian Hackenberg. The other two quarterbacks that were on the roster, Fitzpatrick and Geno Smith, are likely goners.
The Fitzpatrick reclamation project was a failure. After capturing lightning in the bottle last year, the Jets tried to do it again.
Fitzpatrick had the third-most interceptions in the league while maintaining the second lowest completion percentage and third least yards per attempt.
The journeyman also had the lowest quarterback rating of all qualifying quarterbacks in 2016 and it was a $12 million dollar mistake that, apparently, no one in the Jets front office is willing to regret.
“With Ryan, when you look back on that one,” said Jets general manager, Mike Maccagnan, via the New York Jets Media Relations Department. “I felt comfortable signing Ryan when we signed him coming off the 2015 season at that time. Obviously, I think Ryan would say the same thing. I think he holds himself to a high standard. It was unfortunate. We weren’t, as a team, able to recreate some of the success we had the previous season. But from that standpoint, when we made the deal, looking forward, I thought that was an important part of the team to bring back and keep in place.”
“Do I regret that? No, Jets’ CEO, Woody Johnson also said. “Because it looked like the right decision at the time that we did it. I have a lot of respect for him as a quarterback and as a person. No, I don’t have any regrets.”
You can’t blame the Jets for trying, but now it’s time to accept that it failed and move on. So, should the Jets draft another quarterback? That’d make it the fifth time in six years that they drafted a passer.
It’s not usually recommended to have three young guys battling it out. That would be a bit unorthodox. But to be honest, there’s nothing orthodox about the Jets and the way they develop quarterbacks.
As we discovered during the 2016 season, the Jets aren’t just a quarterback away from the promised land. The more fruitful option would be to build through the draft.
The Jets have a lot of areas of need: offensive line, secondary and linebacker/edge. They could fill those holes with a draft pick and a vet or two.
Which brings us to the meat and potatoes of this conversation: Who should the Jets chase? Let’s go through some of the options that could be available, one way or another:
