The Long Fall of the Jaguars

[CampinWithaMissingPerson 2,025]

Interesting (and in my opinion, dead on accurate) article about the downfall of the Jags (my favorite team):

 

The Long Fall of the Jaguars

 

Bad trades, bad signings, and bad ideas have Jacksonville at the bottom of the NFL barrel

 

During Thursday's embarrassing 27-10 home loss to the Colts, the Jacksonville Jaguars acted like they were rejecting a newly transplanted organ. Virtually every notable personnel move the team made this offseason produced a notably disappointing game. Veteran free agent wideout Laurent Robinson, already benched after signing a big deal this past offseason, fumbled a reception away to end a promising drive. Former Giants cornerback Aaron Ross was lost in coverage on a 41-yard bomb that set up a Colts touchdown. Franchise kicker Josh Scobee missed his first field goal of the year. Most disturbingly, wide receiver Justin Blackmon — whom the Jaguars traded up to acquire with the fifth pick in this year's draft — continued to exhibit a total inability to separate from pro coverage and become a playmaker in the passing game. Jacksonville threw the ball 47 times against a team whose starting cornerbacks were both inactive, and Blackmon mustered just three catches for 25 yards. At least third-round pick punter Bryan Anger had a good game.

 

The man behind these decisions is Jaguars general manager Gene Smith, who serves as an interesting case study in why some of the league's personnel decision makers fail when given a role as a key decision maker. Smith, who has been a part of the Jaguars organization since the team debuted, started as a lowly area scout before working his way all the way up through the ranks to become the team's general manager in 2009. When the Jacksonville franchise was sold by Wayne Weaver to billionaire bumper magnate Shahid Khan during the 2011 season, Weaver's last act as owner was to give Smith a three-year contract extension, a deal that ensured he would have time to build a team around Gabbert. Smith's tenure, though, has been marked by one clear problem: For whatever Smith offers as a talent evaluator, he's exhibited virtually no ability to be one in the NFL marketplace.

 

Smith himself encapsulated that problem with a legendary quote earlier this year when he was asked about Anger, the Cal punter whom the organization made the highest-drafted punter in nearly 20 years by taking him in the third round of the 2012 draft. Smith explained (part of) his simple philosophy: "I'd rather take a starter over a backup."

 

Think about that for a second. You don't have to apply advanced metrics to football or develop some sort of complex model of the NFL markets to realize how terrifyingly naive that is. Just think about your fantasy football draft. Gene Smith is basically saying that he's the guy who would take a kicker in the ninth round — even when nobody else is going to take a kicker for another three more — just because he's a starter. That's bad enough when you're running your $25 fantasy football team, but the Jaguars are a $760 million asset. If the Anger selection and Smith's quote afterward were an isolated incident, it would be fair to write off that comment as relatively innocuous.

 

Instead, Smith has consistently exhibited an inability or lack of desire to read the marketplace in terms of the players he wants, forcing him to acquire them at the peak of their value or at valuations far above the amount he should pay. For whatever Anger might offer as a field position weapon, no team had taken a punter before the fifth round since these very same Jaguars selected Adam Podlesh in the fourth round of the 2007 draft. Smith surely could have traded down and acquired a future pick or two while drafting Anger in a later round, but he chose not to. Throughout his career as the chief decision maker in Jacksonville, that exact problem has repeatedly tripped Smith up.

 

In 2010, Smith made one of the more curious first-round decisions in recent memory when he chose Cal defensive tackle Tyson Alualu with the 10th pick of the draft. ESPN draftnik Mel Kiper regarded the pick as an enormous reach, noting that the Jaguars could have nabbed Alualu at the end of the first round. The Cowboys reportedly felt the same way. I've spoken to talent evaluators around the league who have confirmed those reports. Alualu's been a competent NFL defensive tackle, but he's far from dominant and hasn't lived up to his draft pedigree.

 

That wouldn't be a huge problem if the Jaguars held on to all of their picks, but Smith's been aggressive in trading up to try to grab players he's targeted. He dealt a fourth-rounder (the 101st pick) to move up two spots and grab Blackmon this year. In 2011, he moved up six spots in the first round to grab Gabbert by giving up his second-round pick, a selection that the Redskins turned into five different draft picks by the time they were done slicing it up. Gabbert, obviously, hasn't lived up to expectations. In 2009, Smith went after William & Mary1 cornerback Derek Cox in the third round, a talented player who has shown flashes of brilliance as Jacksonville's top corner this season. To get the third-rounder, though, Smith had to sacrifice his second-round pick in the 2010 draft to the Patriots, who are quite good at that sort of thing.2 That became the 44th pick in the draft, which the Patriots used to move up two spots and take Rob Gronkowski. Oops. There's nothing wrong with trading up to grab a player here and there, but you have to replenish the well once in a while by trading down and grabbing additional picks, especially if you have a player who you think will still be around a half-round or more later. Smith has only traded down once in his four-year tenure with the Jags, swapping a fifth-round pick for a future fourth-rounder from the Saints. That's simply not enough.

 

Smith's issue with properly valuing players also extends to the free market, where he's been involved with some curious decisions. This actually stretches back to the 2008 season, when Smith was promoted to a role as executive director of college and pro personnel under then-GM Shack Harris and the team went on an asset-spending spree. Buoyed by their 11-5 season the previous year, the Jaguars went all-in for a title run. Thinking that they were a rookie pass-rusher away from a dominant defense, they dealt two third-rounders and a fourth-rounder to the Ravens to move up 18 spots and grab defensive end Derrick Harvey, and followed that by trading up six spots in the second round to grab fellow defensive end Quentin Groves. Their bookend pass rushers of the future combined for 10.5 sacks across five seasons in teal. Harris also spent big in the free-agent market, signing cornerback Drayton Florence and wide receiver Jerry Porter to six-year deals that guaranteed them $23 million. They each lasted just one year with the team, with Porter earning $1 million for each of his 11 catches as a Jaguars player. Harris was fired after the season, but Smith has continued to make mistakes when he's been given chances to delve into the free-agent market.

 

None of Smith's free-agent contracts has been quite as bad as the Porter or Florence deals, but he's consistently gotten less than he bargained for and/or paid more for a player than he needed to. He started by giving Torry Holt a three-year deal that guaranteed him $4 million in the first year, but Holt caught 51 passes in one touchdown-less season before being released. Aaron Kampman got a four-year, $25 million deal to leave Green Bay, but he only played 11 games with the Jaguars after his knee woes made the trip to Florida with him.3 In the abbreviated 2011 offseason, Smith swooped early to lock up Ravens safety Dawan Landry and Bills middle linebacker Paul Posluszny to long-term deals. Both Landry and Poluszny are above-average players, but Smith was shelling out big bucks to sign players at arguably the two most fungible positions on the defensive side of the football, places where teams often save their money. Consider that Posluszny was one of three young starting middle linebackers who hit the market that offseason, along with Stephen Tulloch and Barrett Ruud. Posluszny got a six-year, $42 million deal at the beginning of the free agent period. Tulloch and Ruud each had to wait and eventually ended up with one-year deals.4

 

This past offseason Smith really exhibited his tendency to buy high. After a run of injuries to defensive backs during the 2011 season, Smith signed Giants cornerback Aaron Ross to a three-year, $15.3 million deal. Signing a starting corner for a Super Bowl winner sounds like a good deal, but Ross was a fourth-stringer and castoff two months before the season, one who was reportedly on the trading block for a late-round pick. After everyone in front of him got hurt, the former first-round pick stepped back into the starting lineup and was below-average, but had his problems hidden by a dominant pass rush and an effective Corey Webster on the other side. Ross is only a part-time starter with the team this year.

 

More distressingly, Smith gave Cowboys wideout Laurent Robinson a five-year, $32.5 million contract that guaranteed him $14 million. It's a deal that I've highlighted as a terrible idea before, but it speaks to everything Smith does wrong. Eleven months earlier, Robinson was an injury-prone Rams castoff who was available on the waiver wire for absolutely nothing. The Jaguars, with four years of tape on Robinson's middling play, chose not to even bring him in for a tryout to supplement their dismal receiving corps. The Cowboys snapped him up and cut him, and again, the Jaguars didn't bite. Then, when Dallas needed a wideout, they re-signed Robinson, stuck him in as the fourth option in a great passing offense, and promptly got an incredibly fluky 11-touchdown season from him in 14 shockingly healthy games. Then the Jaguars were interested! Unsurprisingly, Robinson's gotten hurt again this year, as he unfortunately has more concussions in 2012 (three) than touchdowns (zero). He's also lost his starting job to Cecil Shorts in the meantime. That's the problem with the Jaguars, in a nutshell. A good organization notes that there are talented guys out on the waiver wire for nothing and tries to find the next Laurent Robinson for pennies on the dollar. A bad organization totally ignores what they've known for years about a guy like Robinson and, to paraphrase a Joe Sheehan quote, pays for the outlier while getting the regression back toward the mean.

 

It was the second time in two years that Smith had paid heavily for an outlier performance. Only the year before, Smith had fallen in love with an outlier season from tight end Marcedes Lewis, who scored seven touchdowns in his first four seasons before producing 10 touchdowns on 58 catches in 2010. It was an obviously unsustainable touchdown rate, but the Jaguars gave Lewis a five-year, $35 million deal that guaranteed him almost $17 million and paid him like he was going to be Rob Gronkowski (whose new contract guaranteed him nearly $2 million less) year after year. Instead, after signing his new deal, Lewis failed to catch even a single touchdown pass in 2011. If Lewis hit the market after last offseason, he would have struggled to get even 25 percent of that contract. Jeremy Mincey — who had seven sacks over his first three years in the league — got $9 million guaranteed to re-sign with the Jags after an eight-sack season in 2011. He has two sacks in eight starts this year. Wideout Mike Thomas never really broke out, but the Jags gave the possession receiver a five-year deal that guaranteed him $9 million. He lasted one year before tumbling on the depth chart and being dealt to the Lions. Even kicker Josh Scobee cashed in, when he followed seven years of kicking at a 77 percent rate with a 23-for-25 season that earned him a four-year, $14 million deal.5

 

It's that spending on special teams that leads us back to Anger and how he met the Jaguars. When the aforementioned Podlesh signed with the Bears during the 2011 offseason, the Jags ponied up $2 million in guaranteed money to sign 43-year-old punter Matt Turk away from the Texans. The same team that ended up choosing to start Gabbert for virtually their entire season somehow decided that paying a $1.5 million premium for a 43-year-old punter (without a great track record, mind you) was worth more than paying a free agent the minimum. That's bad. What's worse is that they brought in Turk — who, again, is 43 years old — and told him that they were going to change him from a distance punter into a directional punter. At 43. That plan lasted five weeks before the Jaguars cut him after a particularly egregious performance and signed veteran Nick Harris, who delivered an entirely competent performance for the veteran minimum.

 

The Jaguars cut Harris the day after the draft because they needed to draft a starter. Through nine weeks, Anger was worth 1.8 points of field position, roughly the point total that a team loses every time they kick a field goal on fourth-and-goal from the 1-yard line as opposed to going for it. Five picks after the Jaguars chose Anger, the Seahawks grabbed Russell Wilson, a player who wasn't supposed to be a starter, but one who they thought represented an excellent value proposition in the middle of the third round. Which of the two would you rather have? And if you asked Gene Smith, do you really think he would tell you he'd rather have Anger?

In the interests of full disclosure, I spoke to the Jaguars this offseason about a possible position in their organization, but eventually chose to stay with Grantland and am not pursuing an opportunity in any front office for the time being. The decision was amicable and had no influence on whatever criticisms appear here, which I think are steeped in fact. (Unless I screwed something up, in which case it's out of incompetence, not malice.)

 

Another tidbit, Shad Khan — mustachioed owner of the Jags has recently disclosed that reports about their salary cap space were way off. PFT and other sites (who likely just copied off PFT) reported the Jags had the most cap space in the league. Somewhere around 20 million under the cap. Khan says in fact, the Jags are 15 million OVER the salary cap, and worse yet — have the SIXTH highest payroll in the league. Yet the team is 1-8. You ask how could they be over the cap, teams can't be over the cap right? Well the new CBA has these weird carry over rules, like roll over minutes, and with previous cheap owner Wayne Weaver, the Jags have carried over money each year since the new CBA. So the Jags have a 135ish million payroll even though the cap is 120ish million. Next year teams have to spend to a floor on the cap, so the roll over money won't be able to be as large as the Jags have used it. But this is very very disturbing, and very telling about the competency of the GM Gene Smith. Villainized in my sig pretty much since I've been on this board. I gave the guy a shot, looked the other way on him trading away draft picks to move up and select guys he could of got later. I looked past a lot of stuff in hope that he had a plan and it'd eventually work out. Looks like he's just completely incompetent as a GM. He's just a scout after all.

[AllYouNeedIsLovie 377]

Good read.

 

Jeez, and I thought Mark Dominik was bad. Those are some awful contracts he handed out and his drafts have not been good. Can't imagine the Jags not firing him after this year.

[Turry 755]

I feel really bad for jaguars fans. You would expect at least a decent product on the field with such a high payroll. But my lord some of those contracts are terrible and draft day deals. Like the Harvey and Groves deal. Laurent Robinson was nothing but a one year wonder. He has to be the worst GM in the game.

[SteVo+ 3,702]

"Fall" implies the Jaguars were in good shape to begin with.

[CampinWithaMissingPerson 2,025]

^har har

 

We were in the 90s till Coughlin forgot there was a salary cap.

 

[Omerta+ 1,206]

Man this article makes me want to apply. Pretty sure I could do better. And thankful we have Ozzie.

Edited November 9, 2012 by Ngata_Chance

[Vin+ 3,121]

08 was such an awesome year...

 

1. Kinda surprised he lumped Scobee and Poz into the bad signing list. I'm also amazed he didn't mention Clint Session since every single other signing is mentioned.

 

2. Hindsight is awesome.

 

3. Wonder what position he was looking at taking with the Jags. I was thinking maybe Oehser's job, but the timeline doesn't fit.

[Bucman 891]

How on earth this guy wasn't fired a while ago is beyond me.

[Favre4Ever+ 4,476]

I just don't like the idea that they fired Shack Harris then promoted the guy like directly beneath him, expecting some kind of phenomenal change. The whole goddamn team needs to be swept clean... I'd even get rid of Mularkey... Not any statement of his success or lack thereof.. but just so your new GM can bring in his own guy.

 

It is almost comical reading the list of awful contracts, though.

[BwareDWare94 723]

I feel like the Jaguars started going downhill as soon as they released Fred Taylor (or didn't resign him, not sure). Him and MJD were easily one of the best 1-2 punches I've EVER seen at the running back position. No matter how versatile MJD is, having two of the best backs in the league was the reason they were such a good team that year they played with New England in the playoffs. I still remember the WC game between Pittsburgh and Jacksonville. One of the best football games I've ever watched.

[DonovanMcnabb for H.O.F 2,241]

It always drives me insane to think of how some of these teams manage to pull off a dub, and we couldn't manage to win a single game in 08...

 

It always puzzles me why some coaches love to reach on players in the first rd... Even if its the guy they want. The Jags just need to clean house imo. That's the one thing we ended up not doing in Detroit, and even though Mayhew has made some good moves (and some awful ones), sometimes I get the impression that we coulda done better.

[CampinWithaMissingPerson 2,025]

08 was such an awesome year...

 

1. Kinda surprised he lumped Scobee and Poz into the bad signing list. I'm also amazed he didn't mention Clint Session since every single other signing is mentioned.

 

2. Hindsight is awesome.

 

3. Wonder what position he was looking at taking with the Jags. I was thinking maybe Oehser's job, but the timeline doesn't fit.

 

2008 was a horrible year, we went 5-11.

 

His point on Scobee was he was a 77% accurate kicker his whole career, then after a 23/25 or 91% year he gets a huge contract. Not unlike Marcedes Lewis who had 4 TDs and was a let down most of his career and then in 2010 he had 10 TDs and looked good — then got a huge contract. He's making the point of how Gene Smith pays guys based on fluke years. My thing with Scobee is you can always find a passable kicker for less money, I'd rather they use the money on other things. You don't see good teams shelling out big money to kickers.

 

With Poz, his point is he's a LB. One of the most "fungible" as he put it, positions in football — where teams save money (on 4-3 teams.) Also that the Jags were the only team to spend huge money on LBs that year (your right he forgot the horrible Session contract too), every other team payed peanuts and one year deals. It's bad business. Poz is an above average player — like he said, but he's making too much money considering the market value. That's what's wrong with Gene, absolutely no awareness of market value (hence the reaches in the draft.)

 

Also, at least the dude admitted he tried to join the organization, a lesser writer wouldn't write anything about that. Hide the fact, he's giving full disclosure and even opening up the opportunity for people to doubt his words based off him potentially being a scorned applicant. That's ballsy.

 

Although, he did have a grammatical error (missed a word) in a sentence where he called someone a moron.

[Vin+ 3,121]

2008 was a horrible year, we went 5-11.

Sarcasm, my friend.

 

His point on Scobee was he was a 77% accurate kicker his whole career, then after a 23/25 or 91% year he gets a huge contract. Not unlike Marcedes Lewis who had 4 TDs and was a let down most of his career and then in 2010 he had 10 TDs and looked good — then got a huge contract. He's making the point of how Gene Smith pays guys based on fluke years. My thing with Scobee is you can always find a passable kicker for less money, I'd rather they use the money on other things. You don't see good teams shelling out big money to kickers.

 

I think you would agree (or maybe not) that Scobee is a better kicker than his average indicates. He's been consistent as of late, and given the inconsistency around the league surrounding the K position, I'm glad we have him.

 

With Poz, his point is he's a LB. One of the most "fungible" as he put it, positions in football — where teams save money (on 4-3 teams.) Also that the Jags were the only team to spend huge money on LBs that year (your right he forgot the horrible Session contract too), every other team payed peanuts and one year deals. It's bad business. Poz is an above average player — like he said, but he's making too much money considering the market value. That's what's wrong with Gene, absolutely no awareness of market value (hence the reaches in the draft.)

 

I guess my thing is, I don't mind overpaying for good players. I think it's better to lock up a good player than settle for average or below average for a year and then have to search for a replacement. I do think that Gene somewhat stuck to his typical M.O. because IIRC we were looking at Poz when he came out in the draft. (Wonder if things would been different things would've been had we drafted Sean Lee in '10). I would also say that there's probably a reason that the players mentioned only got one year deals, especially considering that Ruud is on his fourth team since we signed Poz.

[TDJacksonville 31]

i find it pretty laughable to call Scobee a Bust. last year and half hes been almost automatic.

 

also kinda funny to say a 3rd round rookie is a bust when he is tied for the longest punt of the year(73 yards), 7th in average, 4th in net average, and 5th in return average. Not bad for a 3rd round rookie.

 

yes some of the moves made have been head scratchers but Holt was brought in to mentor our WRs that year and i knew we would likely cut him at the latest by year 2. some of his moves seem mind boggoling now but every team misses on free agents and draft picks.

 

hindsight is definitely 20-20 when reviewing his moves. his kampman signing was a good signing at the time because we needed a DE and kampman even though he was coming of a knee injury was among league leaders in qb disruptions until he got hurt. its a shame he couldnt recover from his knee injury he suffered.

[Thanatos 2,847]

i find it pretty laughable to call Scobee a Bust. last year and half hes been almost automatic.

 

also kinda funny to say a 3rd round rookie is a bust when he is tied for the longest punt of the year(73 yards), 7th in average, 4th in net average, and 5th in return average. Not bad for a 3rd round rookie.

 

yes some of the moves made have been head scratchers but Holt was brought in to mentor our WRs that year and i knew we would likely cut him at the latest by year 2. some of his moves seem mind boggoling now but every team misses on free agents and draft picks.

 

hindsight is definitely 20-20 when reviewing his moves. his kampman signing was a good signing at the time because we needed a DE and kampman even though he was coming of a knee injury was among league leaders in qb disruptions until he got hurt. its a shame he couldnt recover from his knee injury he suffered.

 

I find all of your posts pretty laughable.

 

You are actually defending drafting a punter in the 3rd round. Just lol.

Edited November 14, 2012 by Thanatos19

[Favre4Ever+ 4,476]

 

 

also kinda funny to say a 3rd round rookie is a bust when he is tied for the longest punt of the year(73 yards), 7th in average, 4th in net average, and 5th in return average. Not bad for a 3rd round rookie.

 

 

You don't understand what the article is saying in the slightest.

 

 

It doesn't matter how good or bad he is... He might be the best punter in the league... but the guy wasn't going to get picked for another couple of rounds. Why throw away a 3rd round pick on a 5th rounder or later player? It's a complete waste of the selection.

 

If you don't think anyone at that spot holds value, trade back, get extra picks.

[TDJacksonville 31]

You don't understand what the article is saying in the slightest.

 

 

It doesn't matter how good or bad he is... He might be the best punter in the league... but the guy wasn't going to get picked for another couple of rounds. Why throw away a 3rd round pick on a 5th rounder or later player? It's a complete waste of the selection.

 

If you don't think anyone at that spot holds value, trade back, get extra picks.

 

he was gonna go 4th round and if u saw how bad our punt game was last year ud see why it was a good move. i believe the panthers were the team that was gonna draft anger in the 4th. sure it might have been a lil reach but an all-pro caliber player is a all-pro caliber player.

[Thanatos 2,847]

he was gonna go 4th round and if u saw how bad our punt game was last year ud see why it was a good move. i believe the panthers were the team that was gonna draft anger in the 4th. sure it might have been a lil reach but an all-pro caliber player is a all-pro caliber player.

 

Oh right, because the Panthers GM is proven to be so much better than the Jags GM. (You know, the one that got fired this year?) I don't actually doubt that we would have drafted him in the 4th- it would STILL have been a terrible decision.

 

Your philosophy is the same as his. Better to draft a starter than a backup. No, it's not. You could have got a veteran punter for the veteran minimum who would have been close to as good as Anger would be. Your team has so many holes, using a 3rd rounder on a punter is just stupid.

 

It's the exact same reason why you don't draft a kicker in FF until close to the final round- and certainly not until after you've filled your bench with quality players. They just don't matter that much.

 

Here's a hint: If your team is punting enough that you think you actually need a pro-bowl caliber punter, you have far greater problems than your punt team that you should be focusing on.

[Favre4Ever+ 4,476]

You could have had that punter later in the draft and still picked up better talent at real positions of need on the team. You could have still HAD Anger.. lol

[Milla4Prez63 678]

Fall? Not trying to be an ass here, but fall from what? lol The Jags have always been pretty poorly run with limited success.

[Vin+ 3,121]

Oh right, because the Panthers GM is proven to be so much better than the Jags GM. (You know, the one that got fired this year?) I don't actually doubt that we would have drafted him in the 4th- it would STILL have been a terrible decision.

 

Your philosophy is the same as his. Better to draft a starter than a backup. No, it's not. You could have got a veteran punter for the veteran minimum who would have been close to as good as Anger would be. Your team has so many holes, using a 3rd rounder on a punter is just stupid.

 

We tried that with Matt Turk and Nic Harris last year. Anger is 7th in average and tied for 3rd in net. Turk was 31/31 and Harris was 29/23.

[TDJacksonville 31]

Oh right, because the Panthers GM is proven to be so much better than the Jags GM. (You know, the one that got fired this year?) I don't actually doubt that we would have drafted him in the 4th- it would STILL have been a terrible decision.

 

Your philosophy is the same as his. Better to draft a starter than a backup. No, it's not. You could have got a veteran punter for the veteran minimum who would have been close to as good as Anger would be. Your team has so many holes, using a 3rd rounder on a punter is just stupid.

 

It's the exact same reason why you don't draft a kicker in FF until close to the final round- and certainly not until after you've filled your bench with quality players. They just don't matter that much.

 

Here's a hint: If your team is punting enough that you think you actually need a pro-bowl caliber punter, you have far greater problems than your punt team that you should be focusing on.

 

actually my philosophy is actually taking the BPA. i had anger ranked as a 3rd-4th round pick. dude has an Amazing Leg. Maybe you should watch him kick it before judging him. anyways a Veteren punter that we could have had for minimum would probably be the Leagues worst Punter trust me we spent min money and Nic Harris last year and he was probably the 31st best punter ahead of Matt Turk and he was about as useful as ur teams punter last year which was not useful. actually i take a kicker after a get a few backups because if ur having to keep swapping Backups in for ur starters ur pretty screwed there.

 

heres a Hint bro: Field Position is everything in the NFL and with Anger the Jags usually win the Field position game in terms of punting the ball. i dont think we need a Probowl Punter but i do think we need to have atleast an average one. No player picked after anger would help this team more.

[Turry 755]

Here's another hint: field positon means nothing if you can't score and can't play D.

[Thanatos 2,847]

actually my philosophy is actually taking the BPA. i had anger ranked as a 3rd-4th round pick. dude has an Amazing Leg. Maybe you should watch him kick it before judging him. anyways a Veteren punter that we could have had for minimum would probably be the Leagues worst Punter trust me we spent min money and Nic Harris last year and he was probably the 31st best punter ahead of Matt Turk and he was about as useful as ur teams punter last year which was not useful. actually i take a kicker after a get a few backups because if ur having to keep swapping Backups in for ur starters ur pretty screwed there.

 

heres a Hint bro: Field Position is everything in the NFL and with Anger the Jags usually win the Field position game in terms of punting the ball. i dont think we need a Probowl Punter but i do think we need to have atleast an average one. No player picked after anger would help this team more.

 

People taken after Bryan Anger, which according to this guy, were not better than Anger since Anger was BPA:

 

Russel Wilson, QB, Seahawks (ROFL @ Anger being better than Wilson)

Mohamed Sanu, WR, Bengals

T.Y. Hilton, WR, Colts

Chris Givens, WR, Rams

Kirk Cousins, QB, Redskins

Brandon Boykin, CB, Eagles

Najee Goode, LB, Bucs

Josh Norman, CB, Panthers

Chris Rainey, RB, Steelers

Greg Zuerlein, K, Rams (Round 6, where one should be taken)

Alfred Morris, RB, Redskins, (LOL @ Anger being better than Morris)

Blair Walsh, K, Vikings

Audie Cole, LB, Vikings

DJ Campbell, S, Panthers

Alfonzo Dennard, CB, Patriots

 

Don't forget some of those undrafted guys:

 

Leonard Johnson, CB, Bucs

Vontaze Burfict, LB, Bengals

Justin Tucker, K, Ravens

Brandon Bolden, RB, Patriots

 

(There's a ton more, these are just the ones that immediately jumped out at me.)

 

Also, "bro", field position isn't everything. Points are. Actually wins are, but if all you are doing is punting its hard to get those wins.

Edited November 16, 2012 by Thanatos19

[oochymp 2,393]

heres a Hint bro: Field Position is everything in the NFL and with Anger the Jags usually win the Field position game in terms of punting the ball. i dont think we need a Probowl Punter but i do think we need to have atleast an average one. No player picked after anger would help this team more.

winning the field position battle is something that can put you over the top if you're already a good team, but you've gotta be able to play offense and defense first, field positioning doesn't seem to be helping since you're allowing over 27 points per game (not that I have a lot of room to talk when the Titans are allowing over 31, but we didn't take a punter in the third round)

Edited November 17, 2012 by oochymp