Could LDT be the answer at RG?
After another impressive performance, this time against Tampa Bay, could LDT return in 2022?
🗽 Good morning Jets fans and welcome to another edition of The Jets Way. If you’re like me, today will be your first day back at work after the Christmas break…so I’m here to offer a distraction to delay that mountain of emails waiting for you.
Following another good performance, this time against Tampa Bay where the Jets allowed just a single sack and ran for 150 yards against the 3rd best rushing defense in the league, I had two thoughts.
We need to start appreciating our offensive line coach John Benton, who's managed to improve the Jets line performance while losing several key players along the way. Even losing Becton early on, losing Fant at points, McGovern at points, AVT at points, LDT at points…the Jets have somehow improved. It’s completely illogical, but give John Benton and his offensive assistants a ton of credit.
How much improvement do we really need to make? Are we being fooled into believing the problem isn’t as large as it really is? Or were we overreacting to the problem early in the season, with the players getting to know each other, the QB, and new coaches?
So for today, I wanted to focus in on one area and that’s the RG position. It was a problem area to start the season and GVR’s performance left a lot to be desired. Joe Douglas got to dialing and managed to snag LDT for free basically, and since LDT’s arrival, the line has performed at a much higher standard.
Since arriving in New York and making his debut with the Jets during week 11’s game against the Miami Dolphins. LDT has allowed 1 sack and 15 pressures over 217 pass-blocking snaps. The sack and 7 of those pressures came in his first game against a Miami defense that was riding high. So over the last 5 games, LDT has allowed 0 sacks and 8 pressures.
Since week 11 the Jets have rushed for 102, 157, 70, 78, 102 & 150 yards, and without him, they rushed for even more in week 16 against the Jaguars (273 yards), but then that’s the Jaguars. That 109.8 yards per average over his starts would put the Jets at league average, significantly better than where they’ve been for most of the seasons. Obviously, it’s not all down to LDT, but a line works as a unit and since he’s come in, the unit has been working a little better.
According to OTC, LDT is set to become a free agent after the 2021 season and the Jets will need to decide whether to bring him back or not. As usual, it will likely come down to cost. Greg Van Roten is almost certainly heading to free agency, the Jets can save $3.5 million by cutting the much-maligned guard, and considering the Jets replaced GVR with LDT, it would make sense for the Jets to move on from Greg.
While LDT has done a fine job filling in for the Jets, I don’t believe that should prevent the Jets from looking to upgrade the position. Connor Williams of the Cowboys has allowed just one sack and 12 pressures over nearly 600 pass-blocking snaps, the downside to Williams is he’s also given up 14 penalties. Depending on how you look at it, giving up more penalties than pressures is a unique statistic for a starter.
Will someone like Williams hit free agency? Who knows, the Cowboys have some mouths to feed and the cap has a limit, if he does hit the market I’d fully expect the Jets to make a play for him.
Even if the Jets don’t decide to upgrade the right guard spot in free agency, the chances are they’ll take at least one guard in the draft. Drafting a guard to come in and compete with LDT would make a lot of sense, there is a ton of interior offensive line talent in this draft, especially between rounds 2-4.
If you’re looking at some names to watch out for, my personal favorite prospects are Zion Johnson, a guard from Boston College that’s built to play in heavy zone schemes, he has good athleticism and plays with excellent technique consistently. Tyler Smith from Tulsa is another name to watch out for, he is as tenacious as they come and will bring a real physicality, he’s raw and unpolished but his ceiling is very nice. I’ve spoken before about Cole Strange and how he was basically built to play in our offense, he’s likely more a 5th to 7th round prospect but you find a lot of NFL starting guards in the later rounds, and I think he’s next up.
Virginia Tech’s Lecitus Smith is another guard who I love for our scheme. Like Fant, he started as a TE, but quickly moved inside to play guard. He’s still a little raw because he came to the position late, but he possesses the kind of athleticism that MLF would love, if we re-sign LDT and bring a guard through with no pressure to start straight away, Strange or Smith make the most sense to me. If we want a guard to come in and start from day one, then Zion Johnson is head and shoulders the best fit in the area we’ll be picking.
Bringing LDT back for another year makes a lot of sense if the financials add up, but the Jets should still look to improve the position. At best from what we’ve seen from LDT, he can be a below-average to average starting guard in the NFL, which is a significant improvement on GVR, but is it improvement enough? Personally, for a team that wants to build through the trenches, we need to look to that line as a strength, and improving the right guard position is a way to make it a strength. Either sign a starter in FA, or draft a guard outside the 1st round to come in and compete.
Of the 50 highest-rated guards in the NFL this season so far according to PFF, 40 of them were drafted outside the first round, 30 of those were taken in the 3rd round or later and 6 of them were undrafted. There is an opportunity to find a good NFL guard deeper in the draft, and I expect those waters to be the ones the Jets fish in come the spring.
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Denzel
I’m not sure there is much to say about Denzel Mims that hasn’t already been said. On Sunday he didn’t play a single snap, and when asked about it Robert Saleh said the opportunity didn’t present itself to get him in the game. This is a game where Jeff Smith got run, where Dan Brown and Kenny Yeboah each caught multiple passes, and Denzel couldn’t get in the game? At this point, it seems as though the Jets and Denzel Mims are heading for an early separation this off-season. At first, I thought it was logical to reset over the Spring and Summer and come back next season with a fresh slate, but now I’m thinking it may be too late. Just get what you can for Denzel, let him go somewhere and try and start his career, and draft a receiver in a very deep receiver draft.