The Jacksonville Jaguars were the first team in the 2019 regular season to get a chance to see if they could go toe-to-toe with the AFC Champions in the Kansas City Chiefs and it wasn’t a pretty outing, to say the least. It then became clear that the Chiefs were miles ahead of the Jags and the regular season further proved that point.
Now, here we are just a few days away from the Super Bowl and the Chiefs have proven to be the force most thought. Regardless of the outcome of the Super Bowl, the Chiefs will be the team the Jags and every other AFC team will look to dethrone with their high powered offense.
NFL Network’s Gregg Rosenthal recently posted an article stating what each team needs to do to dethrone the Chiefs, and for the Jags, the solution comes down to moving on from the past and making some tough personnel decisions.
Jacksonville Jaguars: Get unemotional about past personnel mistakes.
Jaguars general manager David Caldwell is getting another chance to re-shape the roster after the departure of Tom Coughlin. To move forward, the team needs to make some tough choices regarding some of the moves Coughlin and Caldwell made over the last few years. They have a raft of cap-related decisions pertaining to veterans like cornerback A.J. Bouye, guard Andrew Norwell, defensive tackle Marcell Dareus, wide receiver Marqise Lee, linebacker Jake Ryan and possibly even running back Leonard Fournette. The Nick Foles-Gardner Minshew QB conundrum won’t be easy to solve because of Foles’ contract, but the arrival of new coordinator Jay Gruden was a big step in the right direction. Jacksonville has prized continuity to a fault over Caldwell’s seven seasons, resulting in one campaign with more than six wins. Before Caldwell gets to spend his three top-50 draft picks in April, he needs to honestly assess what’s gone wrong.
The Jags are about $3.2 million over the cap according to Over the Cap, so Rosenthal is right about the moves they need to make to get them out of the negative. Releasing Marcell Dareus, who would free up $22.5 million, is clearly where they will need to start but they can’t stop there. They will need more cap space to address a couple of needs in free agency, pay Yannick Ngakoue and pay their rookie draft class. That said, decisions will have to be made on the other names Rosenthal mentioned.
With nine picks in both 2020 and 2021, it’s time for general manager Dave Caldwell and the front office to stop relying on free agency at the capacity they have and look for more bargains on the open market while also being precise in the draft. With Tom Coughlin out of the picture, that sounds like the path Caldwell will take this year as he told ESPN 690’s Brent Martineau that the Jags will look to be “wise” in free agency.
“I think this could be a quick flip,” Caldwell said about a turnaround. “I think if we make wise choices in free agency, and it might not be market-setters, but wise choices, then we’ll follow it up with a good draft. We have all the way up until the beginning of September to have the roster set so it’s going to be a fluid thing, but we have to make the right choices all the way up to the trade deadline and in the middle of [the regular season].”
Another key variable in taking down the Chiefs will be defensive coordinator Todd Wash. Several coordinators have figured his scheme out and Week 1’s game proved the Chiefs were amongst that group. He’s going to have to adapt and improve as a coordinator in 2020 because the Jags probably won’t have the defensive talent they did in 2017.