If young QB is going to step up, now is the time
OK, CHRISTIAN Hackenberg, it is time for you to show us if you can hack it. You heard what coach Todd Bowles said Tuesday at the NFL owners meetings: There is no No. 1 quarterback. There will be an open competition between you, Josh McCown and Bryce Petty. And maybe someone else. Someone else named Deshaun Watson or Mitchell Trubisky.
No one who currently resides in the quarterback room—you, veteran journeyman Josh McCown, Bryce Petty — offers a compelling argument for the Jets not to draft Watson or T rubi sky with the sixth pick.
The Seahawks signed Matt Flynn to a three-year, $26 million contract with $10 million guaranteed to battle Tarvaris Jackson for their 2012 starting job — until third-round draft choice Russell Wilson beat him out in training camp.
You better keep trying to find yourself a franchise QB until you have found one.
Whether three’s company or general manager Mike Maccagnan decides to add a fourth in the draft, the job is there to be taken.
Take it. Show us what you got. You aren’t on scholarship anymore. Go win the damn job. Go prove you can be the quarterback Maccagnan believes you can be when he raised eyebrows around the NFL by drafting you in the second round.
Bowles was terrified to play you last season, your redshirt season, and with good reason. On too many occasions in practice, you resembled a righthanded Tim Tebow. But your mechanics were so messed up that the plan all along was for you to learn at the feet of Ryan Fitzpatrick and be a sponge.
Petty got his feet wet last year but will be rehabbing over the spring from shoulder surgery.
McCown is 2-20 over his past 22 starts and is, at best, a bridge to a better tomorrow. A $6 million Band-Aid.
That is a lot of coin for a backup, which leads me to believe he is pencilled in as the starter until you or Petty — or Watson or Trubisky — is deemed ready.
But you should recognize the organization has more invested in you than it does in your current competition. The organization will be rooting for you (in truth, the organization is rooting for anyone, someone).
So in case you missed it, here is what your head coach divulged in Phoenix:
“There will be heavy competition for the job. Nobody has been promised the starting quarterback job. They’ll al l get a chance to play and we’ll make that decision, going forward, when training camp starts as we see production from certain people.”
They asked him specifically about you, and he said this:
“This year, he’l l have a chance to play, and he’ll have some pep in his step.”
It is a rebuilding year, with a new offensive coordinator (John Morton) and a clean slate for everyone. The practice reps will be a problem until someone separates himself from the pack. If no one separates himself from the pack, McCown probably will hold the fort at the start.
And if the Jets do draft Watson or Trubisky? Nobody passed a law that says you can’t win the competition anyway, and shed that taunting, haunting “bust” label.
No one around the Jets ever will concede this isn’t about the 2017 season. But everyone knows it isn’t. This is about 2018, and beyond. Because there is no future for the Jets until they find their elusive quarterback of the future.
Twenty years ago, after a rookie placekicker named John Hall booted a game-winning field goal in overtime, Bill Parcells said: “We’re trying to get this kid off diapers and into his street clothes. Today, we took those Huggies off.”
It’s time for you, Christian Hackenberg, to take those Huggies off.