Doug Marrone Updates the Status of Jaguars’ Linebacker Myles Jack and His Return
Myles Jack's fourth season with the Jaguars didn't go the way he or the team would have wanted, with the ironman defender missing games due to injury for the first time in his career and ending the season on injured reserve with a knee injury.
But according to head coach Doug Marrone, the veteran linebacker is progressing in his recovery and is expected to be physically available sooner than later.
I" think when we look at Myles, first of all, he is doing really well. He is rehabbing well, and we are excited," Marrone said Tuesday at the NFL Scouting Combine. "He will be back sometime in mid-March."
After appearing in 48 of 48 possible games in the first three years of his career, Jack played in 11 games last season. The team's 2016 second-round selection earned a big contract extension (four-year, $57 million with $26 million in guarantees) before the season began, but had a down year by most standards.
As the Jaguars' defense took a step back as a whole, Jack had issues in his second season as the starting middle linebacker. The 24-year old recorded 66 tackles (fewest since rookie year), three tackles for loss, one interception, and 0.5 sacks in 11 starts, often having issues with run fits and diagnosing plays.
This has led to some questions about if the Jaguars will consider moving Jack from middle linebacker to outside linebacker, but Marrone was noncommittal on the topic on Tuesday.
"I think that we are going to make sure that we better the team as a whole," Marrone said. "Obviously [Myles] is a guy that is super talented, has played multiple positions for us already, and getting him comfortable is really what my main goal is, and putting him in a spot where he can go and play and maybe not have to worry about a lot of other people. But he has done a good job.
"He has been able to call the defenses for us, he has been a leader on that side of the football. I think at the end of the day, whatever combination is going to make us a better [team], that is what we are going to do. But we are going to do that in discussions with the player first before we publically go out there and tell people exactly what we are doing."
Jacksonville's linebacker unit struggled as a whole in 2019, so the issues were not limited to Jack. Veteran weakside linebacker Telvin Smith retired in May and put the team in a hole from the start, but injuries to multiple players hampered the unit's effectiveness.
Ultimately, the Jaguars had six linebacker start games in 2019 and four (Jack, Jake Ryan, Quincy Williams, and Najee Goode) ended the season on injured reserve. Between injuries and inconsistent play, the linebacker position has become a hot-button issue for Marrone and general manager Dave Caldwell.
"I think we'll address not only that position but I think we'll address every position and if it's not through free agency it's through the draft, and if we can get better we'll try to get better," Caldwell said at the combine Tuesday. "We have two guys that we like with Myles and Quincy, Dekoda Allen is another guy that we have there that we feel like could come in that we got from the Rams late in the year, but he's a physical guy, did a nice job in special teams.
"So we actually have four guys there, plus Leon Jacobs as our Sam, so we have some depth there that we haven't had in the past but if we can get a guy to come in and if we need to move Myles because Myles offers you so much flexibility whether it's Mike, Will, he played Samin '17 -- we feel good about that. And Quincy obviously from a mismatch standpoint from a game-planning standpoint, Quincy can do a lot on third down whether it's blitzing him, covering a back, covering a tight end, the guy played basically safety in college."
