Marcedes Lewis on Being Released by Jaguars in 2018: ‘I Didn’t Understand It for a Long Time’
When the 2017 season ended, it was a foregone conclusion by most that Jacksonville Jaguars tight end and team captain Marcedes Lewis would return to the Jaguars for his 13th season with the team.
It was a conclusion reached by Lewis, by fans, and likely by most of the rest of the league. But, as history would reveal, it was not the same conclusion the Jaguars front office came to.
A week into free agency, the Jaguars and executive vice president of football operations Tom Coughlin released Lewis to save about $3.5 million. Lewis learned the news first from ESPN and then from his agent.
"Probably a good year ... just the way it happened," Lewis told Green Bay media Friday when asked how long it took him to get over how things ended in Jacksonville.
"I didn't understand it for a long time."
Now, Lewis is set to face off against his former team for the first time since his untimely release, a move Lewis said in 2018 was disrespectful. Lewis signed with the Packers in 2018 and has spent the last three years with the team, with the Packers quickly valuing his blocking and leadership ability—the same traits that helped him spend a dozen seasons with the Jaguars.
The only tight end drafted in the first round in team history, Jacksonville selected the gargantuan Lewis out of UCLA with the No. 28 overall pick in the 2006 NFL Draft. He is currently No. 3 in team history in games played (170) and No. 2 overall in games started (156), No. 5 in touchdowns (33), No. 8 in points scored (200), No. 3 in receptions (375), No. 3 in receiving yards (4,502), and No. 2 in receiving touchdowns (33).
Add in Lewis being a key figure in the team's run to the AFC Championship in 2017—a game in which Lewis caught a touchdown in—and his departure from Jacksonville will forever be perplexing.
Not returning in Jacksonville likely would have been a tough pill for Lewis to swallow no matter how he got the news. But the way he learned his decade-plus tenure in Jacksonville was over wasn't how he, or anyone, would envision a team legend being let go.
"From doing everything that they asked and even more, blowing past expectations and just, you know, always doing things the right way ... at least a call, you know?" Lewis said Friday.
"I saw that I was being released on ESPN. And at the same time I'm looking at ESPN, my agent is calling me. I didn't want to hear it from him first. I'd rather them hit me up and at least give me the option of whether to take a pay cut or whatever. At least just have a conversation, but we never got to that point. Just like anybody, you would feel a certain way if that would happen to you."
Lewis is far from the only one who thinks his release was a disrespectful move for a player who is more suited for the Pride of the Jaguars than for the release list, as former Jaguars kicker Josh Scobee tweeted on Saturday morning.
"Wow. He definitely deserved better. One of the best Jags and teammates you could ask for," Scobee said on Twitter about Lewis' release.
Unsurprisingly, Lewis said he doesn't hold any negative feelings toward the Jaguars for his strange and untimely release. The veteran tight end has long been known as a calm and collected figure, so one should expect for him to see Sunday's game against the Jaguars as just another football game.
But for many, it won't be. Lewis is still the best tight end in Jaguars history and his 2018 release is still one of the most baffling moves the team has made in the last decade— which, let's be honest, is saying something. Lewis was far from a dominant tight end and would have been better off as a backup moving forward in Jacksonville, but the Jaguars have gotten nothing from the position since.
"Obviously, it is a business. It didn't end the way that I would have expected it to end," Lewis said. "And I understand the business side of it, but at the same time for somebody that was there for 12 years and always held the organization in high regard and never put myself in bad situations to make the organization look bad, I just felt like to a man it would have been cool to just do it the right way.
"I felt like we could have handled it differently. But we definitely moved on -- no hard feelings. I don't have any of that energy. We are preparing here just like it is another game. Just like I am every Sunday, I am just excited to compete."
