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Doing it any other way is “Amateur Hour.”
Programs that annoint players to starting jobs are bush league.
And it’s hard to win doing things like that.
Good programs, good cultures, always embrace competition at every position, and never stray from that.
Teams that just coronate players into starters immediately, just because of where they were drafted, are acting in a foolish fashion.
As John Houseman used to say on those Smith Barney commercials, you’ve got to “earn it.”
And that is how Robert Saleh rolls. He refuses to annoint Zach Wilson as the Jets’ starting quarterback just yet.
Doing that, would be damaging to the culture he’s trying to build.
“The biggest thing we’re trying to do, and call it coachspeak, we’re trying to give all 90 guys a chance to establish themselves as starters. And we want to give everybody an opportunity to go out there and play and showcase who they are,” Saleh told Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer.
So to start training camp, you will see all the quarterbacks in camp getting premium reps.
“So you’ll see rotation, like you saw in OTAs this year,” Saleh told Breer. “We’d go to the back end (of the roster) and give everyone a chance to be a starter, and step in there with the ones to see how they communicate, see how they work.”
In Saleh’s mind, quarterback is no different than any other position.
“Same thing with the D-line and linebackers and then on the O-line, at running back, receiver, just having that constant rotation,” Saleh said. “So yeah, the quarterback part is the same, those guys are all going to work. Will [Wilson] take the first snap? Probably. But at the same time, it all comes down to what he can handle, and how he can handle things going through training camp and the preseason.”
And that is way it should be, at least if you want to build a winning program.
I have been around the Jets for about a quarter century, and I’ve seen a lot annointing over the years, and it usually didn’t work out well.
Why would you ever put a high pick in the starting line-up, when they didn’t earn it in the off-season, training camp and preseason games, if you want to win?
Why would you start a high pick if they don’t know the playbook well?
This all seems counterintuitive.
But it has happened quite a bit.
Clearly a big reason is confirmation bias, which is according to Simply Psychology, “Is the tendency of people to favor information that confirms their existing beliefs or hypotheses. It happens when a person gives more weight to evidence that confirms their beliefs and undervalues evidence that could disprove it.”
So basically, to confirm the brilliance of their draft pick, they will start a player come heck or high water, even if they guy isn’t ready and hasn’t earned it.
How does that make sense?
It doesn’t.
And Joe Douglas and Saleh don’t get involved in this nonsense, and that is why Wilson will have to wait before being named the starter for the opener.
Of course there is a good chance that will happen, but they will make him earn it.
July 19, 2021
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