Ever since Tony Gonzalez found his way onto the trade block, the rumor mill has churned up talk that the Giants would be a logical landing spot for the tight end. Other teams have been mentioned with some frequency but the defending champs have been getting mentioned more often than anyone else. That includes their Meadowlands co-tenants.
Ian O'Connor of the Bergen Record thinks it is high time that changes. He took pen to paper (or finger to keyboard) and authored a screed demanding that the Jets add Gonzo to their offense.
Gonzalez would be the right ingredient to make the Jets great. They have a bunch of scheduled softies on deck, and Tom Brady's injury made their division and conference as wide open as Ocho Cinco's mouth. The Jets have to go all in now. They need to peddle a piece of their Favre-less future for a better shot in their all-Favre, all-the-time present.
Let's get the pros out of the way first. Gonzalez is better than any tight end on the Jet roster and, at $1 million base salary, easy enough to fit under the cap without disrupting too much of the roster. The play calling has favored shorter passes this season and Gonzo would likely thrive in such a scheme.
The con is that fitting another new player, no matter how good, into an offense that's still trying to gel at this point in the season is risky. It's the equivalent of going all in when you need one card to land a flush without any other way to win the hand. If everything works out, you are going to be very tough to beat. If it doesn't, Mike Tannenbaum has put all his money on the table with nothing to back him up. That could cost him his job and, when added to the Favre trade package, could leave the Jets shorthanded for years to come.
In the end, I'd come down on the more conservative side of the ledger. Mortgaging the future for one big run has its merits but the Jets haven't shown enough signs of being in the upper echelon to recommend that course of action right now. O'Connor mentions the soft schedule in his come-on but if the Jets aren't good enough to win those games without Gonzalez, Gonzalez alone isn't going to make the difference in their season.
