First Year Jaguars Owner Makes Rookie Mistake or Wise Business Move?

Alex Dunlap, Rosterwatch.com

New Jaguars owner Shahid Khan has an epic mustache and is an international Man of Mystery. To the shock of many, the league’s newest member of the Billionaire Boys Club got on board with GM Gene Smith to draft a punter with the Jaguars valuable #70 pick in this year’s NFL Draft, [a third round pick.] No punter has even gone in the Top 100 player selections in 17 years. I picture Khan in the war room in an imported leather chair with a lit cigar, “I don’t always take punters in the third round, but when I do, I prefer Dos Equis.”

Khan has made it known from the beginning he is looking to shake things up in Jacksonville. This is a man who bought the Jaguars via a proposal written on a cocktail napkin. He has a great track record with business prognostications and he sees Europe as the NFL’s next big pay day. The team showed their commitment to much-maligned second-year QB Blaine Gabbert by trading up in the 2012 NFL draft for talented Oklahoma State WR Justin Blackmon. In doing so, they gave up their 4th round pick. Making that pick in the third round [when the Jags selected Brian Anger, Punter, University of California] pivotal with so many other needs at hand.



When asked why they took Anger as opposed to a Defensive Tackle at that spot, Jags GM Gene Smith said “I’d rather take a starter over a back up.” This means that the Jacksonville Jaguars believe that the Bengals, Titans and Steelers got a bunch of back ups in Brandon Thompson, Mike Martin and Alameda Ta’Amu respectively. I saw all three of these players at the Senior Bowl and actually charted Martin one practice. Those guys went to those teams at absolute steals. People in Nashville should be rioting in the streets to have attained Mike Martin at the end of the third.

It is easy enough to make the “Hey, if anyone needs goods punters, it’s the Jaguars!” joke, but like all jokes, it is based in fact. If I’m going to be making jokes about the Jags kicking game, It will be about the new kicker they have invited to camp. He would be the first chinese-born player to ever play in the NFL, is a rugby star, and his name is the onomatopoeia of a booming field goal attempt that eventually bangs off the uprights in a miss: Long Ding.