Trading Darelle Revis a Woody Johnson Production

The New York Jets are ready to part ways with the best player this franchise has seen in decades.

Darrelle Revis, the star cornerback, who missed almost all of the 2012 season due to an ACL injury is likely on his way out of town, and if you look at Revis' Twitter account, you would know he a'int too happy about it, and who can blame him.

Darrelle Revis ‏@Revis24

I'm speechless by far but more importantly I feel more upset for the jet nation for having to go through this!!!

Jets Owner Woody Johnson is ready to part ways with his star cornerback, because he doesn't feel he can pay him when Revis becomes an unrestricted free agent at the end of 2013. Revis signed what was considered a "band aid" contract during his holdout in 2010, that paid him $46 million over four years, with most of that money guaranteed upfront. Revis almost held out at the beginning of this past season because he wanted that long term extension he thought he was promised by Johnson and then-GM Mike Tannenbaum. 

 

It is not known for sure how much Revis is looking for annually, but some speculate in the $10-$16 million per year range. With the Jets in salary cap hell, that might be a tough bullet for Johnson and John Idzik to bit. 

 

The Jets have nobody to blame but themselves for this fiasco. They handed out money like it was going out of style to guys who were not deserving of big time contracts, i.e. Mark Sanchez and his $8.25 million guaranteed for 2013, and three year extension on top of that. The Jets are $19 million over the cap thanks to the reckless spending of Tannenbaum. While the contracts of Bart Scott, Calvin Pace and Bryan Thomas are coming off the books this off-season, it will not be enough for them to make a long term deal with Revis. 

 

If the Jets are smart they better keep Revis. He is the best player on this team, the face of the franchise. More Jets fans wear number 24 than any players jersey in the last handful of seasons.  Trading him will almost certainly be the equivalent of waving the white flag and ushering in a nuclear winter that even the New York Mets would blush at. 

While Johnson has denied the speculation, and Idzik remains non-committal on the entire subject at this moment in time, the Jets better get to work and find a way to keep Revis is green and white. That means trimming the fat of some really bad contracts on this team, and dare I say, find a way to get deadweights like Sanchez out of town.

That of course is easier said than done, considering the cap hit the Jets would take if they started cutting players now in order to find a way to sign Revis down the road. 

If the Jets do indeed trade Darrelle Revis, they will not receive a first round draft pick for him; not for a guy who is coming off major knee surgery. The Jets could get a second and third round draft picks for him, and if they do, Idzik better do something that Tannenbaum never did and that is draft brilliantly -- or else trading Revis is going to look even worse.

This is a big 180 degree turn for a franchise that has prided itself publicly in trying to sell as many PSL's as possible. Yet just the idea of Darrelle Revis in another uniform while Mark Sanchez remains a Jet is not only hilarious, it will drive fans away in droves and this time for good.