Trader Joe May Rue Wasting Jets’ Draft Capital In Moves Up
Jets General Manager Joe Douglas has to learn to dial down the hubris in these NFL Drafts.
The Jets are being lauded for this great haul of players, including three first-rounders in cornerback Ahmad “Sauce Gardner, wide receiver Garrett Wilson, and edge rusher Jermaine Johnson, selected over the weekend at the 2022 Draft, which is what you’re supposed to get when you finish 4-13 last season and were gifted another top ten pick plus a high second-round pick courtesy of past trades. As my son Jack tweeted, everyone in the media who loves Gang Green’s draft was really just in love with their draft capital.
Douglas’ problem, which started with last year’s Draft Day trade up into the first round to select guard Alijah Vera-Tucker, is a troubling tendency of falling head-over-heels in love with a player—no matter the position--to the point where he is then lured into expending his draft capital to get him, losing out on further rolls of the dice that can potentially round out rosters.
All Drafts--in all sports, really, if you recall the scene in the baseball film “Moneyball” where Brad Pitt’s Billy Beane reminds his head scout that he can’t predict the future--are crapshoots. At best, GMs make highly-educated guesses; they can never really know. So many things can turn a potential Pro-Bowler into a bust.
Such risk makes trading up something of a sucker’s bet. Pro Football Focus did an analysis of such Draft Day trades within the first 100 picks during the period of 2011-through-2018 using wins above replacement and found that the acquired player fared only slightly better (54%) than the next player at that position chosen directly after him. Ergo, the trading up team would have been better off sticking with their board and holding onto all their darts.
Some of the worst trades involved quarterbacks (see Darnold, Sam, and the three second-round picks the Jets surrendered), where needy teams often act recklessly out of desperation. Suffice it to say, though, that moving up for a nonpremium position like running back makes even less sense.
So while Douglas’ decisions to trade up prior to selecting Johnson in the first round (No. 26 overall) and Iowa State running back Breece Hall in Round 2 (No. 38) have been hailed by many in the media, they might not be the steals they’re made out to be.
Those two moves cost the Jets both of their two fifth-round picks plus the effective difference between a pick at the top of Round 3 versus Round 4, all so they could climb 9 slots for Johnson and 2 slots for Hall. If you don’t think those lost picks are ever consequential, I remind you that Douglas’ best-performing picks from the 2020 Draft were cornerback Bryce Hall (fifth round) and punter Braden Mann (sixth round).
Just for kicks and giggles, the Jets, who ended up with Johnson, Hall, and Ohio State tight end Jeremy Ruckert (Miami swooped in to take Georgia linebacker Channing Tindall, my preference, with the next selection), could have had instead:
No. 35: Hall
No. 38: Jalen Pitre (Baylor safety)
No. 69: Travis Jones (UCONN defensive tackle)
Two fifth round picks
Again, you might have gone different ways with those picks, but the point is that Johnson and Ruckert have to beat the cumulative value of four players, two of whom could possibly start as rookies (Jones only on early downs), for the trades to work in the Jets’ favor. Tall task.
Though Johnson at least plays a premium position, doesn’t it give anyone pause that a reportedly healthy and productive player fell so precipitously? The Jets told the media that they reached out to every team starting with the No. 15 overall selection before Tennessee agreed to be a willing partner at 26. No one had Johnson that high up on their board, whether it’s out of age bias (Johnson is 23 and was a nonfactor at Georgia before transferring prior to last season), teams’ needs, or concerns over how translatable his pass rushing toolkit will be at the NFL level. I get that the consensus opinion can sometimes be proven incorrect; however, I know for a fact that Douglas can’t be so sure that Johnson will take the brighter path to warrant doubling down on the pick.
The Hall trade is a total head-scratcher, more strange considering Douglas apprenticed at the feet of Ravens executive Ozzie Newsome for 15 years. The Jets were apparently trying to trade back into Round 1 AGAIN to secure the rights to Hall but settled for usurping the Texans by making a deal with the rival Giants early on Friday. What are they doing? Smart teams: A) Don’t fall in love with prospects, B) Understand positional value, and C) Don’t constantly trade up at a net loss on the trade value charts.
Then Douglas went out and crossed all three red lines in one swoop, like Ben Stiller’s night guard character to Hank Azaria’s villain in one of the forgettable Night of the Museum sequels.
Of course, it might work out for Douglas just like it did for Stiller, but it’s still bad process. Hall carried the rock 532 times over the last two seasons. That’s a lot of hits. He may have tremendous ball-carrying skills and was a workout warrior but the NFL has a way of humbling running backs like him.
Douglas can stand to gain some humility himself.