New York Jets: Back To The Future

Think back.  Way, way back, deep into the mists of time.  All the way back before Ryan Fitzpatrick, before Brandon Marshall, before the return of Revis, before spending all those gobs of money in free agency.  All the way back to a time when Rex Ryan roamed the sidelines for the Jets and moon walked in press conferences, way back in prehistory when John Idzik was drafting twelve players in one draft.  That's right, all the way back to 2014.

Do you remember 2014?  The year without a secondary?  The year it all fell apart and the Jets couldn't cover anybody because the team had the likes of Darrin Walls and Antonio Allen manning the starting cornerback spots?  That was ugly wasn't it?  How ugly was it?  How about this ugly:  Worst team in the NFL in generating turnovers.  Third worst team in the NFL in passer rating allowed by the defense.  The parade of horrors goes on and on.

Fast forward to 2016.  Rex is long gone, Idzik is long gone, the secondary has been completely rebuilt by throwing giant gobs of beautiful benjamins at it.  So what has all that wrought?  How does a Back To The Future movie sound to you?  Michael J. Fox and crew take the DeLorean all the way back to 2014, only to find the future looks a lot like the past, only more expensive.

Take a look at this side by side comparison of the Jets passing defense in 2014 and in 2016.  It's like one of those children's games where you have to look closely at the drawings to find the tiny differences that distinguish one from the other.

Up until now general manager Mike Maccagnan has been mostly showered with praise.  He even won the NFL's Executive Of The Year award in 2015.  It is of course still early in the 2016 campaign, and there is plenty of time to turn things around.  But after spending very large sums of money to fix the secondary in 2015, if these results don't dramatically change as the 2016 season progresses, the question has to be asked: what the heck did the Jets spend all that money on?