Jaguars bench QB Bortles, starting Kessler week 13

[rich homie]

39 minutes ago, Boltstrikes said:

Bortles is Sexy Rexy 2.0. He can streak and look wonderful and then streak bad and look like well bad Sexy Rexy. 

Bortles has never looked as good as Good Sexy Rexy

[tom cody]

I knew the Jaguars would take a step back this yr., didn't think it'd be by this much though. Got to think some big changes are coming for them this offseason. 

[RuskieTitan]

1 hour ago, .Buzz said:

What national pundits after last year's playoff run said we needed to cut bait? Please show me.

The only time I saw someone say we should move on is if they paid Cousins, who was the only clear upgrade to Bortles back then. The only rookie QB we had a chance to get was Lamar Jackson. The other FA QBs consisted of over the hill vets that aren't taking you anywhere or hoping for lighting in a bottle from Bridgewater who had major knee issues and not many teams went after for said injury and McCarron who brought in an unknown element, which we now know would have been an atrocious signing.

 

Or... hear me out... let him play out his 5th year instead of giving him a new contract. 

[.Buzz]

39 minutes ago, RuskieTitan said:

Or... hear me out... let him play out his 5th year instead of giving him a new contract. 

Let's not act like they gave him some mega long term deal. It was one extra year in the grand scheme of things, after he had a season in which he played to a solid level and was paid just under what the average QB makes a year when the cap is rising and the numbers will just begin rising. 

Even with him having that extra year, he does carry a cap hit for next year that is solid sized, but we should be fine as we were going to need to let go of a couple of high cap hit DL whether Blake sank or swam this year. If we give him the June 1st designation, it's about half of that cap hit at just 5 or so million.

Ultimately, they gave a short term contract to a guy who performed to a solid level and was part of making it to the AFC Championship game. He showed growth and steps last year as a game manager, and clearly upper FO thought he would continue down that path. Had he done that, this contract would have been a bargain and way better off doing than playing out the 5th year option and either tagging or paying him likely much more for more years the following year.

It didn't work out, it happens. But I never viewed the contract as a bad one. It obviously carried risk, but it wasn't like it was a massive risk. With Church getting cut due to age/decline in play and a high cap number, and the same for one or two of Malik Jackson, Calais Campbell, and Marcel Dareus (although Campbell is still good but is obviously slowing down and Dareus is actually still quite good, I expect him to stay), and other easy let go's/cap savings we'll be fine going into 2019. 

We were sinking or swimming with Blake regardless once we decided not to pay Cousins that massive contract. There wasn't an option out there last year that you could say with much confidence could be as good or better as I stated above. Ideally, we would have went with a guy like Lamar looking back at it (although I wanted him at the time too) and had a young guy who could sit and learn with upside that could be the guy in 2019 or maybe a guy like McCown who brought more security, but also wouldn't have likely altered the downward trajectory of the team.

[Adrenaline_Flux]

I don't really get how the contract carries risk (aside from "giving it out in the first place") when there's an out after 2018 even without factoring in the June 1 designation.

I believe ~4.5 million in savings by cutting him and as a June 1 designation that, I think, grows to ~9.5 million (could be off on that part of it though) off the top of my head.

[Soko]

2 hours ago, .Buzz said:

What national pundits after last year's playoff run said we needed to cut bait? Please show me.

The only time I saw someone say we should move on is if they paid Cousins, who was the only clear upgrade to Bortles back then. The only rookie QB we had a chance to get was Lamar Jackson. The other FA QBs consisted of over the hill vets that aren't taking you anywhere or hoping for lighting in a bottle from Bridgewater who had major knee issues and not many teams went after for said injury and McCarron who brought in an unknown element, which we now know would have been an atrocious signing.

I don’t know about national pundits, but there were definitely people here saying that they wouldn’t make the next step with Bortles.

We could go back and forth about what kind of options they had, but they opted to sit on their hands and do nothing at all. Not even bring in competition.

[Leoric]

2 hours ago, rich homie said:

Bortles has never looked as good as Good Sexy Rexy

That time he torched the Patriots?

[.Buzz]

29 minutes ago, Yin-Yang said:

I don’t know about national pundits, but there were definitely people here saying that they wouldn’t make the next step with Bortles.

We could go back and forth about what kind of options they had, but they opted to sit on their hands and do nothing at all. Not even bring in competition.

I mean, a lot of those same people that said that also was listing Bortles as a turnover machine who makes consistent bone-headed plays after last year when that couldn't have been further from the truth...not in the game manager role they put him into rather than the air-raid attack we used with him prior.

Again, I definitely agree they should have had someone in case something happening, but again, the options weren't really out there. It was either drafting Lamar who had a wide range of opinions on or getting an old vet that likely wouldn't have taken us anywhere. I'll give you Bridgewater, as I like the guy, but clearly most teams were scared off with his medicals and we still don't know if he'll hold up or if he'll return to his form in Minnesota. I would have liked the signing and we would be in better position in my personal opinion, but who the hell really knows?

Either way, I don't fault them for giving Blake what they did considering the circumstances (his play, short term, limited risk, minimal outside options) and still, even now knowing that he isn't the guy and we'll have to eat some salary, am not upset about it. I probably would have done the same thing as I didn't like the idea of paying Cousins crazy money and you couldn't go into the season following a AFCCG with a late 1st rd QB who is a raw rookie or an old veteran who would likely keep us in or around the position we're in and keep us in purgatory going into the 2019 draft. It was either ride Bortles after a solid season and likely still be a contender like most people still had us prior to this season or see him crash and burn as he has and move on with a solid pick to potentially find a successor. I don't think there was a lot of chance for anything in-between.

[.Buzz]

5 minutes ago, Boltstrikes said:

That time he torched the Patriots?

Or when the defense faltered massively against Pittsburgh in the playoffs and Bortles and the offense had to pretty much go shot for shot with them in the 2nd half?

Bortles had plenty of big time moments last year. I know I was drinking the kool-aid after thinking it was time to move on after his struggles in the preseason.

[Woz]

22 hours ago, LinderFournette said:

Flowers-reed-shatley-cann-parnell-O'Shaugnessy LT to TE

What's wrong with Oh-Shag-Hennesy?

[LinderFournette]

5 hours ago, Woz said:

What's wrong with Oh-Shag-Hennesy?

hes a 3rd String TE at best and probably the best ST TE in the league. 

theres no way u can tell me hes a Starting caliber TE in the NFL

[bananabucket]

Whats interesting is that the line only move 1 point after the news.  Vegas must not have gotten the memo that Bortles owns us.

[evilpimp972]

16 hours ago, .Buzz said:

No one said his numbers were great. We're not talking about him as a top QB. We're talking about him in the role of game manager who took care of the ball. Last year was his first year in that role, and he did a solid job at it. They bought in that by not having him play hero ball like he did his first few seasons and we didn't rely on him but instead relied on a defense (that has regressed greatly in some areas) and a running game (without having a backup plan to Fournette if he got hurt, which he did) and have him take what's given to him which he did largely last year.

I was all about drafting Lamar incase/for the future, but not sure how you could have expected Blake to get to the point he is now if you watched him game by game last year. Not to mention he stepped up big in the playoffs, PIT and NE in particular. This is on them expecting that nothing would change from year to year as far as regressions/injuries to key players, but I don't fault them for keeping Bortles as the guy after a very average season with minimal options besides Cousins as a clear upgrade who has/had questions himself but wanted like 35-40 percent more a year than Blake.

 

Throwing 13 picks while having the best run offense in the league is a solid game manager?

[Kmart128]

On 11/26/2018 at 6:50 PM, pwny said:

Psst - this post isn’t going to make Josh Allen less trash.

I just find it funny. When the news broke I claimed that Ramsey shouldn't be making these comments because his own QB is trash. And then every Jags fan came out in support of Bortles and how he is a solid QB.

[.Buzz]

3 hours ago, evilpimp972 said:

Throwing 13 picks while having the best run offense in the league is a solid game manager?

Our offense was ranked 6th in the NFL, still top 10 if you take away defensive TDs. Our scheme was predicated on running the ball, but it was also pretty much an even split on how much we did each. With that, the run was focused to setup downfield shots which yes, will allow for mkre opportunities for turnovers.

Our run game may have been the best ranked for total yardage, but check the ypc as well as the efficiency. Fournette, as great as he is when healthy, averaged under 4 ypc and was the workhorse when healthy. Let's not act like we were running with no trouble every game.

When we were behind or the run game failed/defense didn't have a great game he was forced to do more. His highest interception games were against TEN both times (who he's brutally awful against for some reason), SF, and LAC.

The guy in the playoffs also didn't throw a single interception nor turned it over once.

So yes, I'd say what he did was definitely solid considering the playstyle most of the time predicated on several deep shots a game and at times having to try and do more depending on how the defense played/Fournette being injured and not 💯 for half the season/over half the season with no legit backup in a ground and pound offense.