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Joe Douglas deserves credit for not wasting time trying to fix this . . .
As we mentioned here before, the receiving corps the Jets used against New England was far from ideal.
This isn’t meant to cast aspersions on Jamison Crowder, Braxton Berrios and Robby Anderson, but there wasn’t anyone in this group who is going to win jump balls. You have two slot receivers (Crowder and Berrios) and 6-3, 175-pound Anderson.
Not a good idea, especially against the Patriots known for their tight man coverage. Against them, you need the ability to go up and win 50-50 balls in tight coverage. That really isn’t in the wheelhouse of Crowder, Berrios and Anderson.
So hat-tip to Jets GM Joe Douglas for going out today and signing 6-3 receiver Vyncint Smith off the Houston Texans’ practice squad. Not only is he tall, but he has 4.36 speed.
The Jets are getting Smith at good time. He came into the league last year as an undrafted free agent out of Limestone College. He was very raw when he arrived in Houston, so last year was kind of redshirt season for him where he learned a ton from the Texans coaches. Same this off-season, summer, and the first three weeks of this season on the Texans’ practice squad. So that development should benefit the Jets.
Look, Joe Douglas clearly inherited a mess. That is pretty obvious right now. Perhaps he made a couple of moves himself that were questionable, like signing kicker Kaare Verdik for week one.
But Douglas signed a six-year contract to be the Jets GM. He’s only been in the building since June. Let’s see what he does moving forward to fix some of the issues.
Signing Smith perhaps will help fix an issue. The Texans didn’t want to lose him, but he couldn’t pass up this opportunity with the Jets. It’s a good sign for the Jets that the Texans were bummed out about losing Smith . . .
The Jets aren’t going to practice during the bye-week. This probably surprises some people since they played so poorly the first three weeks of the season.
“Really, the bye week, I haven’t done practice in a long time,” Gase said. “It’s usually been kind of a week to get in the meeting room, kind of go over, especially this early – the first three weeks – we kind of had a plan as far as how we wanted to take this with the players of going back through some of the basics of what we’re doing schematically, just kind of look at some of the stuff that we’ve done from these first three games and make sure that we’re really getting tightened up and cleaning up and make sure that if there are any questions, we get those answered. That’s just kind of been the way I’ve done it.”
Gase twice referenced here how he’s “done it.” I’m not looking to be flippant here, but was his program particularly successful? They had their moments, but he was fired after three years. Perhaps all the issues down there weren’t his fault, but I’m not sure I get all these references to how he did in Miami. This isn’t like Matt Patricia going to Detroit and trying to do things like they did in New England, where they have won six Super Bowls.
And this is another example of why the Jets’ corporate structure might not be ideal.
As you know, the Jets are run by Christopher Johnson. Below him are the three top officials in the organization, President Hymie Elhai who runs the business operation, GM Joe Douglas who signs and drafts the players and decides who is on the 53 man roster, and Adam Gase who coaches the team and decides who plays on game day. They are all equal and none of them report to each other, just to Johnson.
Okay, so the Jets had a really bad start to the season. Let’s say you are of the opinion that Gase hasn’t done the best coaching job and needs some input. Okay, who is going to give it to him? Douglas and Elhai want to say something to him, they really can’t. They are equals. I saw Douglas and Elhai having a long talk after the game in the locker room in Foxboro. First thing I thought of when I saw them talking was, “They can talk all the want, but they really can’t say much to Adam about how he’s coaching the team, because he doesn’t report to either one of them.”
Christopher Johnson is a heck of a guy, and a smart individual, but does he have the football background to suggest to Gase what he might want to change football-wise? Not really.
So this is a little flawed set-up in my opinion. This is the kind of time you need a football czar to have a long talk with the coach and make him change some things.
September 23, 2019
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