How the New York Jets Can Try to Replace Carl Lawson

In the NFL preseason, wins and losses aren’t decided on the scoreboard. They’re decided in the medical tent. It’s why so many teams rest their starters for the entirety of the preseason, or even limit their exposure in joint practices. Every day without injuries is a win.

If that’s the case, the New York Jets just lost big time. Carl Lawson, the Jets’ 26-year-old edge rusher who signed a three-year deal worth $45M this offseason, tore his Achilles tendon on Thursday morning. The injury occurred during a red zone pass rush drill in the team’s joint practice with the Green Bay Packers.

Lawson was the unquestioned star of training camp. He racked up pressures and sacks in practices with ease, anchoring a defensive front that was supposed to be one of the best in football this coming season. He is the highest-paid player on the roster, the prized signing of the offseason and the best pass-rusher New York has had since John Abraham in 2005.

Now, he won’t play a down of the 2021 season. Instead, he’ll spend the year rehabbing, hoping to return to form in a year’s time.

So how do the Jets replace Lawson on the defensive line?

The short answer is that they can’t. Nobody else on this line possesses the game-changing speed around the edge that Lawson does, the kind that forces quarterbacks to panic and takes the pressure off an extremely young secondary. Quinnen Williams, Sheldon Rankins and John Franklin-Myers are very good players, but Lawson had the potential to be great this season. Like double digit sacks at a minimum great.

Instead, the Jets are going to have to replace him in the aggregate. That means rotating defensive ends to keep fresh legs rushing the quarterback, incorporating more blitzes or signing a veteran free agent still on the market.

The first guy Robert Saleh will look to is Bryce Huff. A projected third-down and situational pass rusher this season, Huff will likely add early-down work to his repertoire in Lawson’s stead. The 2020 undrafted free agent had two sacks in Saturday’s preseason win over the Giants, drawing rave reviews from his head coach in the process.

"The more we watch him, he’s just winning," Saleh said of Huff. "He’s one of those guys, at first, we were like, ‘Man, how are we going to hide this guy in the preseason, he’s going to end up with like 10 sacks.’ It got to the point where we were like, ‘How are we going to keep him off the first unit?’"

Huff likely won’t be kept off the first unit anymore, especially if he learns to defend the run and set the edge. His lone blemish on Saturday came on an end-around that caught him way out of position for a big gain.

Huff’s emergence is a start, and the Jets will need every pressure he can provide come Week One in Carolina. They’d also greatly benefit from the return of Vinny Curry, whose Week One status is up in the air.

Curry, the 33-year-old veteran free agent signing from the Philadelphia Eagles, underwent an undisclosed offseason procedure that has kept him from practicing in team drills during training camp. If he can return to form and win his one-on-ones, he’ll be able to man the outside with Huff on third downs, bumping Franklin-Myers — who will play the edge on early downs — to his more natural position of defensive tackle.

If either of those guys struggle or are forced to miss time, the onus will fall on Ronald Blair to fill the void. Blair, who is familiar with Saleh’s scheme from his time in San Francisco, was signed late this offseason to beef up the defensive line depth. He has looked promising throughout his career when healthy, but has had injury issues his first few years in the league.

None of those three guys can be Carl Lawson. A rotation of the three, coupled with Franklin-Myers’s early down work on the edge, can replicate a large enough fraction of his production to keep New York’s defensive line from regressing dramatically. For Saleh and defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich, that’s all they can realistically expect.

The alternative from a front office perspective is to sign a veteran commodity. Olivier Vernon had nine sacks last year for the Browns and is still a free agent. Everson Griffin had a workout with the Vikings this week, but the four-time Pro Bowler remains unsigned. Adrian Clayborn has familiarity in Ulbrich’s system from his Atlanta days. Aldon Smith was cut by Seattle this offseason after a promising campaign a year ago in Dallas.

All of the above are north of 30 with injuries or baggage that go with them. That’s why they’re free agents in mid-August. And given the Jets’ reluctance to sign older veterans at cornerback, it’s unlikely they’ll dip back into the free agency pool now. Still, it remains a possibility for a team coming off an unexpected and devastating loss.

The coming days will likely be filled with a “next man up” mantra. But the next man up won’t be able to fill the giant shoes that held Lawson’s swollen ankle on Thursday morning.

It might not have the same ring to it, but “next men up” is New York’s best shot of replacing its budding star.

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