SAME SHIT, DIFFERENT YEAR

Christmas in September has come, and now. almost, gone. I say almost because I'm writing this on Monday afternoon with two Monday Night Football games to go. We saw a lot of big games yesterday, and I'm excited to watch the final two. The Buffalo Bills showed the nation what they've been up to with a shocking domination over the visiting Colts. The Rams took a big home stand against division rival Seattle. Marcus Mariotta made a statement and tossed four, count'em four, touchdowns in his debut. Is it coincidence that Jameis Winston's only two losses since high school have come to the hands of Mariotta? And the Cowboys took a late lead on a clutch comeback to beat the Giants last night. We saw a lot of surprises but one thing, over the rest stands out to me.

I'll admit my bias right off the bat. I'm a die hard Jaguar. Been a fan since August 15, 1995, for those of you that don't know that was the day the Jaguars played their first game. I was just a wee lad at that point, ripe old age of 5. However, as young as I was I remember my dad telling me that my hometown got the expansion team, the Jaguars. I've been a fan ever since. At that point I was young so I really didn't understand the expansion concept, or even that my team was legit back in the day. The late 90's and the early 00's were nonstop wins for my team, and I hate that I was too young to really understand how important it was. The city of Jacksonville fought hard for their bid and it was returned to them with a winning product on the field. It's been pretty much all downhill since.

We haven't had a winning season since 2007; a miraculous 11 win season, a playoff win at Pittsburgh, capped by a loss to the Patriots in the Divisional round. We quickly followed that up with only one mediocre season since, an 8-8 campaign in 2010. Since that year the Jaguars have managed to win only 14 games, a record of 14-51 record, including yesterday. It's sad that I, as a Jaguars fan, have come to not only accept losses, but expect them.

So this makes time for the million dollar question. When, WHEN will it stop? All we've heard out of the organization is all the improvement, about how much (young) talent is on the roster, the strong relationships between coaches, players, and staff, and how they're doing it right about building in the draft. Maybe I've just been drinking the kool-aid. Maybe my bias has clouded what I was seeing all along. But then again, I'm pretty sure we're cursed in the NFL Draft.

Here's a quick list of the Jaguars first picks in the Draft since 2004. Reggie Williams (2004), Matt Jones (2005), Marcedes Lewis (2006), Reggie Nelson (2007), Derrick Harvey (2008), Eugene Monroe (2009), Tyson Alualu (2010), Blaine Gabbert (2011), Justin Blackmon (2012), Luke Joeckel (2013), Blake Bortles (2014), and Dante Fowler (2015). Three of those picks have been receivers, all now out of the league because of drug problems. Yes, Justin Blackmon, while still technically on the roster, is all but done. Reggie Nelson is now on the Bengals and is decent, Derrick Harvey is out of the league, Eugene Monroe is now in Baltimore, and Blaine Gabbert, I don't even want to talk about Yo Gabba Gabbert. I'll say that Marcedes Lewis has been solid, and Tyson Alualu has been good enough to keep his roster spot. Joeckel is inconsistent, Blake has the potential but has yet to do much with it. Say what you want about the team around him, but my point still holds. Dante Fowler tore his ACL less than hour into his NFL career.

That's just our first round picks. Since that same year, 2004 up through 2013, the Jaguars had 67 draft picks, only 4 of them are even relevant players now: Terrance Knighton, Rashad Jennings, Daryl Smith, and Maurice Jones-Drew who is now retired. The Jagaurs draft history is impossibly bad, and even more so, unbelievably unlucky. Maybe you can chalk up a lack of bad draftees to the staff, but if that were the case you'd think, or would like to think, the new staff would be better.

Not to mention the Jaguars are consistently towards the top of the league in terms of available cap space. We have an abundance of salary to give out to elite level players, but we consistently ignore them and instead go after "under the radar" players. This past off season we had the opportunity to sign DeMarco Murray but let him walk over $1M, we could have at least entertained Jeremy Maclin to get some veteran experience for our incredibly young receivers. We could called Devin McCourty to try and get that secondary some help. There is almost always elite players available in Free Agency that have plenty of years left that we just flat out look over. I get that we don't want to sign the grandpa's, the guys that have been in the league since I was a kid. But if a guy is still under 30 and is on top of his game, at least call the guy!

It's been three seasons under new ownership, and subsequently new staff all around. I'd like to say it may still be too early to tell, but at the same time I'm not seeing much improvement from where we were under Wayne Weaver. I'm seeing piles of losses, same draft issues, and same mistakes every Sunday. 

Yesterday I saw much of the same problems we've had for years. Issues on the offensive line which has resulted in poor runs, and inconsistent passing. Drops by the receivers has been an issue, but then again that can fall back on Bortles not having the time to get the pass out, thus an inaccurate pass is thrown. The defense was solid for most of the game, which has actually been a relative strong point for us over the years. The big problem with the defense is they crumble towards the end of games because they're on the field so much. Until the offense can get any sort of consistency, the defense will continue to struggle come crunch time. Not only that, but penalties, and turnovers have plagued us. It seems once something goes wrong on a drive, its all over, they can't recover from it. Once an interception is thrown, our offense doesn't know how to respond.

My largest complaint with the Jaguars is the false hope. We as fans always will have hope for the best, and I understand as coaches and staff they must have faith in their team. No coach in his right mind would go out and say he doesn't have faith in his team. But that's not the point here. The point is that every year we're told its gonna be better, every year we're told they're doing it right, every year we're told that this is it, every year we're disappointed, and so far this year it looks the same.

So I can't completely obliterate my team and just end it there. I do have some positives. In my opinion I truly do think that this staff is doing it right by building through the draft instead of paying high dollar for veterans passed their prime. I also really like what Shad Khan is doing with the surroundings, and this'll play back into the Free Agency thing. Khan, along with the city of Jacksonville, understand that there isn't a lot to offer to free agents other than money. Players want money, sure, but they also want a city that's fun to be in. So what they're doing is improving the environment. We've already seen the stadium renovations. The largest scoreboard in the world, the pools and cabanas, etc. Those are things that will certainly improve attendance and fan morale. The city, along with a large financial contribution from Khan, are now working on developing the surrounding area. The docks have been an eye sore for the city for years, Khan is improving that by adding high rise hotels, shops, parks, community sports facilities, along with a double deck practice field for the Jaguars. Those same fields will also be available for events and public use in the off season.