This morning, I flipped on my computer screen to check the morning headlines - first browsing the convention news, then the local Israeli headlines, and then GGN.com for Jet news. I always knew and expected that a deal might get done in the 99th hour. And I preferred having Fitz on the team this year – at the right price. But when I read through the thread about the deal and learned its terms, I was REALLY upset. Skimming through the comments, one greened comment caught my attention.

JetsFanOverseas is probably sleeping right about now

I think it’s 2:40am. Wait until he wakes up tomorrow. Boy is he gonna be upset. lol

Expect a 5000 word essay on why this was such a big mistake.

by shiff71 on Jul 28, 2016 | 2:41 AM reply rec (1) flag

Well, I have been quite busy of late, and have thus tried to keep the amount and size of my comments to a minimum. But if there is one thing I find hard to resist, it is a challenge – especially a public one that is done in a (playfully) mocking way. So I was tempted to sit down and write a response right there. But I didn’t think I could keep my response REALLY short, and I had recently been asked by Smackdad to post a long comment as a fanpost rather than in the comments section. So I decided to wait a bit. Then I read John B’s assessment of the deal, in which he noted the pattern that emerged from Mac's last 3 deals and indicated his satisfaction, noting that "Maccagnan comes out of this looking pretty good. He played poker and won." Well, I have great respect and admiration for our esteemed boss, the honorable Mr. B, but I could hardly disagree any more. So I decided to set aside some time in my work day to roll up my sleeves and write my first ever fanpost (aided by info and arguments that I had saved from the past).

There are two entirely different aspects of this deal to judge: a) whether the way in which Mac got to this deal helps or hurt the team; b) whether it was good to sign Fitz at this price. The answer to the 2nd question depends on how you view Fitz vs. Geno. The first one does not. So let us assess each one separately and show why I think it is a failure on both accounts.

Part A) A Failed Negotiating Process.

Let us summarize the process as we know it. According to all the reports, there was a Jet offer for a 3-yr. deal, with year one guaranteed at $12 mil, and years 2 and 3 at $6 mil/yr with only $4 million of that guaranteed. Fitz rejected that and countered with a one-yr deal at $12 mil guaranteed, which Mac rejected. And so things stood for 3 months or so, with neither side budging, or offering any proposal to bridge the gap. One day before training camp, the Jets raised their offer to $12 mil for one year, with another $3 mil in incentives, and Fitz quickly agreed. So to sum up the end result in one (long) sentence: Instead of accepting Fitz’s proposal 3 months ago, Mac waited until the last minute, when, upon realizing that Fitz would not budge, he caved and accepted Fitz’s offer fully, and threw in a potential for $3 mil extra just for good measure. So why is this a terrible deal even if you love Fitz and hate Geno?

1) It will hurt him in all future negotiations: What does Mac’s negotiating style say to all future players who will negotiate with him? In each of the last 3 cases, he waited to the last minute. With Wilks, he got a very fair deal by today’s standards (although he could likely have gotten a better deal one year earlier, when Wilks could not possibly have requested more than JJ Watt’s 16 mil/yr). In the Lee deal, he extracted a compromise in terms of the 4th year guarantee that others did not get. So one can argue that the wait was worth it. But what is one to deduce from this deal? Mac got not one iota from Fitz. He gave him everything he asked for 3 months ago, and even added in a $3 mil incentive bonus. So why should the next player not wait until the last minute, in the expectation that Mac will cave before the deadline? And as to Mac's threatening to "move on" if Fitz rejected it, please don’t make me laugh. I offer you all that you asked for and then some, but I warn you that you better accept it, or else?

2) It caused an unnecessary 3-month distraction: Since the team gained nothing from waiting, the distractions to the players and coaches, and the possible damage to team unity were needless.

3) It hurt Geno’s standing with the team: Whether you like him or not, Geno will be on this team in 2016. Neither Petty nor Hack is anywhere close to being a viable backup right now. Even if he will only be a backup, why undermine his confidence and his relationship with his teammates? Had Fitz signed the same deal 3 month ago, Geno would have accepted (as he did last year) that unless Fitz utterly fails, he will be the backup, and that he would have to await his chance elsewhere next year. Instead, Geno had to go thru OTA’s and minicamp as the starter, while the media mocked that very thought in daily articles, while this and that teammate indicated their preference for Fitz, and while Bowles dutifully stated that he has full confidence in him being the starter since he was light years ahead of last year. Then, after rejoining his teammates yesterday, still as the presumed starter, he must return a day later to face Fitz being welcomed back by all his teammates, while he is told to go back to the 2nd team. This was a needless undermining of Geno, his confidence in himself, and his relations with his teammates.

4) It hurt Fitz’s standing: Had the deal been signed 3 months ago, Fitz would have returned as the popular team leader, with all the fans and teammates on his side. Yes, sure enough, once the news broke, the vast majority of the recent converts to the Geno bandwagon quickly jumped ship and praised the deal. But things are not the same. The anger built up against Fitz will not disappear. Fans will expect big time results after this contract. And when he almost certainly will disappoint them in the first weeks against the far tougher defenses that he inevitably will stink against, they will start booing far faster. Now, from my perspective, that is a positive. But assuming Mac gave him this money because he wants him to be the starter, he has undermined Fitz’s ability to succeed in that role.

5) It ties Bowles's hands: At 8 mil/year, Bowles could have run a real competition, and been free to yank Fitz for Geno in mid season if he faltered. But now that Mac caved and offered Fitz 12mil plus after waiting 5 months, Bowles will have a very hard time doing so, even if Fitz is being outplayed by Geno.

Now let us consider the deal itself.

**********************************************************************

Part B) The Deal Itself Is Bad.

As so many others have pointed out here recently, Fitz has been a failed starter on 5 different teams over 12 years. He never has taken a team to the playoffs, and until last year, never had a winning record. Anyone watching him perform could see why. He is slow, has a noodle arm, bad accuracy, and an utter inability to throw deep. Yet I supported the trade last year, since we needed a viable backup in case Geno failed or was injured, and he is a viable backup. But then came his "career year." On the one hand, things looked impressive. A Jet record 31 passing TD’s, 10 wins, and a return to respectability. On the other hand, he was only good against bad defenses (of which he luckily faced so many), but was awful against good defenses. Overall, he was merely 29th best in completion percentage, 27th in INT%, worst in terms of "interceptible passes" (as ably demonstrated by Cian Fahey at: http://presnapreads.com/2016/03/29/2689/), 27th in Y/A, worst in the league (IIIRC) in 3-and-outs, and 24th in passer rating.

So how are we to judge his season, and his value to the team? How are we to reconcile the "record season" with these paltry stats and the heartbreaking letdown in the final Bills game? In my opinion it boils down to this: Fitz has a very mediocre arm and poor accuracy. He is unable to zip the ball into tight spaces and get completions, because he lacks the accuracy to pinpoint the throw, and he lacks the arm strength to get it there fast enough before the defender makes a move on it. Hence, unless a good offensive system or top receiver talent provides him with consistently open receivers, he will inevitably throw a ton of INT's and be unable to score points. He "succeeded" in 2015 because he had both of these factors, with Gailey designing a system exclusively for him, and with the NFL's top tandem of WR’s. But even with this, he still stalled far too often (esp. when the running game was absent), his long game was nonexistent, and he failed against Rex and all top defenses that covered his receivers well and confused his reads. Had he played with the offensive design and the support that Geno had in 2013-14, when finding guys open was rarer than finding water in the desert, he would likely have done no better, if not worse.

However, many will argue that Fitz is indeed mediocre, but Geno would be much worse. Now, I can present a case as to why Geno could be expected to do so much better now, given his new OC, a more fitting system for his talents, more experience, far greater knowledge of his offense and NFL defenses, infinitely better receivers, vastly better defense, and yes, better overall protection (certainly when including much better TE and RB pass protection). However, I am tired of doing it for the thousandth time. Moreover, the Geno haters will simply say that he did bad things on his own as well, and that every QB must make do with the cards that he is dealt. Finally, some will argue as Jeremy J. Jackson did in a recent comment, that all Geno supporters merely use his bad supporting casts in 2013-14 as excuses, but do not cite any actual positives based on which we should prefer Fitz. Well, I neither have the time, nor the computer tools or knowledge, to try to offer detailed examples of what Geno does better. But I have looked at many of his college game reels, and have seen every Jet game he played in. So I'd like to point out several aspects of his game that are clearly superior to Fitz’s, and which, I believe, can be seen in the following 4 videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tYm0ZUfNXY&spfreload=10 (8 TD vs. Baylor)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZo__7PRl8A&spfreload=10 (vs. Marshall 2012)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1zqqutj6Uo&spfreload=10 (vs. Maryland 2012)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZCPd5u6f3c (vs. Oklahoma 2012)

1) Deep ball ability: In college, he showed tremendous arm strength, accuracy and touch on long passes. Take a look at the Oklahoma video. It includes 5 incredible deep completions (at the 2:41, 3:22, 6:03, 7:16 and 7:26 marks), as well as two other excellent long passes (one of which was a PI, and one a superb INT), and several other tremendous throws in the 15-25 yd range. You can search through Fitz’s entire 12 years and not find 5 throws like these. Geno actually was one of the NFL's best long passers in 2013 despite dreadful receivers, and only dropped off sharply in 2014 due to even worse deep receivers (and an injured Decker), and thanks to Rex's decision to not even try deep passes, so that he had no practice and timing when he did make a rare attempt.

2) Excellent placement and ability to lead receivers: I know, many of you will laugh, since there was little evidence of this in his first 2 NFL years. But that is where awful play call and design, and dreadful receivers (both in route running and pass-catching ability) come into play. If you look at the college game reels, you can see it on almost every throw, even on the short screens and crossing patterns. That was as much a reason for WVU's ton of YAC, as was the talent of its receivers. Fitz, on the other hand, is dreadful at ball placement. Hence, although the tremendous catches of BM and Deck helped him produce completions and yardage despite bad throws, we ended up with one of the league's lowest YAC rates.

3) Fine running ability: This too is evident in the videos. He showed great downfield vision and elusiveness, esp. in his redzone runs. Everyone talks about Fitz's running prowess last year, but few realize how much Chan's playcalls affected that. The frequent use of a spread offense, with 3-5 guys running downfield, opened up huge running lanes, while the defenders running with the receivers could not even see him take off. Geno could produce far more yardage with those kinds of opportunities, of which he had so few in MM's offense.

4) Ability to make every throw: Fitz is not only utterly incapable of completing deep passes, but also severely limited in the variety of passes he can complete. He cannot complete tightly covered sideline passes, or zip a pass into a tight window. He can only complete an endzone pass if the receiver is wide open, or if he can just throw it up high and rely on BM to go up for it. How many WOW throws did Fitz make all year? You can count them on the fingers of one hand. Geno can make many of them, and of all varieties.

Now let us see compare Geno vs. Fitz based on all their respective Jet TD's:

a) All 31 of Fitz's 2015 TD's:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOn0uzoR95U&spfreload=10

b) All 34 of Geno's Jet TD's:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgZzvK7l2PU&spfreload=10

I will use five categories to categorize all the TD passes

a) (CIB: Clear In Back): Simple over-the-top throw to receiver clearly ahead of DB.

b) (CIF: Clear In Front): Clear view, unimpeded throw to receiver, with no DB in front of him or near enough to interfere with pass.

c) (GT: Good Throw): Close defender requires high quality throw from the QB.

d) (HP: High Point): Easy layup due to WR's distinct height advantage over DB.

d) R: A running TD from the QB.

Here is the ordered list of Fitz’s 31 touchdown passes and 2 TD runs in 2015: CIB, GT (0:50), CIF, CIF, CIF, CIB, CIB, R, CIF, CIF, CIF, CIF, CIF, CIB, CIF, GT (3:03), CIB, R, CIB, CIF, CIF, HP, CIF, HP, CIF, CIF, CIF, CIF, CIF, GT (5:26), CIB, CIF, CIF

Here is the ordered list of Geno’s 27 touchdown passes and 7 TD runs with the Jets: CIF, R, GT, GT, CIF, GT, CIF, CIB, CIF, R, R, GT, R, GT, CIB, CIF, R, R, GT, GT, R, CIF, CIF, GT, CIF, GT, GT, CIF, CIB, CIF, CIB, CIB, CIF, GT

Summary: Fitz had 2 running TD’s, 2 HP's, 7 CIB's, 19 CIF's (including 4 receptions that became TD’s only due to superior run-ins by the receiver), and 3 quality throws (I marked their time points in the video). That adds up to 28 easy TD throws that required no special accuracy, zip or placement, and 3 quality throws. For Geno, we have 7 runs, 5 CIB's, 11 CIF's, and 11 quality throws. Anyone can check the accuracy of my assessments (which I bent over backwards to be fair to Fitz), thanks to the ordered markings.

This helps explain why Fitz’s TD numbers were so much better than Geno’s, and why I think it could so easily be copied and even outdone by Geno. Fitz did not complete difficult TD throws. His success was due to the exceptional talents of BM, Deck and Powell, and to his players being open thanks to Chan's excellent designs. Such opportunities were extremely rare for Geno. Hence, in order to succeed at all, he had to make really good and tight throws. And if he managed to complete this many high quality throws even with his dreadful receivers, one can only assume that there were many more that failed because the receiver lacked the ability to make an even semi-difficult catch. Likewise on the runs, Fitz’s 2 runs are straight lines to the endzone, whereas almost every one of Geno’s 7 runs required nice elusive moves to get there.

Final Assessment of the Deal:

In light of all the above, there is strong reason to believe that Geno could potentially outperform Fitz by a considerable margin, thanks to his superior speed and running ability, the greater assortment of throws that he could complete, his ability to complete difficult throws, and his ability to stretch the field and score on long throws. What Fitz has in his favor is that he has already demonstrated that he could perform at a mediocre level, which, given his defense and playmakers on offense was enough to produce a winning record against the NFL's easiest schedule, whereas Geno, for all his potential, has yet to show any sustained success on the field. Nor has he proven that with good talent and coaching, he can eliminate the killer mistakes that can lead to losses even when many good throws are made. Although I would have preferred Geno, I can see why a GM might be afraid to risk his season on Geno alone at this time. I myself was in favor of offering Fitz 8 mil/yr, as a backup and potential starter if Geno was injured or outplayed. However, given Geno’s far greater talent, the things he has already shown he can do better than Fitz, his younger age, and the possibility that he can be our long term answer (which Fitz certainly cannot be), there was no reason to buckle and raise our offer. If he refused it, we could have signed Foles (who was released as expected) for 3-4 mil. Like Fitz, he needs a perfect storm, but his success under such perfect conditions far outdid what Fitz accomplished.

Now that he is signed, I think it would be a big mistake to just give him the starting job. We should have a real competition, with the winner getting the starting nod. Unfortunately, I fear that Mac has tied his own hands. By offering Fitz the ridiculously overpaid amount of $12 mil/yr, Bowles will now be forced to start him and keep him as the starter, unless he absolutely falls apart. This will not only deprive us of the possibility to go further with Geno, but also blow the last chance for us to test whether he can really be the long term answer. He may finish out his contract and go on to success with another team (he will certainly get opportunities), while we are stuck with an aging and mediocre Fitz, and two young QB’s who IMHO have far less potential to succeed in this league than Geno Smith. I therefore sadly vote a resounding no on this deal, with a fervent prayer that I am proven wrong in due time, while my favorite GM is proven right. Go Jets!

[P.S. Given how much time this took me, and how much work I am currently saddled with, I do not expect to write another fanpost any time soon. Also, if I fail to respond to every comment, please know that it may simply be due to a lack of time. Hope you enjoyed this despite its length.]