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In today’s edition of One Jets Drive, we take a look at the Jets staying in Florham Park and also Matt Schaub signing with the Baltimore Ravens . . .
Matt Schaub signed a one-year deal with the Baltimore Ravens today.
The Jets were interested.
One Jets beat writer tweeted, “Breathe easy, #Jets fans RT @SI_PeterKing: The Ravens have signed Matt Schaub.”
Nothing should be done for fans to breathe easy.
And that obviously didn’t happen here. The Jets were interested in Schaub, but he signed elsewhere.
You know what makes fans breathe easy – winning.
You don’t make any personnel decisions based on fan and media reaction.
The football people need to make football decisions based on a ton of film study, background checks, scheme-fits and so forth.
Never, ever, worry about how the public is going to react.
People who makes personnel decisions worried about the public reaction, end up watching the games with the public.
The Jets were smart to look into Schaub.
He’s a two-time Pro Bowler who has thrown 130 touchdowns to 86 interceptions.
No question he had a bad year in 2013. It happens to the best of them.
The year before that he made the Pro Bowl. Last year, the Raiders decided to write-off the season, and go with Derek Carr, and let him develop on the job. Schaub never had a chance.
I’m not putting him in Canton, but there is such a dearth of top-shelf quarterback talent, most of the league has to struggle to find an answer at this all-important position.
Going after Schaub was smart. Quarterbacks are so hard to find in this league. Why not add Schaub and throw him into the hopper with journeyman Ryan Fitzpatrick and work-in-progress Geno Smith? Why not? Is Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers coming to town? We need to keep it real about the quarterback landscape in the NFL. It’s not pretty.
So to be dismissive of Schaub, considering how barren the quarterback desert is, makes no sense to me.
And I don’t think Todd Bowles and Mike Maccagnan are going to govern by public opinion polls.
And that is a good thing for the Jets organization . . .
As first reported here, the Jets are going to train in Florham Park.
This decision makes a lot of sense.
First of all, the Jets have a state-of-the-art training facility, perhaps the best in the league. It cost them $75 million to build.
It has cutting edge training rooms, weight rooms, video technology and so forth.
Also, and perhaps as important as anything else, they have an indoor field house to practice on rainy days. The Jets had no indoor practice option in Cortland, which is given to a few storms a summer.
Remember the Giants used to train at SUNY-Albany, but Tom Coughlin pulled the plug on this, in large part, due to the lack of an indoor training option on rainy days.
Another issue is that it’s hard to get players in and out of Cortland, whether it be for medical reasons, or for transactions.
Florham Park is 20-25 minutes from Newark Airport, one of the busiest airports in country.
Also, the Jets affliated hospital is in Morristown, five minutes from Florham Park. From a medical standpoint, Florham Park makes more sense.
And let’s not forget the Jets have a first-year coach and GM trying to get their sea legs. It easier for them to do that at home, not as part of a traveling road show.
March 31, 2105
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