Jets need stability at QB

Jets need stability at QB

Maybe you weren't even a thought in your father's head when Joe Namath dropped back in the pocket, looking for an open receiver. Perhaps your only recollections of old Number Twelve are vague snippets. Or maybe you fully remember when the man from Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania went from taking snaps for Bear Bryant's Alabama Crimson Tide to calling signals for the New York Jets.

Whatever you know about Namath, you must know this - the last time Namath wore a green and white uniform was the last time the Jets had any long-term stability at quarterback.

Brett Favre, though drafted by the Atlanta Falcons, played the last 16 of his 17-year career for the Green Bay Packers. John Elway spent his 16 NFL seasons playing for the Denver Broncos. Phil Simms was a New York Giant for all 15 years of his pro career, and though he lost his starting job at different intervals, Simms made his first start as early as Week 6 of his rookie year in 1979 and as late as a second-round playoff loss in January, 1994. In between, Simms went into seven consecutive seasons as the Giants' starter.

Even Donovan McNabb - who has taken plenty of hits from pass rushers on the field and from the Philadelphia media off it - has so far spent his entire NFL existence with the Eagles, and is about to begin his 10th season with the franchise.

The Jets' starting quarterback position is too often as stable as the New York Stock Exchange on a Friday afternoon. There have been some extended starting quarterback stints, 'extended' in Jets-speak meaning five or six years, but it seems the Jets are looking for an answer more than they are finding one.

2008 brings yet another installment of the Jets' semi-recurring reality series "So You Want To Be A Starting Quarterback". Head coach Eric Mangini has proclaimed there will be an "open competition" for the starting job between established starter Chad Pennington and 2006 draftee Kellen Clemens. But will that make the eventual choice better for having fought for his starting life? In this election year, we kept hearing (mostly from Hillary Clinton) that a contentious battle right down to the last primary was good for energizing the Democratic Party. Surely the Jets would be much better off if they had a John McCain already ensconced in the starting role.

What should make the Jets' situation troubling for their fans is that the current battle is more comparable to Joe Biden vs. Dennis Kucinich. Both are competent enough, hard-working enough, well-meaning enough, but...

THE PROMISE OF PENNINGTON

Pennington excited Jet fans when he was the 18th overall selection on Draft Day, 2000. But just six years later, the Jets were buyers again. The old car was giving them trouble. When it ran the way it was supposed to, it was a great little car, but it seemed to spend too much time either not running well or parked in a mechanic's garage. The Jets were ready for a new 2006 model. After drafting stud offensive lineman D'Brickashaw Ferguson in the first round, the team grabbed Clemens out of Oregon in the second. Pennington had twice led New York to the playoffs, in 2002 and '04, and in the latter appearance, he brought the Jets one bad kicker away from the AFC Championship game. But a torn rotator cuff for Pennington in 2005, leading in part to a miserable 4-12 season, made the Jets believe it might be time for some new wheels.

Even after Clemens was drafted, Pennington brought the Jets back to the playoffs in 2006, starting all 16 regular-season games and their first-round playoff loss to the New England Patriots. He was named Associated Press NFL Comeback Player of the Year.

A high ankle sprain limited Pennington's effectiveness last season, and Clemens replaced him in the Jets' eighth game. Clemens didn't exactly grasp firmly onto the job that day - he completed 5 of 12 passes (44 percent) for 67 yards, no touchdowns and two interceptions in the Jets' 13-3 loss to the Buffalo Bills.

Clemens started most of the season's second half, but Pennington did return in Weeks 15 and 16, completing 51 of 70 passes (73 percent) for 438 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions in the two games combined. Pennington finished the season with 179 completions on 260 attempts (69 percent) for 1,765 yards, 10 touchdowns and nine interceptions. Clemens had a completion percentage of only 52 percent (130 of 250) for 1,529 yards, and twice as many interceptions (10) as touchdown passes (five).

CAROUSEL

The team has shown even less patience with quarterbacks before. Namath's immediate successor, fellow 'Bama alum Richard Todd, led the Jets to a playoff appearance in 1981, then followed that with a run to the AFC title game in '82. And yet, a mere three months after losing that game to the Miami Dolphins, the Jets had wandering eyes again, and selected a quarterback with their first-round pick in the 1983 Draft. It was a doubly mind-numbing choice because the Jets were drafting another quarterback in the first place, and because they drafted little-known Ken O'Brien out of UC-Davis when they could have had Pitt's Dan Marino, who went on to play all 17 years of his pro career for the division rival Miami Dolphins.

While Marino was earning his Hall of Fame credentials, the Jets were running a multi-million dollar carousel. The year after O'Brien was drafted; Todd was packed up and shipped to the New Orleans Saints. The Jets were high on O'Brien for a while, but eventually soured on him enough to draft Louisville's Browning Nagle in the first round of the 1991 Draft. In 1993, after Nagle had flopped harder than New Coke, the Jets signed longtime Cincinnati Bengals' starter Boomer Esiason, a seemingly perfect match with his Super Bowl experience and Long Island heritage.

Esiason did bring the Jets a playoff berth - albeit with an 8-8 record - and made the Pro Bowl in his first season with the team. But after the Jets went 9-23 in the next two seasons combined, they tried another free agent with a local connection and a Super Bowl on his resume. Raised in New Jersey, Neil O'Donnell was fresh off playing for the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl XXX when he signed with the Jets in 1996, yet O'Donnell fared much worse than Esiason had. O'Donnell's first season with the Jets was a 1-15 nightmare in which he started only six games; his second year ended in disappointment when the Jets were eliminated from playoff contention on the season's final Sunday.
Enter the well-traveled Vinny Testaverde in 1998. Like Esiason, he had spent his childhood in neighborhoods off the Long Island Expressway. But unlike Esiason, Testaverde had Jet fans realistically thinking Super Bowl. The Jets' 1998 season ended in the AFC Championship game, where they lost to the Denver Broncos after having led 10-0 at halftime.
1999 seemed like it could be the year, the first of those years for the Jets in three decades. But when an Achilles tendon injury ended Testaverde's season on opening day, and his replacements were subpar (Rick Mirer) to average (Ray Lucas), the carousel started whirring into motion once again, and Pennington was drafted out of Marshall the following spring.

As for this year, Pennington has the classic "best chance to win now" tag. And with Clemens already entering his third NFL season, he is approaching "if not now, when" territory.

The numbers along with Pennington's leadership and experience seem to make him a more sensible choice. But Clemens is younger and healthier (so far), and though his arm isn't the best, it's stronger than Pennington's. Mobility isn't an edge for either quarterback; both are practically dead weights in the pocket.

Don't be surprised if Pennington is named the starting quarterback in camp. Don't be surprised if Clemens is installed as the starter at some point this season or by the start of the next.

And don't be surprised if the Jets are drafting a new quarterback in two or three years.

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