When the Jets fired Mike Maccagnan as their General Manager in May, the surprise was the timing rather than the decision to find someone else to run their personnel department.
The Jets went 24-40 over four seasons with Maccagnan calling the shots and Todd Bowles as head coach, so no one would have been shocked if Maccagnan had been let go along with Bowles in January. He remained on hand through another draft, although those six picks won’t bear much fruit for the Jets this season.
Third-round pick Jachai Polite was cut by new G.M. Joe Douglas on Saturday and sixth-round cornerback Blessaun Austin is on injured reserve. The Jets also cut 2017 sixth-rounder Elijah McGuire and 2016 seventh-rouner Charone Peake while trading 2018 sixth-rounder Parry Nickerson.
All in all, only 16 of the 34 picks that Maccagnan made over five drafts remain in the organization. The Jets have the third spot in the waiver order and Douglas made it clear he plans to use it, so that number could drop even lower before the start of the season.
Maccagnan did make the deal to land quarterback Sam Darnold in 2018 and his development would mitigate some of the big misses, but there’s little doubt that the Jets’ poor results in recent years are tied directly to their minimal returns in the draft.