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Why are some so obsessed with this?
A reporter opened Adam Gase’s season-ending presser with questions about Le’Veon Bell’s involvement in the second half of the Jets win at Buffalo. Bell finished the game with 16 carries for 41 yards and a 2.6 average. Bell had 12 carries in the first half and four in the second half.
Here the exchange with the reporter from today to open the presser:
Q)Can you clarify what was said postgame regarding Le’Veon Bell’s lack of involvement in the second half?
Gase: We had seven plays in the third quarter. He had one snap, Bilal (Powell) had three, we were four wide receivers, one tight end.
Q)Why didn’t Bell get a touch until two-thirds into the fourth quarter?
Gase: That’s football.
Like I said yesterday, I don’t get this obsession with Bell’s workload. Who cares? Powell is a good player. Give him the rock also. And, honestly, Bell had a pedestrian season, rushing 245 times for 789 yards and a 3.2 average. He did contribute 66 catches as well. This narrative that Bell should almost never come off the field, and always has to be the focal point of the Jets rushing attack, is misguided, especially this deep into an average season by the player.
The next two questions were as follows:
Q)Would you like Bell back as the starting running back in 2020?
Gase: He’s under contract for three more years. You can ask Joe (Douglas) tomorrow.
Q)Would you like Bell back in 2020?
Gase: You can ask Joe tomorrow. I’m not in charge of personnel.
So as you can imagine, with social media, this exchange became a national story.
NBC Sports Headline – “Adam Gase doesn’t answer when asked if he wants Le’Veon Bell back.”
A couple of things to consider here.
First of all, the reporter asking the questions is an enemy of Gase, so his short answers might be connected to that.
As for whether Gase wants Bell back next year, we can only speculate at this point.
The relationship between the two men didn’t get off to a great start this spring.
First Bell skipped most of the Jets off-season workout progame, aside from the three-day mandatory minicamp. This could not have sit well with Gase. If you’re a first-year head coach, would you want the centerpiece of your offense skipping the first off-season program, when you installing a new playbook? Probably not.
Then in May, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport announced, after Jets GM Mike Maccagnan was fired, that Gase believed the former Jets executive overpaid the running back. Even though Bell said all the right things when asked about this, Rapoport’s announcement couldn’t have sat well with Bell.
And then you had Bell, who was inactive for the Week 14 Dolphins-Jets game due to an illness, spotted bowling at an alley near the Jets facility on the Saturday night before the game. Perhaps this wasn’t the best optic, and not helpful to the Jets’ football culture.
You also have an issue with Bell sometimes not hitting holes fast enough, which can’t make Gase happy.
What’s going to happen here?
A Bell trade is certainly a possibility this off-season.
And you know what, trading Bell to his former team, Pittsburgh, would make a ton of sense.
They could use a running back, and QB Ben Roethlisberger, who missed most of this season with an elbow injury, loves to throw to Bell out of the backfield, a nice option for a thrower coming off arm surgery.
December 30, 2019
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