Brett Favre Won't Improve the New York Jets

Everyone has heard of the Brett Favre saga. After his reinstatement to the NFL, the Green Bay Packers traded the veteran QB to the New York Jets for a draft pick.

The Jets gave up a conditional fourth-round pick to acquire the ironman, but the cost could rise depending on the 2008 season. According to the NFL Network, if Favre takes 50 percent of the Jets' total snaps in 2008, the fourth-rounder becomes a third-round pick.

If he gets 70 percent of the snaps and the Jets make the playoffs, it becomes a second-round pick; and if he gets 80 percent of snaps and the Jets make the Super Bowl, it becomes a first-round pick.

Favre’s durability will help an injury-prone and experience-starved quarterback-unit in New York. Favre has started 253 straight regular-season games since his first Packers start in 1992. Over that same time period, the Jets have started Browning Nagle, Boomer Esiason, Frank Reich, Ray Lucas, Rick Mirer, Neil O'Donnell, Chad Pennington, Vinny Testaverde, Quincy Carter, Bubby Brister, Glenn Foley, Brooks Bollinger, Kellen Clemens, Ken O'Brien, and Jack Trudeau.

Beyond his durability, though, there are several concerns. Although Favre has the most touchdown passes of any QB in NFL history, he also holds the record for most interceptions in NFL history—a stat that the Jets could truly do without.

The Jets need to possess the ball and play smart football—Favre’s improv may bite them at some point. To make matters worse, Chad Pennington has a better interception-per-pass-attempt percentage (3.36 percent) than Favre (3.62 percent) since 2003.

Favre has also played with the same top-notch receivers over a long period and was clearly perfectly timed with Donald Driver. With Favre missing all of training camp, he’ll be thrown right into action to see how well he adapts to the offense.

However, the true limiting factor to Favre will be the Jets’ offensive line. Since 2003, Favre has had a stellar offensive line, allowing at most a 3.9 percent sack-per-pass-attempt average. The Jets, however, have been terrible since that time, yielding a 4.6 percent sack-per-pass-attempt average at best.

In fact, since 2003, the Jets' quarterbacks have been sacked on 7.8% (2003), 4.6% (2004), 9.8% (2005), 5.8% (2006) and 9.7% (2007) of their pass attempts.

Although the Jets have bolstered their O-line this offseason, it’s not clear that the unit will perform well. Alan Faneca, for example, was a Pro Bowler for the Steelers, yet the Steelers fielded a terrible offensive line last year.

Faneca could easily be on the decline. Right tackle Damien Woody is on the decline as well. He couldn’t even help the Lions’ O-line woes.

In the end, Favre’s on-field success truly depends on these new pieces. Off the field, he will clearly aid in Kellen Clemens’ development, but will that be enough? Only time will tell, but I’m not worried. Yet.