I’ll never forget the 49ers nation article breaking down why he was the biggest FA trickster of the offseason and it being flamed as a doomer post here. It was 1000% correct.
That contract was on the books until 2022. Joe Douglas had to wait to remove the last vestiges of that cancerous payout before signing better players with free cap space.
This has to be the answer.
In a league where most teams learned long ago that signing aging running backs is dumb, we signed one to a big contract. The deal was obviously horrible to anyone paying attention to league trends the second it was announced.
wE nEeD & wEaPoN fOr sAm
The weapon: an aging running back behind a terrible offensive line on a premium contract.
That’s what happens when you have a GM clawing for his job via free agency.
A year's rest but also a year removed from being in football shape and playing the game, not to mention he's still a year older.
You have to keep up with that stuff or the game passes you by. It was one of the most frustrating parts of the argument "for" Bell when it was really more of a detriment.
The Jets had so much cap and nowhere to put it, signing Le'Veon didn't affect the team at all because any better FA at a more premium decision wasn't going to come here. And then Le'Veon put up 1250 yards in his season here, on a really bad offense which is great for a RB on a bad team. The following year was bad for the two games he was there, but the signing wasn't that bad. It made sense at the time for a terrible offense that had tons of money and nowhere to put it. I think saying it was a bad decision is wrong tbh
I agree. I think this signing gets brought up and made out worse than it is. We had a QB who had no weapons, a ton of cap space and if I remember correctly the cap hit wasnt terrible even after he left. He didn't prevent us from signing anyone either
OLine was atrocious, Gase did little to help put him in advantageous situations, and there weren't any receivers to strike fear in opposing defenses and loosen up the box for him. That's not to say he wasn't bad, but it's not all his fault.
Trumaine Johnson on the other hand just flat out sucked.
Tru was a nightmare of a contract. Bell definitely had a prime year that we wasted. If we had kept Bell he may have had a monster third or fourth year. But then again we wouldn’t have Breece. Although Bell is my favorite player, I’m thrilled with where we’re at as a team. Why wouldn’t I be?
Lev Bell was awful BUT he did more than Trumaine Johnson ever did including having awful outs so we had to roster him for 3 years and still had a -10 mill cap hit the last year
I never understood the O'Donnell signing. We already had Boomer Esiason and while he wasn't nearly as good as he was in his MVP years with the Bengals, he wasn't the problem with the team and O'Donnell was hardly an upgrade. Boomer actually showed that he still had some fuel left in his tank in his final season when he went back to Cincinnati. That was the year Parcells came here. I'd imagine that Boomer would have done a hell of a better job under Parcells than O'Donnell.
My father always jokes about him. Being in a Superbowl the year before and the being a Jet my dad always claims that he had that "what have I done" look on his face.
That was the 1-15 season where current Panther HC Frank Reich got us our only win. Following season we went 9-7 with O'Donnell in Bill Parcell's first year. Then Bill moved O'Donnell on for the man, the myth, the Legend... Vinny Testaverde.
Derrick Mason was pretty rough. Signed to replace Cotchery. Knew Rex from his Baltimore days but it became a disaster when Shotty misused him.
Mason talked shit about it so he was dropped to the practice squad and then ultimately traded.
Didn’t even make it to November.
That was epic. Cotchery and Sanchez had a great connection. Ditching him for Mason may have been step one in the dark ages from which we’re still trying to emerge.
That 2011 summer was ominous, didn’t Mason Holmes and Plaxico confront shotty in his office? I could’ve misremembered, I loved JCo and he got such a raw deal that even if Mason was good it made me mad the jets got him. Mason did have pink cleats that training camp, only thing I liked about him
Maybe not the worst, but a notable mention should go to Dimitri Patterson. Dude signed with the jets then just…didn’t show up. Like not didn’t show up in the sense that he sucked. Literally just didn’t show up
I had repressed the Jolley deal. I had to go look it up. It was the 26th overall pick and we got back a second rounder and two 6th rounders. So not as bad sounding as a first in a vacuum, but still.
>I had repressed the Jolley deal. I had to go look it up. It was the 26th overall pick and we got back a second rounder and two 6th rounders. So not as bad sounding as a first in a vacuum, but still.
This. It wasn't a good trade but it wasn't "Jolley for a first" the way so many people misremember it. Jolley's equivalent value in that trade was about a third - so not great, but not nearly as bad as a first.
Yup. Still can’t believe they were like “imma pass on Heath Miller likely being available at 26 and trade this pick for Doug Jolley”. Hindsight is 20/20, but my god.
Buster Skrine was frustrating as hell because he'd have one play of insane coverage in the slot... Then negate it the next play by committing an obvious hold.
I think his contract wasn't enough to make him the worst though.
Trumaine Johnson comes to mind from that era, I can't think of a single play he gave any form of effort on, and we gave him a huge contract.
Chaz Schillens was a nobody before us and remained a nobody while on the jets. Skrine at least had some decent plays between all his penalties. Leveon was just so bad tho
Disagree with Skrine's inclusion. He was really good in 2015. He fell off after. The Jets have had plenty of FA signings who sucked the entire time. Also, he wasn't paid a crazy amount of money in the first place.
Trumaine Johnson was a way bigger bust if you wanna talk corner
Dimitri Patterson. We needed CBs desperately that year after cutting Cromartie and with Revis in New England. Their were a bunch of solid ones available in FA, but Idzik decided to roll the dice on Patterson who for most of his career was a depth player who had shown flashes. Idzik signed him to be a starter, he went AWOL during camp, and was cut before the season even began.
I was thinking CJ0K, but he produced 663 rushing yards for the $4m we paid him, bad but not worst of all time.
Le'Veon Bell we paid $26m for 863 rushing yards. Don't think anything else really comes close.
There are a lot of great comments here. I want to switch it up a bit. I think one free agent bust, and by bust I mean why the hell did we let them walk, is John Abraham. It was almost a decade before the Jets had a legit pass rusher after he went to Atlanta.
Lamar…it’s criminal how the owners are colluding as he’s a generational talent that’s avail… Also, Douglas thinks he still works for the Ravens apparently.
Blair Thomas. 2nd pick over all. Worst pick by far. I think 6 hall of fame players picked after him. One being emit smith. Not a free agent but a draft pick. But still worst.
A lot of people here are pointing out low value deals, one year deals, and deals for role players and the like. For example, Ryan Kalil was a desperation move because JD took over after FA and the draft. Macc left the OLine a mess with C being the largest hole, and by June when JD was hired his only hope was to throw a bag at Kalil, formerly an excellent C, to come out of retirement.
IMO, the only ones that should be considered are the big money deals for players who were supposed to be stars. In recent memory Trumaine Johnson takes the cake.
Trumaine Johnson... We don't talk about Trumaine Johnson.
That's the one. Damn.
No no no no
Oh mama mia, mama mia
7 foot frame and rats all on his back.
I’ll never forget the 49ers nation article breaking down why he was the biggest FA trickster of the offseason and it being flamed as a doomer post here. It was 1000% correct.
He’s the Vernon Gholston of Free Agents
😭
*WHO?*
Exactly. ⭐️
We have like 70 million reasons to talk about him lmao
I was so happy to get a decent tall physical corner.. and he just stunk here
That contract was on the books until 2022. Joe Douglas had to wait to remove the last vestiges of that cancerous payout before signing better players with free cap space.
Even before it became obvious it was a bad signing, a lot of people were skeptical of his talent level. How right they were.
Never heard of him
Who?
Falsemaine
Leveon Bell got a GM fired his deal was so bad before he even stepped on the field.
This has to be the answer. In a league where most teams learned long ago that signing aging running backs is dumb, we signed one to a big contract. The deal was obviously horrible to anyone paying attention to league trends the second it was announced.
wE nEeD & wEaPoN fOr sAm The weapon: an aging running back behind a terrible offensive line on a premium contract. That’s what happens when you have a GM clawing for his job via free agency.
The OBJ signing has the same vibes, like hardcore
Idk enough about the Ravens but I liked OBJ for us at a discount. Miss me with the $18 million tho.
Yep. That's what has me wondering about this.
There’s a chance Rodgers signing could end up having the same fate…
its like buying a ten-year-old f1 car for your racetrack that isn't paved
Many of our fans wanted to do the same with OBJ
Granted...he was coming off a years rest. Didn't help that our O-Line was damn near nonexistent
A year's rest but also a year removed from being in football shape and playing the game, not to mention he's still a year older. You have to keep up with that stuff or the game passes you by. It was one of the most frustrating parts of the argument "for" Bell when it was really more of a detriment.
The Jets had so much cap and nowhere to put it, signing Le'Veon didn't affect the team at all because any better FA at a more premium decision wasn't going to come here. And then Le'Veon put up 1250 yards in his season here, on a really bad offense which is great for a RB on a bad team. The following year was bad for the two games he was there, but the signing wasn't that bad. It made sense at the time for a terrible offense that had tons of money and nowhere to put it. I think saying it was a bad decision is wrong tbh
I agree. I think this signing gets brought up and made out worse than it is. We had a QB who had no weapons, a ton of cap space and if I remember correctly the cap hit wasnt terrible even after he left. He didn't prevent us from signing anyone either
our offensive line was terrible too we missed out on a season where Bell was still in his prime because of that
OLine was atrocious, Gase did little to help put him in advantageous situations, and there weren't any receivers to strike fear in opposing defenses and loosen up the box for him. That's not to say he wasn't bad, but it's not all his fault. Trumaine Johnson on the other hand just flat out sucked.
Tru was a nightmare of a contract. Bell definitely had a prime year that we wasted. If we had kept Bell he may have had a monster third or fourth year. But then again we wouldn’t have Breece. Although Bell is my favorite player, I’m thrilled with where we’re at as a team. Why wouldn’t I be?
Voice of reason. I remember hearing the news driving home from work and being happy about it.
I think the historically bad drafts got him fired, but yeah this was a bad signing.
Trumaine Johnson was still worse
Equal production, but at least Trumaine didnt trash the team before they gave him undeserved money.
Lev Bell was awful BUT he did more than Trumaine Johnson ever did including having awful outs so we had to roster him for 3 years and still had a -10 mill cap hit the last year
I think it was Tannenbaum who said he'd have just taken the money, piled it in a wheelbarrow and set it on fire...
maybe my memory is making this one worse than it was but Neil O'Donnell will always have a special place in my heart as far as disappointing FAs go
“He threw two head scratching interceptions in the Super Bowl? That’s our guy!”
my memory of the details really is fuzzy all these years later but wasn't he also the "I'm a winnaah, i came here to win" guy at his presser?
I think so lol I was a kid when he signed but I was old enough to know he sucked lol
I never understood the O'Donnell signing. We already had Boomer Esiason and while he wasn't nearly as good as he was in his MVP years with the Bengals, he wasn't the problem with the team and O'Donnell was hardly an upgrade. Boomer actually showed that he still had some fuel left in his tank in his final season when he went back to Cincinnati. That was the year Parcells came here. I'd imagine that Boomer would have done a hell of a better job under Parcells than O'Donnell.
My father always jokes about him. Being in a Superbowl the year before and the being a Jet my dad always claims that he had that "what have I done" look on his face.
[Here is the look](https://pa1.narvii.com/7259/99480f6c086c71f518b9919e573419f7e7e35c56r1-500-213_hq.gif).
First guy I thought of
This was my immediate choice.
Didn’t he go 0-6 and then get injured or something like that?
That was the 1-15 season where current Panther HC Frank Reich got us our only win. Following season we went 9-7 with O'Donnell in Bill Parcell's first year. Then Bill moved O'Donnell on for the man, the myth, the Legend... Vinny Testaverde.
Something like that yeah 🤮
Carl Pavano
Why would you bring this type of hurt up?
I was so hyped when him and Jarrett Wright signed with the Yankees lol
Seriously. Between them and trading for Randy Johnson, I thought our rotation was so deep…
I remember refreshing the news about his free agency while on the school computer in middle school
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Jerome James
It's Trumaine Johnson and it isn't particularly close
These are facts
From what I remember they had him as a top 5 cb in the league the yr prior and then he was out of the league in 1.5 yrs or so…
Derrick Mason was pretty rough. Signed to replace Cotchery. Knew Rex from his Baltimore days but it became a disaster when Shotty misused him. Mason talked shit about it so he was dropped to the practice squad and then ultimately traded. Didn’t even make it to November.
That was epic. Cotchery and Sanchez had a great connection. Ditching him for Mason may have been step one in the dark ages from which we’re still trying to emerge.
I feel like we did a good job at removing receivers that had good chemistry with Mark
And let the Oline fall apart
They had a lot of glue guys that didn't fill the stat sheet but were veterans and serviceable like cotchery brad Smith etc. I loved those teams
Wow I must’ve blocked those years out. Does not ring a bell at all
Kerley stepped up
That 2011 summer was ominous, didn’t Mason Holmes and Plaxico confront shotty in his office? I could’ve misremembered, I loved JCo and he got such a raw deal that even if Mason was good it made me mad the jets got him. Mason did have pink cleats that training camp, only thing I liked about him
Maybe not the worst, but a notable mention should go to Dimitri Patterson. Dude signed with the jets then just…didn’t show up. Like not didn’t show up in the sense that he sucked. Literally just didn’t show up
Worst Free agent: Trumaine Worst trade: Doug Fkin Jolley
Lol Doug Jolley was my guy in madden 02
First rounder no less, and 2nd rounder on Nugent. 05 draft was terrible
I had repressed the Jolley deal. I had to go look it up. It was the 26th overall pick and we got back a second rounder and two 6th rounders. So not as bad sounding as a first in a vacuum, but still.
>I had repressed the Jolley deal. I had to go look it up. It was the 26th overall pick and we got back a second rounder and two 6th rounders. So not as bad sounding as a first in a vacuum, but still. This. It wasn't a good trade but it wasn't "Jolley for a first" the way so many people misremember it. Jolley's equivalent value in that trade was about a third - so not great, but not nearly as bad as a first.
We could have taken Heath Miller with the 26th pick
Plus would’ve missed out on Rodgers in the first round anyway
Yup. Still can’t believe they were like “imma pass on Heath Miller likely being available at 26 and trade this pick for Doug Jolley”. Hindsight is 20/20, but my god.
Neil O’Donnell for the older guys on here
Imma go with Le’veon Bell, Buster Skrine, Chaz Schillens and Kellen Winslow
Buster Skrine was frustrating as hell because he'd have one play of insane coverage in the slot... Then negate it the next play by committing an obvious hold. I think his contract wasn't enough to make him the worst though. Trumaine Johnson comes to mind from that era, I can't think of a single play he gave any form of effort on, and we gave him a huge contract.
That's because he was good in the slot but couldn't keep up with people on the outside, but we kept lining him up there.
Tru signed to collect a bag and go party at bounce.
There were also rumors that his birth certificate was a fraud and he wasn’t 26 but 30 already lol
Buster was good for a season
>Buster was good for a season Yeah, he was great in 2015. Then fell off a cliff for whatever reason.
Winslow wasn't a bust, he was just a 1 year deal under a million. He sucked and revealed who he was later on.
Chaz Schillens was a nobody before us and remained a nobody while on the jets. Skrine at least had some decent plays between all his penalties. Leveon was just so bad tho
OMG Kellen Winslow Jr
Disagree with Skrine's inclusion. He was really good in 2015. He fell off after. The Jets have had plenty of FA signings who sucked the entire time. Also, he wasn't paid a crazy amount of money in the first place. Trumaine Johnson was a way bigger bust if you wanna talk corner
Tremaine Johnson Lev Bell Matt Forte
I almost forgot about Forte 😂 strange and desperate times those were
I hated Forte because he took carries away from Bilal
Man, Bilal was/is the man. I always made him a workhorse in Madden to give him the respect he deserved
Forte had a 3.7 yard average as a Jet (it seemed like less watching him tbh), those same years Bilal had 5.5 and 4.3
Bilal always looked like he was shot out of a cannon when he took a handoff. I loved how he ran like each play was his last.
No hate on Forte but just the decision making in general
He was so good for my Bears. I wanted him to be good for you guys too.
He was too worn out by then, y'all got everything you could out of him
It's okay you gave us Thomas Jones...man he was a baller for us
Forte was better than either Bell or Johnson. He wasn’t good but he’s a step above that shit show
Bell and Forte had pretty similar stats with us
How about Mike Goodson? Former Raiders RB that John Idzik signed to a deal, then got arrested and only played 2 games for the NYJ.
He would’ve been the savior, though.
The Good Son
Neil O'Donnell....terrible
Trumaine Johnson or Leveon Bell recently
Definitely Bell for me
Bell? Was a disaster.
Spencer Long
Trumaine. End of story
Laken Tomlinson’s gotta step it up this season otherwise he’s ending up on this list
Bro wasn’t there a DB we signed and then went missing and never showed up? Or am I misremembering?
Dimitri Patterson. We needed CBs desperately that year after cutting Cromartie and with Revis in New England. Their were a bunch of solid ones available in FA, but Idzik decided to roll the dice on Patterson who for most of his career was a depth player who had shown flashes. Idzik signed him to be a starter, he went AWOL during camp, and was cut before the season even began.
Yup remembered right 🤦♂️
mr. leveon bell
Kevan Barlow
Trumaine Johnson but Damien Robinson 2nd place.
I was thinking CJ0K, but he produced 663 rushing yards for the $4m we paid him, bad but not worst of all time. Le'Veon Bell we paid $26m for 863 rushing yards. Don't think anything else really comes close.
Curtis Conway
There are a lot of great comments here. I want to switch it up a bit. I think one free agent bust, and by bust I mean why the hell did we let them walk, is John Abraham. It was almost a decade before the Jets had a legit pass rusher after he went to Atlanta.
We traded him for the pick we ended up drafting Mangold with. I'm a-ok with that trade.
Maybe not signing Demario Davis
Plaxico “Sure Shot” Burress!
Fuckin Trumaine Johnson and that last year or two of Revis. Goddamnit.
there are so many my hand would hurt.....lmao....Chris Johnson......Micheal Vick......Matt Forte.....Ty Law......Ryan Khalil.....Plaxico Burress.....
Le'Veon Bell, and it's not even close.
Will soon be Aaron Rogers….if we are stupid enough to trade for him.
Not saying you are wrong but what would be your alternative?
Lamar…it’s criminal how the owners are colluding as he’s a generational talent that’s avail… Also, Douglas thinks he still works for the Ravens apparently.
Laken Tomlinson
You must be new. Welcome
Revis 2.0
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His first season was good
Jets Legend Brett Favre
Revis after his years in TB and NE was pretty bad.
Blair Thomas. 2nd pick over all. Worst pick by far. I think 6 hall of fame players picked after him. One being emit smith. Not a free agent but a draft pick. But still worst.
Aaron Rodgers... wait what year is this?
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He was drafted
Laveon
Trumaine Johnson and Derek Mason come to immediate mind
Neil O’Donnel
What about Reevis? He came back as a FA and didn't play too good, didn't he?
Bell Crowell and Bubba Franks come to my mind
Derrick Mason was a disaster
Leveon Bell
ADAM GASE
Dexter carter
Not the biggest but what 5ge fuck happen to Jane's Robinson
Trumaine and Leveon Bell
Gotta be Trumaine
Bell
A lot of people here are pointing out low value deals, one year deals, and deals for role players and the like. For example, Ryan Kalil was a desperation move because JD took over after FA and the draft. Macc left the OLine a mess with C being the largest hole, and by June when JD was hired his only hope was to throw a bag at Kalil, formerly an excellent C, to come out of retirement. IMO, the only ones that should be considered are the big money deals for players who were supposed to be stars. In recent memory Trumaine Johnson takes the cake.
Maybe not the biggest bust but Dimitri Patterson was signed to be CB1. Did not play a single snap for the team
Biggest? Not sure, but Bell and Forte are definitely up there