Don’t fall for the trap

Phoenix – The Jets have an new friend in Mike Lupica of the Daily News and ESPN Radio in New ork. How long this will last remains to be seen.

Clearly there is a charm offensive going on here.

Hey, maybe it will work.

I’m not going to sit her and rip them for it.

Lupica has destroyed the Jets for years, often in a very disrespectful, flippant fashion.

Recently, somebody at One Jets Drive clearly got to Lupica, or his boss behind the scenes, to their credit – pitching stories is an important part of public relations.

Lupica wrote a flowery piece on how Woody got it right this time.

I agree with Lupica.

By Woody bringing in two sage football minds in Charlie Casserly and Ron Wolf, and taking his time with the interviews, he deserves high marks for the hiring process.

Now we have no idea if Todd Bowles and Mike Maccagan will be successful, but it’s okay to laud Johnson for handling the process much better this time, much better than in 2013, when he hired John Idzik.

The panel that hired Idzik was made up of business-types – Woody, Ira Akselrad and Neil Glat.

That wasn’t the best approach.

And kudos to Woody for realizing that.

This time around it was Woody, Charlie and Ron doing the interviews.

It is important to point out that Glat was in on some interviews, but he asked no football questions. He was there to answer money questions for individuals in the room. Glat, a Wharton Business School and Harvard Law graduate (that educational combo is as good as it gets) oversees the team’s finances.

So Lupica wrote a nice column about Woody recently. It was very fair and well-written.

The next step in the charm offensive was providing Woody to Lupica for his radio show. This happened on Wednesday.

Lupica was showering Johnson with questions about the team’s spending last year.

“The Jets were frugal last year” angle is a very popular one, as we know.

Could they have spent more?

Of course, but who else could they have signed, on top of those who they did ink (it’s not like they didn’t sign anyone), who would have made a huge difference in the won-loss record?

It’s a QB-driven league, and the Jets didn’t get very good QB play, sans a few games.

You could say they should have signed Darrelle Revis.

But notice that Revis didn’t help Tampa Bay’s record in 2013 with a bad quarterback situation, but did help New England this year with one of the best quarterbacks of all time.

Revis is a great player, but if you don’t have QB, is a top-shelf CB going to lead you to the promised-land?

So Woody can’t fall into a trap the media is setting, including Lupica. The trap is “you need to spend a ton this year to make up for last year.”

Don’t fall for it.

Spend wisely.

Don’t spend to appease.

Even to appease the Jets’ new friend Lupica.

January 29, 2015

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