Xavier Newman-Johnson

Edition #677

Good morning! ☕

Although all the talk online is revolving around Haason Reddick and who’s to blame for the current situation we find ourselves in, we’ve got a joint practice to look forward to with Carolina. Much like JD, we like to focus on the players who are in camp and putting in a shift here at TJW. So unless there is any real developments, we’ll keep the Reddick talk to a minimum.

I went back and watched the Washington game last night and one player popped off the screen for me and he’s a player I didn’t include in my immediate summary on Monday. Xavier Newman-Johnson the Jets backup guard got off to a great start and we’re going to take a look at that today.

Morgan Moses and AVT have the potential to be a dominant force on the right side of the line for the Jets and with both returning from injury, they’re getting time to gel before the new season kicks off - "We are off to a great start," Moses said about building chemistry with Vera-Tucker. "We're gelling, the conversations and we sit beside each other in the meeting room, too, so like there's things that we're going over to film, I'm like, 'hey, like you see how this guy does that? Like if we can do that,' we're just talking football, so we're getting that chemistry on the field and we're getting that chemistry off the field."

AVT also spoke about that connection with Morgan and the positives of having someone so experienced on his right shoulder - "The more experience you have the better," Vera-Tucker said. "I'm blessed to be out here and doing my thing and working with Morgan Moses. He's been a veteran in this league for a long time at right tackle so just being with someone like that who's comfortable and knowing what to do, it feels good."

ESPN ranked the top-10 NFL QBs by traits. Aaron Rodgers was nowhere to be seen under arm strength, ball placement (shockingly), pocket presence, rushing ability, or second reaction ability, but he was ranked 8th in terms of mechanics, 1st for decision making with the ball with ESPN saying: “Rodgers is the best in the game here. Yes, he threw 12 interceptions in his last full season (2022 with Green Bay), but before that season, he hadn't thrown double-digit picks in a season since 2011. He can read it out and keep the ball out of harm's way.”

Aaron Rodgers has hinted that he may reach out to Reddick to try and get him in camp - "There's always new things in the league," Rodgers said after practice. "I've been around 20 years; I've seen a lot of stuff. I think as players we always first try to side with the player because we know what it's like to be a player. I don't know him well. I had a couple messages with him, I believe, when he got traded. Obviously, we'd love him to be here, but we don't judge him for trying to do what's best for him. I think what's best for him is to be a Jet because this is going to be a fun ride. But he's got to make the best decision for him and his family."

• Tyron Smith was not participating in team drills again yesterday.]

• Michael Carter II and Jeremy Ruckert were both absent from practice.

• We haven’t really spoken about Jermaine Johnson a lot this off-season, but according to reports he was dominating the LOS yesterday.

• Allen Lazard continues to impress. This time with a 30+ contested catch on Sauce Gardner. I don't need to tell you guys that's not a very easy thing to do.

• Couple of other guys were notable mentions for the session. Tyrod Taylor, Irvin Charles and Micheal Clemons.

• It sounds as though the defence started strong and the offence finished strong. That's exactly what you want if you're running a team. You don't want one unit to constantly dominate the other, as that shows you have a lopsided team.

• The Jets had an outstanding move the ball drill where they got the ball back with 1:02 on the clock with the offence needing to eight to tie the game. Rodgers went 72 yards down the field, found Breece for the TD and hit Corley for the 2-point conversion. Love to hear it.

• The Jets scripted three quarters worth of plays for the first time this camp in an effort to get their starters ready for the regular season - "It's all progression," Saleh said. "We've been stair-stepping and trying to add all of the mindfulness to be ready for Week 1 so we just keep adding the load on top of our players, so we can get them ready to play a full game. Right now, I feel confident we can play a full game even though we repped it to the equivalent of about three quarters. But we'll have another long one coming up."