COHEN'S CORNER SPORTS

A week after being inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, Mike Piazza had his jersey retired by the Mets, at long last. Over the years the retirement on jersey's, or lack thereof, by the Mets has long been a topic among the fanbase. Many have clamored for the Mets to finally retire the jersey's of Keith Hernandez, Gary Carter, Darryl Strawberry, Doc Gooden, and, of course, Piazza. Well, Piazza's number 31 is finally hanging in the rafters at Citi Field. His number now stands in immortality next to Tom Seaver, Gil Hodges and Casey Stengal, as the only Mets to have their jersey retired. It's an exclusive group. As much as the Mets have been criticized for not retiring more jersey's, they deserve credit for keeping such a club so exclusive over all these years. Inspite of inclement weather, and a wallowing baseball team on the field, Mets fans came in droves to see Piazza's number retired. He came out to a thunderous ovation, after a poignant film...

The Jets quarterback quandry got even more interesting on Friday night when the team selected Christian Hackenberg out of Penn State with the 51st pick of the draft. Hackenberg had been linked to the Jets for days leading up to his selection after rumors about Paxton Lynch heading to Gang Green died out by Thursday night. Once former Jets quarterback Chad Pennington announced to the crowd that the Jets had selected Hackenberg, a collective gasp could be heard in the audience in Chicago. Those dressed in Jets gear sat in their seats,  with their hands on their heads in total disappointment and shock, and who could blame them. The Jets have totally made their quarterback position into the biggest joke in the NFL. Not event the Cleveland Browns can claim this much instability at the position. In Hackenberg the Jets get a total project . He was brilliant his Freshman year under Bill O'Brien's pro style offense for the Nittnay Lions, but struggled horribly when O'Brien left ...

The stalemate between the New York Jets and quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick hit ridiculous speed a long time ago, as neither side can come to terms on any kind of deal. Heck, they can't even meet halfway right now. Reports surfaced on Thursday that Fitzpatrick would rather sit out the entire 2016 season than play for the Jets and their offer. The Jets reportedly offered a deal in the $7 million to $8 million range. Fitzpatrick wants a deal around $16 million a year. Even the Denver Broncos steered clear of Fitzpatrick when his asking price was too much for them. The Jets want to get a deal done with Fitzpatrick, if for no other reason than the fact the quarterback had great locker room chemistry with his teammates and played well last year. Fitzpatrick has seen the likes of Brock Osweiler, Sam Bradford and Chase Daniels cash in on mega deals, and none of those guys threw 31 touchdown passes last year. Fitzpatrick did. If Fitzpatrick is fixated on sitting out an entire season bec...

It has been a pretty bizarre off-season, at least for one of the two teams in New York. In one corner, Giants GM Jerry Reese is under the gun to get the G-Men back on track, or else face the wrath of John Mara and company at the end of the upcoming season. In the other corner, the Jets continue their kamikaze off-season. It has not been fun for either team this Spring. It didn't get any better after the first night of the NFL draft. The Giants pretty much panicked with their first pick in the draft when the selected Eli Apple, a corner back out of Ohio State with the 10th pick. A lot of people had defensive end Leonard Floyd falling to the Giants at 10, but the Bears traded up to nine to get him. The Giants could have tapped Shaq Lawson, the talented pass rusher out of Clemson, but surprisingly passed on him. Yes, the Giants needed a cornerback, they had one of the worst pass defenses in the league last year, but Apple is a guy who is extremely raw, and was kind of a reac...

The 2016 NFL schedule is now available ! The schedule, which was not supposed to be released until next Thursday, was instead released this evening with a whole slew of surprises, big games and monster primetime match-ups.  From the national perspective, the NFL hits a monster homerun with its top two primetime games in week 1, the Panthers will visit the Broncos in a Super Bowl rematch on the opening Thursday night. Meanwhile the Patriots will visit the Cardinals on Sunday night football. The NFL did drop the ball a bit by having Rams and 49ers in San Francisco rather than in Los Angeles in Week 1 on Monday Night Football, but there is a chance the reason the Rams didn't get a single primetime home game had a lot to do with the team playing in a college stadium. As far as the local teams, the Jets will open the season at home for the seventh straight season, and for the second straight year it will be against a AFC North opponent from Ohio. No not the Browns, but the Cincinn...

When reports surfaced on Friday that D'Brickashaw Ferguson had decided to retire from pro football everyone was stunned, except for the Jets. Perhaps Gang Green really did anticipate his retirement coming, because 36 hours after the announcement the Jets formally acquired Ryan Clady and a seventh-round pick from the Denver Broncos in exchange for a fifth-round pick.   All of sudden the Jets have replaced Ferguson, who started 167 consecutive games over 10 years for New York, with a tackle who when healthy is a physical presence on the offensive line, who stands at 6'6" and 315 pounds.  The big question regarding Clady is health. While his predecessor was always the top bill of health, Clady was the opposite. He has missed 30 games over the past three seasons.  He played only two games in 2013 when he suffered a Lisfranc injury (foot injury) that led him to miss the rest of the '13 season. Clady missed all of the Broncos 2015 Super Bowl season.  Becaus...

D'Brickashaw Ferguson won't take a paycut to stay with the Jets. Instead the pro Bowl leftt tackle decided to retire for reasons most still are not sure of. One thing is for sure, the Jets offseason which has been pockmarked by the ongoing Ryan Fitzpatrick negotiation, has now taken a new twist with the Jets losing their blindside protector for the quarterback, which will almost undoubtably change the course of the Jets draft plans. For Ferguson the announcement of his retirement comes as a big surprise, even if the Jets claim that it isn't, at least to them. While Ferguson's production had dropped off the past couple of years, there was no indication from him until the day it happened that he was going to retire. In fact, it is ironic in more ways then one that he made his firm decision only after the Jets spoke to him about a pay cut. Reports have indicated that Ferguson had considered retirement for sometime, especially if he couldn't meet his own standar...