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What an amazing trade.
Getting a one, a two and DT Mazi Smith for Quinnen Williams, who is a good, not great player who has a bloated contract now commensurate with his contributions.
The amazing thing to me is that some of these analytics sites claim Williams gets high marks for his run defense. Not sure what the hell they are looking at.
Did they watch the Cincinnati game? With two rookie guards, neither picked in the first two rounds, the Bengals were running up the middle with ease. Obviously, Williams was not on the field for all the big runs, but he was for plenty.
While pass rush is important from defensive tackles, in my opinion, run defense is more important. Great edge-rushers, you can get away with average run defense if they get you double-digit sacks. We have seen plenty of those, but to me, if you are going to pay a defensive tackle big bucks, he needs to dominate against the run.
When Mo Wilkerson and Kris Jenkins were on the team, you flat-out could not run at them.
Teams successfully ran at Williams, who is a little undersized, with regularity. This issue was ignored by the media up until last off-season, when Williams admitted it himself. Of course, he made some nice plays against the run along the way, but there were too many big runs at him mixed in as well over his time with the team.
In his only media availability in the off-season, he was asked about working with the new staff and said, “They just telling me what I’m bad at and what I’m good at and just trying to get on the same page and go in the right direction right there.”
So that gave an easy follow-up, since he said he was “bad” at something, for somebody to ask what he needs to get better at. Otherwise it wouldn’t have happened.
Nobody seemed to be aware that he needed to get better at something until he said it. His superstar reputation with the press transcended any critical analysis.
So when he was asked what he needed to get better at, he said, “A lot of mistakes, man, especially when it come down to the run game and block shed and extension in my arms.”
After the Bengals game, we wrote the following on this website:
“The run defense was pretty bad, with the Bengals rushing for 181 yards. There were major issues up the middle, with Jets defensive tackles, whether it was the starters or backups, got easily handled too often by interior offensive linemen.
“Quinnen Williams didn’t have a good game against the run. He finished with one assisted tackle. That was all that was on the stat sheet. Tough penalty by Williams late first half. On third-and-four, on the Jets’ 25, Williams jumped offsides, giving the Bengals a first down, and they scored a couple of plays later.
“He also got locked up by one blocker on Samaje Perine’s 32-yard TD in the third quarter. That wasn’t the only big run up the middle that he struggled to disengage from a block. If they get a good offer for Williams before the trade deadline, perhaps they should mull it. Forget the media hype – based on the film, he’s a good player, but perhaps not elite, and when you pay a DT $24 million a year, you are paying for elite.”
So to get a first and second round picks, and a first-round defensive tackle Mazi Smith in exchange for a good interior pass rusher who is average against the run, is quite a haul.
The Jets’ defense has been bad this year, aside from the Denver and Carolina games, and the team is 1-7.
Watching the Jets defense this year, in games against QBs not named Bo Nix and Bryce Young, you could see they need a lot of work and an infusion of new talent at all three levels, and all this draft capital will help them do that.
Nobody should have been off limits if the offer was right at the trade deadline. Nobody!
So trading two players from this unit, Williams and Sauce Gardner, and landing three ones and a two, along with a couple of players with a lot of potential, is quite impressive.
And Williams, like Gardner, probably needed a change of scenery. All the losing was eating at him.
So this is a win-win for the player (Williams) and the Jets.
November 5, 2025
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