It's that time for another Jets rant. I was going to do this earlier but I needed some time to collect my thoughts or else this would have been more of a ramble.
So I've finally come to the point where I'm ready to blow it up. It's a hard conclusion for me to come to because I do believe Rex Ryan will be a pretty successful head coach in the NFL. Unfortunately if he does, his stop with the Jets will be the place he made the mistakes he will learn from. If I'm making a pie chart...screw it I'm making a pie chart:
As you can see, I place most of the blame on Mike Tennenbaum. I understand Rex Ryan has input on players but when it comes to putting a bad roster together, the GM is the one who needs to take the fall. Tennenbaum loves trading up in the draft to get guys he wants (Revis, Harris, Greene, Sanchez) and it's kind of worked out (and I'm counting Sanchez as kind of working out if you go back and look at that trade*). That's on Tennenbaum. Rex can coach defense. The history is there as a coordinator and in his first couple of years as a head coach. Ideally I would still like to give him a couple of more years but someone needs to be the scapegoat for this year. Brian Schottenheimer was the guy for last year so they can't go back to the Offensive Coordinator well again and fire Tony Sparano. So the guy has to be Tennenbaum. Unfortunately for Rex they need to be a package deal. It's unfair to bring in a new GM and not let him hire a new Head Coach. And if they made the new GM keep Rex it would only be delaying the inevitable that situation never works out. Just cut ties and blow the thing up.
Where I fault Rex Ryan the most is actually in the hiring of Tony Sparano. That was a miserable hire and you could see it coming from a mile away. Just because Rex wants to run a certain type of offense doesn't mean they had the pieces to run it.
Notice on the pie chart that Mark Sanchez isn't represented. I actually feel really bad for this guy. He has the talent to succeed in this league. I'm sure of it. But the Jets broke him and they did it at every turn. The receiving core they marched out there in 2011 was so old and incapable of getting open. They had Santonio Holmes as a #1 when in reality he is a glorified slot receiver, Plaxico Burress who was helpful in the red zone but completely unable to get any separation between the 20s and an on his last legs Derrick Mason. Gone was Jericho Cotchery who was his most reliable receiver and gone was Braylon Edwards who was the only guy on the team who could actually stretch the field. Somehow he managed to throw for 26 TDs and run for 6 more. Then forget about the Tim Tebow disaster. I tried to talk myself in to is possibly working but every Jets fan knew that it was going to be a disaster. Not only didn't it work from an on field aspect, the media writing about Tebow week in and week out has made this season unbearable. I would trade this season in for the 1-15 season in a heartbeat.
If the Jets had lost a normal game to the Patriots on Thanksgiving then I actually think this regime would be safe for next year. There are a few legitimate excuses for a down year. Their best defensive player (if not the best defensive player in the league) and their "best" offensive player are out for the year. But to lose the way they lost on a football holiday on national television means heads have to roll.
As a lifelong Jets fan I would like to close out with a prediction:
At the urging of Woody Johnson Tim Tebow gets his shot. The Jets finishing up the last five games facing teams with a combined record of 18-37 they run the table with Tebow at the helm. The 9-7 record doesn't get them in the playoffs but it saves every one's job. The Jets brass are convinced that Tim Tebow is their guy for 2013 completely ignoring the fact that they were playing lousy teams. Tim Tebow being a disgusting NFL quarterback leads the Jets to a 4-12 2013 season wasting yet another year.
*Jets move from 17 to 5, give up a 2nd rounder in the same draft and send Kenyon Coleman, Abram Elam and Brett Ratliff to Cleveland. Look at what Washington gave up for RGIII this year (two future 1st round picks and a 2nd rounder in this past draft. And that was only to move up 4 spots). The Jets gave up essentially nothing to get Sanchez. The worst thing a Jets fan can do is wonder how the draft would have shaken out if that trade never happened. The Browns traded the 17th pick that was the Jets pick to Tampa to select Josh Freeman. Cleveland flubbed the 2nd round pick they got from the Jets (David Veikune) but the player who went with the pick right after was LeSean McCoy. I'm not super high on Freeman but the offense does seem like it would be in better hands with Freeman and a do-it-all back like Shady McCoy doesn't it?
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