Right on, thanks for the in-depth response. Isn't Hunter a UFA? If he's as good as you say he is, I could see a lot of teams (including, potentially, the Pats if Light walks and Vollmer moves to LT) taking a shot at him. Jets could potentially have a hard time keeping him.
I'm with you on Jenkins, Taylor, and Pace. Looking at his cap figures, it looks like Pace isn't at all cuttable until 2012, and realistically isn't until 2013. I'd have to think that they would have cut him this year if they had anyone at all behind him, just to get his cap hit out of the way in an uncapped year rather than carrying his bloated salary around for a couple more (not totally clear on the uncapped year rules, but my understanding was that you could do that, since there's no current-year cap to 'punish' you).
Do you think that the Jets will be targeting OLB early in the draft? That could get interesting; they certainly won't have the ammo to move past the Pats, pick-wise, and the elite 3-4 OLB prospects usually get snapped up quickly. Seems to me like being undermanned at OLB might end up having to be a fact of life for the Jets for the next couple of years, unless they stumble upon a James Harrison-style diamond in the rough. As a Pats fan over the past few years, I can attest to the fact that having lackluster OLB production sucks. I hope that Cunningham can make some big strides next year. All that I can say is don't count on anything from Crable. He was given every opportunity to make it here, and he couldn't. Don't see how things will be any different for him in New York.
I dunno about Ellis coming on the cheap, though. If he wasn't on everyone's mind already, he definitely made himself some money against the Pats last week. There aren't a ton of guys who have shown that they can play 3-4 DE like he does, and if the Jets lowball him, I would absolutely love for the Pats to snag him. He's a proven talent at a valuable position, and with Richard Seymour about to set the market for guys like that, he might find that he's an awful lot more valuable than he made this past season. Given his age, I'd be surprised if he doesn't go for all the guaranteed money he can get, since this will almost certainly be his last chance at a big contract.
Also, looking at the site that you linked, do you think that guys like Brunell and Hartsock (making <$2M, but no dead money if cut) could be in danger? Seems like, if the Jets get really desperate and need a few more million to get one more guy re-signed, they might replace those folks with UDFAs. Dangerous approach, and pretty much the antithesis of what the Pats do, but would be interested to hear your take. Given that Brunell's bankrupt, you couple probably cut him and re-sign him for the vet minimum and, since nobody's likely willing to pay him more and retirement isn't an option, he'd probably take it. That would only save around $500K though, so if they want greater savings than that they'd probably have to replace him outright.
hahahahah
