Josh McCown: Potential Jets

Josh McCown was one of the quarterback prizes of free agency a year ago. He was coming off a great half season of play in place of an injured Jay Cutler. The Buccaneers gave him a 2 year, $10 million contract and immediately named him the starter over Mike Glennon. Now a year later off a bad year McCown has been cut. Should the Jets swoop in?

The Jets might have as big of a need as any team in the league at quarterback, but I don't see McCown as a viable option. Just look at some of the big picture indicators. He's 35 and has never once started 16 games. He was just on his sixth team. His career average per pass attempt is 6.6 yards. That's lower than Mark Sanchez's career rate. He has thrown at least 166 passes in six different NFL seasons. In four of those six he threw more interceptions than touchdown. And in a fifth, his TD-INT rate was a less than robust 11-10.

McCown put up some gaudy stats with a top notch supporting cast in Marc Trestman's quarterback-friendly offense in 2013. He threw 13 touchdowns against 1 interception. He completed 65% of his passes and averaged 8.1 yards per attempt. Was there any reason to believe McCown after years of nothing but journeyman work had suddenly figured out to be a franchise quarterback at age 34? It was pretty clear his Chicago success was unsustainable, certainly it would be if he left the favorable Chicago surroundings. I mean McCown's interception rate in 2013 was 0.4%. The greatest quarterbacks in NFL history weren't able to get their rate near that. Were we really to believe Josh McCown could sustain that over the long haul?

I don't think McCown would be an improvement over what the Jets have at quarterback. I think they should steer clear.