Jets should play young talent in 2017
The New York Jets are not going to be good this season. In fact, they might be the worst team in the NFL, depending on whether the Cleveland Browns can get anything from their approximate collection of 809 draft picks over the past two seasons.
With that in mind, the quarterback competition in East Rutherford, NJ should be slanted. While Josh McCown is undoubtedly the best of the options, he should be grabbing a seat while Bryce Petty and Christian Hackenberg battle it out for snaps. Petty is going into his fourth season with the team, and yet has only logged a handful of starts due to youth and injuries. Hackenberg, a second-round selection of a year ago, didn’t sniff the field in 2016.
However, the Penn State product was making some headlines on Monday, claiming he’s ready to make a move toward the field, per ESPN.
“I’m a lot more comfortable in Year 2,” he said Monday, speaking to reporters for the first time since the end of the season. “I really, really feel good about where I’m at.”
Nobody is nieve enough to believe Hackenberg would come in and play like a veteran right off the bat. If he wins the job, he is going to take his lumps, much in the way every young quarterback does. Perhaps he takes nothing but lumps and ultimately proves he can’t get the job done. Perhaps he comes in, plays horribly and allows Petty to take the job from him.
Or, maybe Hackenbergc comes in and gives the Jets a taste of hope at the position, something they have not truly had since the days of Joe Namath back in the 1960s.
Regardless, any and all outcomes help to solve the situation under center. New York would either have a good young quarterback in Hackenberg/Petty, or it could grab one in the draft next spring. Most everyone agrees that the upcoming class of signal-callers are phenomenal, and if the Jets are atrocious, they’ll have the inside track to Josh Rosen of UCLA or Sam Darnold of USC.
No matter what happens this season, the Jets are shockingly in good position. If they stun the football world and make a run toward the playoffs, they likely have some kind of good results at the league’s most important position. While it’s unlikely, stranger things have happened.
The worst outcome would be allowing McCown to win the job out of camp and then subsequently keep it, while leading the team to 6-7 wins. Then nobody knows about the talent behind him, and you don’t get a high enough pick to land one of the aforementioned quarterbacks.
The Jets are likely going to be bad no matter what they do at quarterback in 2017. if they’re smart, they go young and at least get answers.
