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This is just coach-speak. It’s rhetoric. File it in the category of “what did you expect him to say.”
The New York Jets made a mistake of biblical proportions not starting Mike Vick earlier.
There is no way around it.
Jets QB coach David Lee doesn’t see it that way.
“I would not look back and do anything differently,” Lee said. “I am not going to second-guess anything we have done. I think we have done the right things. There’s no looking back here.”
No sir, you guys didn’t do the right things.
Yes sir, how you guys handled this should be second-guessed.
This is all rhetoric. It’s not worth the tape machine it was taped on.
Lee seems like a nice enough fellow, and he’s falling on a sword for John Idzik who is the Dr. Frankenstein in this Geno Smith experiment.
The Jets 2014 campaign looks like it was wasted due to Idzik’s experiment which was clearly backed by Woody Johnson.
“I have a lot of confidence in Geno,” Johnson said on October 2. “I think Geno can be a franchise quarterback. I really do. I see traits in him and we all see traits in him that are extremely positive and (there’s) room for a lot of optimism.”
When asked about his willingness to go through the growing pains of a young quarterback, Johnson said, “I knew we were going to get.”
So Johnson was on-board with this, which clearly helps Idzik’s job security.
Johnson also said, “We’re going to try to win every game. So we’re going to deploy the resources that we see week-to-week are going to help us win and sustain the winning, not just one or two plays, but we’re looking at it over the whole season and forward.”
He clearly the owner felt that could do two things at once – develop a quarterback and win games. Sometimes it’s hard to marry those two concepts successfully.
Let’s cut to the chase people.
Lee and others can tap dance around this issue all they want.
I don’t have to. Neither do you.
The bottom line is quarterback situation was mishandled – big-time.
There is no way around that.
Of course they are going to say they aren’t looking back and have no regrets.
That is the spin we should expect now, and for the rest of the season.
But it’s important to view this situation through the prism of common sense.
If the Jets wanted a chance to compete for a playoff spot this year, Mike Vick gave them a much better chance to do that, especially with that stretch of tough quarterbacks (though Jay Cutler isn’t looking so good right now), they faced six games in a row.
With the kind of schedule the Jets had, using the season as a developmental platform for a green quarterback, was an ill-advised concept.
So no, to offer a retort to Lee, the Jets didn’t do the right thing.
Not by a long shot.
They made their bed, and now they must sleep in it.
November 12, 2014
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