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Not only do the Jets need 6-7 new starters on defense (or more), they need to target great leaders in their pursuit of new players.
You have to have natural leadership ability, but also be paying well. Leadership sans production is useless.
Speeches from leaders who aren’t doing their own job on a high level often ring hollow.
Last year, in one particular game, I don’t recall which one, the two captains that went to the center of the field for the coin toss with Justin Fields and Jamien Sherwood.
Neither was playing great at the time.
This doesn’t work.
The captains need to be high-level performers. And other leaders, who might not be captains, also need to be high-level performers.
The Jets made Sherwood into something he’s not last year – a highly-paid, green-dot leader of the defense.
I’m not saying he doesn’t have leadership ability. He’s a good guy, a hard worker, who gives you all he’s got, but on other teams, he would probably be a backup linebacker/core special teams player.
He has not displayed the coverage instincts of a starting NFL linebacker. Look, don’t kill the messenger on this. He told one of the network broadcast crews late in the season that he needed to improve in coverage.
But after five NFL seasons, what are the chances of this happening?
It’s not a lack of effort, but too often he’s a see-and-go reactor, getting the crime scene a tad late. He’s too often doesn’t trust his eyes, and this leads to him not doing a great job of reading his keys in coverage.
His run defense is solid, but this isn’t the NFL when Dick Butkus was playing. The NFL has turned into a passing league, and it’s hard to have an inside linebacker who is a liability in coverage.
The Jets had two last year in Sherwood and Quincy Williams.
Williams gave up three passing TDs in a Jets blowout loss in Jacksonville. Some say it was four. They might be right, but in my notes, I only had three. However, even giving up three touchdowns to running backs in coverage in one game is far from ideal.
The Jets need to go out and get a linebacker to run the defense with great instincts and leadership ability.
If Sherwood is back with the team, he should not be the leader of the defense, but more of a role player.
Either a backup/core special teams player or the third linebacker, playing in certain packages.
If New Orleans free agent LB DeMario Davis still has his wheels, maybe make a run at him – alpha dog leader who over the years has backed it up with his play. Not only is he a former Jet who is familiar with the scene, but he was in New Orleans with Glenn for four seasons, when Aaron was the Saints’ secondary coach. They know each other well.
If he still has the requisite mobility at 37, what a perfect guy to lead a reconstructed Jets defense.
Same with Detroit free agent linebacker Alex Anzalone (no relation to “Fireman Ed”). He obviously knows the team’s new scheme from his time in Detroit with Glenn and Brian Duker.
Another guy they should make a beeline for is Texas Tech linebacker Jacob Rodriguez, college football’s best linebacker from this past season, who dominated on the defensive awards circuit.
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Chuck Bednarik Award (nation’s top defensive player)
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Butkus Award (nation’s top linebacker)
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Bronko Nagurski Trophy (nation’s top defensive player)
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Lombardi Award (nation’s top lineman or linebacker)
He finished last season with four interceptions and seven forced fumbles. He’s a turnover-forcing machine, something the Jets need after a rough 2025-26 season on that front, which included forcing no picks.
He gets high marks for both instincts and leadership. He would be perfect at perhaps pick 44, the second of two second-round picks.
This defense not only needs more playmakers but better leadership on the field. It has to come from defenders playing at a high level, not from anointing leaders who are struggling in their own jobs, so their words ring hollow.
March 4, 2026
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