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The Jets traded for a couple of defensive tackles yesterday – Jowon Briggs (Cleveland Browns) and Harrison Phillips (Minnesota Vikings).
When teams make trades this time of the summer, it’s usually to get players who are likely to be cut next week, without competition for their services.
Why would the Jets trade for two defensive tackles now?
Well, Byron Cowart, who they signed as a free agent this offseason, has been out injured the last couple of weeks and is perhaps headed to IR.
Also, another veteran defensive tackle Derrick Nnadi, has had kind of a quiet camp. Look, I’m not a defensive line coach, and don’t play one on TV, but I have not written down Nnadi’s name down much this summer, and as our readers here now, I write a lot about defensive tackles.
You would have to think they plan on keeping Phillips on the regular roster for sure, but there is always a chance they could try to sneak Briggs to the practice squad at some point, a place he spent most of last year in Cleveland.
These are two run-stuffing 300-pound defensive tackles with great character . . .
Speaking of trades, the echo chamber keeps talking about how the Jets need to trade for a receiver.
That is foolish and driven by a fantasy football mindset that so many people have these days.
The Jets have no shortage of receiver talent.
The issue they have had this summer is getting those receivers the ball enough.
Like for instance, on Wednesday, Josh Reynolds, who was plenty of talent, and comes from Detroit, so he knows the Jets’ offensive scheme better than anybody, was in the witness protection program yesterday.
I might have missed it, but I didn’t see him catch a pass on Wednesday.
If you have a starting QB, who often throws to his first read (not a criticism, just the reality) how do you expect the likes of Reynolds to haul in a lot of passes when they aren’t the first read?
The Jets don’t need any more receivers. They have plenty of talent in that room, in fact they are going to have some difficult cuts.
Spare me with the nonsense they need to find a #2 to complement Garrett Wilson.
That is echo chamber rhetoric.
Reynolds is a good receiver, as is Brandon Smith, who has been one of the stars of Jets camp. They also have guys like Tyler Johnson and training camp standout Jamal Pritchett. What are they going to do with Malachi Corley?
Please stop with the yearly banging the drum about needing more receivers.
In fact, if you want to talk about receiver issues, you should be more concerned with why Garrett Wilson didn’t have more catches this summer. That is a bigger issue, Fields and Wilson getting on the same page more often, not a #2 receiver to complement Wilson. There are plenty of candidates to do that . . .
Aaron Glenn continues to remind his players to ignore the outside noise.
“You’re going ot hear a lot of outside noise – don’t even worry about that, because they don’t know,” Glenn said. “They have no idea.”
I will agree with him that there are a lot of things we don’t know.
But I get the sense that on the rare occasion where we do know, if it’s a negative narrative about his team, that might be true, he’s going to tell us we don’t know.
I’m not getting defensive here, just saying that when the media wonders about his QB going 1-5 for four yards in the second preseason game, and he attacks questioners about that fact, he’s defending his player, having his player’s back, and not a case of the media having “no idea.”
So the point here is simple – yes, there are a lot of things reporters “don’t know” and have “no idea” about, but there are some things we do, and those might get shot down by the coach as well, like a protective father when somebody questions one of their kids.
This isn’t a complaint about Glenn, who I think has done a solid job so far, but just a dose of reality about how he has his players’ backs, sometimes even when the media might have something right about one of them that might be negative, like the claim Arian Smith had drop issues at Georgia last year.
August 21, 2025
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