With franchise-tagged players dealt with last week, and even Tom Brady’s suspension reaching its final destination, we’ve put most of the offseason business to bed.
But while the Jets still don’t have what you’d call a starting quarterback at the moment, at least one former Jet doesn’t think that’s quite a disaster if Ryan Fitzpatrick doesn’t come back and the jobs falls back to Geno Smith.
CBS analyst Bart Scott told Darryl Slater of NJ.com that Smith could be an upgrade over Fitzpatrick, which seems odd to anyone who watched Fitzpatrick last year (31 touchdowns, 15 interceptions) or Smith ever (27 touchdowns, 35 interceptions).
“I’m sure they would want to reward him for what he was able to do,” Scott said of Fitzpatrick. “But at the end of the day, we would be having a different conversation if they would’ve made it to the playoffs. I didn’t say he doesn’t have much left. What I’m saying is, Geno went 8-8 [in 2013] with Clyde Gates and some other receivers that we didn’t know of.”
Oh.
“Geno brings something to the table because he can throw the long ball, so it makes defenses have to step back and play more honestly, defend the entire field, because he can throw the 70-yard bomb on a rope,” Scott continued. “Fitz has to step into that. He can throw the same route, but he has to let it go earlier, which doesn’t allow the big receivers or the speed of [Eric] Decker to separate. So he has to throw it up, and they have to go get it. That’s just what it is, man. I wasn’t trying to cause any controversy, but I just understand the business side of it, from both sides, because I’ve been in that same situation.”
Scott said he thought it would be tough for the Jets to make the playoffs this year with either quarterback, and that’s possibly very true.
And while the physical differences between Smith and Fitzpatrick Scott mentioned might be true as well, it’s hard to imagine that would compensate for the differences in every other aspect of their games — none of which would tilt the table toward Smith.