Inherited Jaguars Roster Equals High Expectations for Gladstone and Coen

In their 1996 hit, "A Long December, the Counting Crows front man Adam Duritz sang, "And there's reason to believe that maybe this year will be better than the last". But when anybody is starting over, there's always a tough road to get everything together. Sometimes, it's survive and then thrive.

But for the 2025 Jacksonville Jaguars, the roster has remnants of a great 2022 and a decent 2023 team. It seems that with what the new regime is inheriting, this year would be a disappointment if it weren't better than the last.

On a recent episode of the Jacksonville Jaguars Insider Podcast, Beat Writer for Jaguars on SI and Host John Shipley talked about why it's going to be a year of great expectations in Northern Florida.

"I do think it's important to provide the context that this new regime is not walking into the season with a completely barren roster," noted Shipley. "Should that increase the expectations perhaps, I think to a degree. I don't think the expectation should be the expectation for that Urban Meyer roster. The expectation for the first Gus Bradley, Dave Caldwell team in 2013 should have been to win like two games. The expectation for this team, there's far more talent, so I think they should be expected to do more."

"I really think they get around eight-to-nine wins with this roster and this talent. You're adding other guys like Travis Hunter, Jourdan Lewis, Patrick Mekari, Dyami Brown to it. I think these are all factors that play into what you should expect from the Jaguars over the course of this upcoming season. That is why I think it's important to look at the context of what were they really left by the past regime."

Perhaps the. biggest carryover from the last guys just came last year when they pulled the trigger on a star receiver late in Round 1.

"For Brian Thomas Jr. alone, what a gift for the new Jaguars regime to have that, to have a No. 1 receiver on a rookie deal, for my money, is the best bargain in the NFL right now. He is top ten to me, probably closer to a top-eight receiver or so, and they have him on one of the cheapest deals in football. I think 59 receivers make more annual per year than Brian Thomas Jr, and that includes Mack Collins, Kalif, Raymond. It includes a really shocking list of names," noted Shipley.

"So the last regime. Yes, it ended in negativity. Yes, it ended with a terrible 4-13 season that will not be forgotten, forgiven, whatever you want to call it, for quite some time. But it also, on the other hand, ended with the Jaguars getting a new regime that no longer has to do things that the past new regimes have had to do, which is hope and pray that eventually you can get enough NFL talent to show why you were hired and to justify why you should stick around. That is no longer the case for the Jaguars which is massive as you look at the 2025 season coming up and the potential story and narratives that can come from it."

With that level of talent and not starting from scratch, the excitement is high, but so is the pressure to not waste it. If this new administration can lead the "Big Cats" to new heights, GM James Gladstone and Head Coach Liam Coen will be singing a different Counting Crow's song in Duval, and that would be their 1999 smash, "Hanging Around".

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