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Sam Darnold is right.
He was asked what he could improve upon from the Miami game after watching the tape.
“I think I can play a little bit faster, go through reads a little bit faster,” Darnold said.
Bingo!
No more needs to be said . . .
Powerful stuff from a beat writer about the 2019 Jets.
“The Jets have been an unmitigated disaster under Gase’s watch, a collection of lost souls led by a blind man in the forest. Calling this team a dumpster fire is an affront to dumpster fires everywhere.” – Manish Mehta, New York Daily News.
You rarely see this kind of stuff from beat writers. Very, very rare to see a beat-writer unload on a team and a coach having to see them every day and look these people in the eyes. Sports talk hosts – yes, columnists – maybe, but beat writers, you almost never see this.
Usually beat writer try to be a little more self-restrained and measured.
From a beat writer standpoint, this is unicorn material, and I’m not even judging, just telling you how rare this is. I challenge anyone to find a credentialed beat writer, covering any team, in any sport, in any city, writing in such a vitriolic fashion on a regular basis. If you find it, please e-mail us at Jets Confidential.
So are the Jets “A collection of lost souls led by a blind man in the forest?”
I will say what I’ve said before. Adam Gase has not done a great job in his first year as Jets coach, but this team has no pass rush, substandard corners, a struggling offensive line and a young, green developing quarterback who was over-hyped by the many in the media, and the team’s social media department. When I say “over-hyped” I’m not talking long-term. A couple of years from now we could be having an entirely different conversation about Darnold. After all, he’s only 22. What I’m saying is the hype surrounding him in 2019, doesn’t match what he brings to the table in 2019. He’s clearly a major work-in-progress. So while Gase hasn’t done a top-shelf job coaching the 2019 Jets, the talent on this roster isn’t very good.
And you can’t just look at the offense, because Gase is an offense guy, because lacking a pass rush and quality starting corners is a recipe for disaster in a pass-happy NFL.
One other thing. I do not blame Gase for the opening day loss to Buffalo. That was on the GM, who signed an inexperienced kicker (Kaare Vedvik) to replace an inexperienced kicker (Taylor Bertolet), which made little sense, and the Jets lost their opener because of their placekicker.
Once again, I’m not a special-pleader for Gase, and he hasn’t done a great job this year, but objectively speaking, the personnel missteps of the former GM, who was fired May 15, are certainly hurting the Jets on the field in 2019, including the ill-advised signing of speed-challenged CB Trumaine Johnson to a monster contract last year. He was put on IR this week and likely will never play again for the Jets. So now we can officially say, this was one of the worst signings in not only Jets history, but NFL history – $34 million fully guaranteed at signing, and he played 17 games for the Jets, and was pedestrian at best, and often didn’t play the sticks. He made $2 million a game and played like a journeyman corner . . .
NFL.com’s Mike Garofolo announced that the Jets claimed CB Maurice Canady off waivers from the Baltimore Ravens. He was a sixth-round pick of the Ravens in the 2016 draft out of Virginia who bounced between their practice squad and regular roster.
The Jets move to claim Canady was smart. The Ravens were probably trying to move him back to their practice squad, but the Jets pounced on him. The Ravens recently got back cornerback Jimmy Smith from the injury list, and traded with the Los Angeles Rams for Marcus Peters, and they needed to sign a kick returner, so they had to get rid of somebody, and they went with Canady, and now he’s a Jet.
November 6, 2019
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