Trevor Lawrence will be a lot happier with Jacksonville Jaguars
The sweepstakes for the No. 1 overall draft pick– and Trevor Lawrence- were officially settled Sunday afternoon and it was one of the biggest stories coming out of the league.
The New York Jets- who had seemingly been a shoo-in to come away with the No. 1 pick in the 2021 NFL Draft- actually won a second game.
Though Jets fans were screaming at their team just a week ago when they pulled off a 23-20 win over the Los Angeles Rams, they were even more distraught this past weekend when they saw their team win for a second week in a row- this time against the Cleveland Browns- and completely take themselves out of the running for Trevor Lawrence.
There was still a path for the Jets to lock up the No. 1 overall pick before the win, but that victory officially took them out of the running and paved the way for the new team who will pick first in this coming spring’s draft: The Jacksonville Jaguars.
The Jaguars are currently 1-14 on the season and- at best- could finish with two wins on the year. They hold the ‘tiebreaker’ over the Jets, though, and that’s why they’ve already locked up the pick.
While Jets fans may be distraught, the truth is that Trevor Lawrence will live a much happier life with the Jacksonville Jaguars
Sorry, Jets fans. This article isn’t meant to kick you while you’re down, but it’s just the truth.
You can ask 1,000 people if they’d rather live in the warmth of the Florida sun or the cold of New York winter and 999 of them are going to say they’d rather go tropical.
If that wasn’t enough, we all know that quarterbacks thrive in warmer weather, especially a quarterback like Trevor Lawrence with such elite arm strength. Lawrence will be playing home games in December that still are in 80 degree temperatures. He won’t have to deal with the week-in, week-out grind of playing in the cold and what that means in terms of finding ways to eek out victories through the running game and play-action passes.
But, it’s not just weather that should have Lawrence excited about his next destination.
Lawrence’s home town of Cartersville, GA is just a little over a five-hour drive from Jacksonville, so he’ll be able to stay relatively close by to his family and where he grew up.
And then there’s income taxes.
The state of Florida has no income taxes while the state of New York boasts one of the highest income tax rates in the entire country.
With Lawrence standing to make right around $9 million per year off his rookie contract alone, you’d be talking about a state income tax rate of 8.82 percent if he played in New York. That means he’d stand to lose more than $70,000 per year in just state taxes, which would accumulate to nearly $300,000 over a four-year contract period.
If the weather, taxes and relative proximity to home weren’t enough, there’s also one other big factor: Franchise growth potential.
While the Jaguars have never won a Super Bowl, it wasn’t that long ago that we saw Jacksonville have legitimate success. The Jags made the playoffs in 2017 and advanced to the AFC Championship Game before losing a close one to Tom Brady and the New England Patriots. We have to go back to 2010 to find the last time the Jets were in the playoffs.
In addition, if you look at the two franchises and their directions, you can simply see a difference. The Jets have been wandering in the desert for far too long. Their offense has no identity and they’ve wasted much of the talent that they’ve drafted.
The Jaguars, on the other hand, at least feel like they’re building something. They’ve missed out on draft picks and they’ve struggled mightily at times, but it just seems like the overall culture there is a much better fit for Lawrence than what he’d be inheriting in New York.
Only time can tell, but we imagine that Trevor Lawrence is still jumping for joy at the news that he’ll be heading down to the Jaguars instead of to the Jets, where most had him pegged for the majority of the last three months.