While much of the football world was taken aback by Friday’s news that Zach Wilson would return to the New York Jets lineup as the starting quarterback against the Detroit Lions, Detroit head coach Dan Campbell was prepared.
“We kind of had an idea (Wilson would start),” Campbell said right out of the gate in his press conference Friday morning. “We’re ready.”
Coach Campbell continued on Wilson,
“We knew he was going into the game anyway, so we figured they were going to play him. It’s really — same thing, man. It’s about being disciplined. We know what type of game this will be, what they’re going to want to do offensively.
We’ve got to play our keys. We’ve got to be disciplined. We’ve got to run, we’ve got to hit, all those same things.”
Campbell sold the angle well, but the reality is that Wilson and White are very different styles of quarterback. Wilson has a bigger arm and is more willing to hold the ball and take chances. He’s also a more capable runner. With White under center, the Jets focused more on getting the ball out quickly and creating after the catch.
That’s not what Wilson does stylistically, for better and for worse. White is a much better processor of defensive information and a more accurate thrower than Wilson, who has a negative TD/INTO ratio in both of his NFL seasons and completed just 55 percent of his passes. Wilson was benched for consistently making poor decisions with the ball and missing too many open throws, as well as having a less team-oriented attitude.
It’s going to be very interesting to see how the Jets players respond to Wilson’s return, as well as how he handles the situation. Wilson does have enough raw talent to have merited the No. 2 overall pick in 2021, but translating that to the field consistently has been a struggle for both him and the Jets’ coaching staff.
