• Try to trade for Matthew Stafford… again: At 35 years old, Stafford still looks more than capable of leading an offense and produced five big-time throws in the Rams' win on Sunday. The issue is that the Rams likely won't want to trade their signal-caller after Sunday. In a weak NFC, the Rams will surely feel like they can be a playoff team with Stafford at the helm.
• Trade for a veteran backup: New Orleans' Jameis Winston is one such option. For all the talk about his interceptions, Winston has earned a passing grade above 65.0 in every season in which he's attempted at least 100 passes.
• Stick with Zach Wilson: Two seasons into his NFL career, Wilson earned a PFF passing grade of 54.8 as a rookie and 43.3 as a sophomore. There was obviously hope that working with Aaron Rodgers could help his development, but on last night’s show, it’s too soon for that.
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
After all the pageantry and fanfare that accompanied Aaron Rodgers‘ move from the Green Bay Packers to the New York Jets, it now looks like the future Hall of Fame quarterback's debut season in New York is over.
Four snaps into the Jets' season opener against the Buffalo Bills, Rodgers was sacked by Bills edge defender Leonard Floyd and fell awkwardly on his left leg. He stood up after a few moments but needed assistance to get to the sideline before being carted to the locker room.
An MRI will confirm the answer today, but Jets head coach Robert Saleh suggested that the team think they already know the outcome.
Backup quarterback Zach Wilson played most of the game in relief of Rodgers, with the Jets ultimately winning the game on a walk-off punt return in overtime, but thoughts will now turn to whether the team wants to make a move to try to remain a Super Bowl contender this season.
Options are limited, but here’s what they can do.
Try to trade for Matthew Stafford… again
Last Sunday, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported that the Jets called the Los Angeles Rams during the offseason to inquire about trading for Stafford. The Rams weren’t interested, and the Jets were able to get a deal done with the Green Bay Packers for Rodgers, but perhaps the Jets will look to ask again with Rodgers sidelined.
Stafford impressed for the Rams on Sunday, earning a 90.3 PFF passing grade after going 24-for-38 for 340 yards, with Puka Nacua and Tutu Atwell as his top targets.
At 35 years old, he still looks more than capable of leading an offense and produced five big-time throws in the win on Sunday. The issue is that the Rams likely won't want to trade their signal-caller after Sunday. In a weak NFC, the Rams will surely feel like they can be a playoff team with Stafford at the helm.
Trade for a veteran backup
Assuming the Jets can’t pull off a big move for someone like Stafford, there are still backups out there who would likely be an upgrade over Zach Wilson as things stand.
New Orleans' Jameis Winston is one such option. For all the talk about his interceptions, Winston has earned a passing grade above 65.0 in every season in which he's attempted at least 100 passes. He will make mistakes, but he has a big-time throw percentage of 4.3% for his career, which would have ranked inside the top 20 at the position last season.
Andy Dalton is another option. For his career, Dalton has a 4.8% big-time throw rate — though he hasn’t been above 4.1% since 2018 — but is also safer with the football than Winston, with his 3.2% turnover-worthy play rate since 2015 1.5 percentage points better than Winston's mark over that same span.
Dalton earned an 81.0 passing grade with the Saints last year and would likely be good enough to keep the Jets in the playoff hunt.
Stick with Zach Wilson
The Jets won last night, but we can be pretty confident that we know who Zach Wilson is at this stage.
Two seasons into his NFL career, Wilson earned a PFF passing grade of 54.8 as a rookie and 43.3 as a sophomore. There was obviously hope that working with Aaron Rodgers could help his development, but on last night’s show, it’s too soon for that.
However, if the Jets can’t pull off a big trade for someone like Stafford, and they don’t think they can contend for a Super Bowl in a loaded AFC with someone like Dalton or Winston, the best thing to do might simply be to ride with Wilson and go again with Rodgers next year.
The conditional 2024 second-round draft pick the Jets sent to the Packers for Rodgers only becomes a first-rounder if Rodgers plays 65% or more of the team’s snaps. If Rodgers is to miss the rest of the season, the Jets could very easily retain a pick in the top half of the draft.
Trevor Sikkema’s first 2024 NFL Mock Draft featured four quarterbacks in the top 10, so that pick could easily be used to select Aaron Rodgers‘ successor or to help the team get better on the offensive line.
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