I
am shocked, I am stunned, I am completely beside myself. How is it that
in less than 24 hours, the Jets can turn my desire to swallow broken
glass into sheer joy?

Not only did Hackett resign, but a replacement was named on the same day, and not just a replacement, but Mike Heimerdinger,
who is the yin to Paul Hackett's yang in every way. Heimerdinger is
progressive, and his system has evolved with the needs of the team.
Edwards saw an opportunity to grab a great coordinator and snagged it.
It is obvious that Heimerdinger likes to throw the ball, and will have
some help from the Front Office to reshape the offense into his image:

“This
group will get whatever we need. If we need more wide receivers, we'll
go out and get wide receivers. We have money to do it. They've shown me
they want to be aggressive.”

“Re-Tread” Factor:

While Dinger has been an O.C. for more than three years, and is
leaving team that struggled this past year, he is by no means a
retread, but rather a victim of circumstance. Heimerdinger was at the
end of his contract with the Titans, McNair is thinking retirement, the
AFC South will be much more competitive soon and salary cap issues are
coming home to roost. When Hackett came to the club, he was in effect
run out of USC, and might have appeared like a steal at the time, but
in hindsight was a hindrance. As he said in his statement, he did have
a hand in the Jets present success, this is true. What he didn't say,
was that he had more of a hand in holding the team back.

Flexibility

In one of his first quotes, the Dinger said:

“I'm for the shotgun if Chad wants to be in the shotgun.”

When was the last time you heard Hackett say anyting remotely like that? I think he used to say:

“I'm for the draw play because I'm for the draw play.”

Although
no one can figure out what will happen with LaMont, if he stays, will
we see the two back formations we have been pining to see for years?
What about the shotgun, pro-sets, spread formations and the rest? This
is like Christmas morning! Everyone understands that under Herm, the
defense will be the focal point of this team, which is fine by me, but
the offense can carry it's weight too. Hackett had his system and was
as predicticable as the tides. Heimerdinger will breathe new life into
the offense while following some suggestions along the way.

Recent Success:

I am not even going to talk about Hackett, I refuse to. I won't
even put the word “success” in the same sentence as his name. One the
other hand, what has Heimerdinger done with his club in the past few
years? Only turned a run-centric, double TE offense into one of the
best passing attacks in the NFL, solely because of what personnel was
available to him at the time. Along the way, I have noticed announcers
and analysts gush over the guy. Have I heard anyone gush over Hackett
in the past few years? No. Dinger's lineage traces to Gibbs &
Shanahan, who have proven successful in the current NFL, which could
work well with the Jets already impressive O-Line. Heimerdinger helped
the Titans to the playoffs twice and Steve McNair to a Co-MVP trophy in 2003.

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