Revisiting a controversial New York Jets roster decision from 2022

In 2022, the New York Jets made one highly controversial roster decision

In New York Jets training camp in 2022, if there was any fan-favorite player, it was cornerback-turned-safety Jason Pinnock. After Pinnock received an 89.5 Pro Football Focus run defense grade in 2021, fans were already prepared to coronate him the Jets’ new starting free safety. The hoopla grew after Pinnock showed off his hands during camp.

When final roster cutdowns came, though, Jets fans were shocked to see Pinnock’s name on the list. Instead, the Jets kept little-known undrafted free agent Tony Adams as their third safety behind Lamarcus Joyner and Jordan Whitehead (Ashtyn Davis was the fourth). When waiver claims went in, the Giants picked up Pinnock, ending any hopes of sneaking him onto the practice squad.

Pinnock appeared in 14 games for the Giants in 2022, starting five. In 2023, he earned their full-time starting free safety role in training camp. Meanwhile, Adams appeared in 11 games for the Jets, starting two, but played just 246 total snaps. He also won a Jets starting safety spot in 2023 (perhaps buoyed in part by Chuck Clark’s season-ending injury in OTAs). He’s still the Jets’ starter, as well.

Given the players’ starting roles in 2023, the Pinnock vs. Adams comparison is fairly easy to make. As of now, does it look like the Jets made the right choice?

Analytics

Here’s a head-to-head comparison of Adams and Pinnock from 2023. I could add in their 2022 statistics, as well, but it makes more sense to use the season in which both players started from Week 1. All rankings are among 68 qualified safeties.

The first thing to notice is that Pinnock and Adams had vastly different roles. Pinnock played as a deep safety close to two-thirds of the time, while Adams did so two-fifths of the time.

They played in completely different defensive schemes, as well. Wink Martindale’s 3-4 Giants scheme involved a tremendous rate of man coverage and single-high safety play, while Robert Saleh and Jeff Ulbrich’s 4-3 relied heavily on two-high coverages and far more Cover-4 and Cover-6 man-match schemes.

Adams was also asked to play in the slot far more than Pinnock, which is interesting considering that both of them have cornerback backgrounds. One thing not noted here is that Pinnock blitzed a lot more than Adams: Pinnock had 40 pass rush snaps compared to Adams’ 8.

Pinnock had somewhat stronger coverage statistics than Adams. Although Adams allowed fewer yards per cover snap, Pinnock significantly outdid Adams in yards per target, suggesting that Pinnock’s coverage was safer. Pinnock also forced a much higher rate of incompletions via pass breakups or tight coverage.

Adams saw fewer targets on a per-snap basis and also had far more coverage snaps per reception. However, that seems to have been more of a function of the Jets’ defensive scheme, as Jordan Whitehead also fared well in this category despite poor overall coverage numbers.

It makes sense that Adams’ run-stop rate would be higher considering that he played close to the line of scrimmage far more often. Unlike Adams, Pinnock consistently played a very deep safety, making him the last line of defense rather than a run-stuffer.

Pinnock was a better tackler than Adams, although both were poor. Pinnock had a far better penalty rate, although he was called for one penalty to Adams’ two, so it’s not such a drastic difference.

It is notoriously difficult to quantify safety play in any meaningful way. However, Michael Nania’s technique for evaluating safety play includes missed tackle rate, yards per target, run stop rate, touchdown/interception margin, and snaps per penalty (which I redid as penalties per 1,000 snaps).

Comparing just those metrics, Adams had an average ranking of 31.4, while Pinnock’s was 29.4. Among 68 qualified safeties, Pinnock’s average ranked 25th, while Adams’ ranked 30th.

Overall, it’s not a vast difference, but Pinnock was a somewhat better safety in 2023 by this calculation.

(For what it’s worth, Pro Football Focus saw the players as eerily similar, giving Adams a 68.0 overall grade and Pinnock a 67.7. Their category-by-category grades are almost identical, as well.)

Technique

In the 2022 offseason, Joe Blewett reviewed some of Pinnock’s 2021 performance at safety on his live Blewett’s Blitz show. He demonstrated that Pinnock was highly overrated by Jets fans and had several major coverage lapses on film in limited safety snaps. He also put out a film review explaining why keeping Adams was the right call using Adams’ 2021 college film.

Obviously, Blewett did not review Pinnock’s 2022 or 2023 performance because Pinnock was no longer a member of the Jets. However, he did review Adams’ performance. He concluded that Adams was an average-ish safety in 2023, perhaps somewhat below average. The metrics certainly bear out the average label. Blewett pointed out that Adams’ tackling needs work, as well as some of his man coverage technique.

However, a cursory look at Pinnock’s film highlights some of the same issues Blewett brought up from his time with the Jets. Pinnock gets turned around in coverage far too often, even compared to Adams. His tackling is also almost as bad as Adams’, particularly when it comes to tackling angles downfield.

Pinnock wears No. 27.

While Adams’ film wasn’t great, he’s not turned around quite as much as Pinnock. He’s also generally closer in coverage than Pinnock is. The numbers are the numbers, but the film doesn’t paint quite the same picture.

A third option?

There may be a different debate worth having in hindsight — and that debate should have been going on at the time, too. The Jets wanted to sneak Pinnock onto their practice squad; Robert Saleh said as much. But if they were going to keep four safeties, why not release Ashtyn Davis and keep both Pinnock and Adams?

Davis barely played on defense in 2022, seeing just 13 snaps. His role was solely on special teams, particularly as the punt protector. While that’s an important role, it’s not nearly as valuable as safety. The Jets had the aging Lamarcus Joyner as a one-year stopgap at safety. Wouldn’t it have made sense to keep two young players with potential?

While Davis carved out a niche for himself in 2023 as a linebacker-type in big-nickel packages, Pinnock became an every-down safety. Would the Jets have been better off with Adams and Pinnock as their two safeties?

If we’re comparing Pinnock to Jordan Whitehead, the answer is likely yes. Whitehead gave up seven touchdowns in 2023 and was singlehandedly responsible for most of the Jets’ blown coverages. Whitehead’s tackling is also so poor that it makes Pinnock’s look good by comparison. The Whitehead vs. Pinnock head-to-head look makes some sense because Whitehead played a good chunk of deep safety, too, albeit in two-high looks rather than single-high.

Overall, Pinnock’s numbers are decent, but his film continues to show the same shakiness in coverage. However, considering the safety play the Jets have seen over the past two seasons, it’s fair to wonder if they would have been better off retaining Pinnock.

A caveat about contracts

Pinnock is entering the final season of his rookie contract. The Jets drafted him in the fifth round in 2021. Adams is also going into the final year of his rookie deal, but because he was an undrafted free agent, the Jets can offer him a tender after this season. Whether the Jets do end up offering him a tender will largely hinge on his play, as the second-round or right-of-first-refusal tenders are the only ones that make sense for a former UDFA.

In general, it’s worth noting that the Jets have more team control of Adams than the Giants do of Pinnock.

Pinnock also has a $3.1 million cap hit in 2024 compared to Adams’ $988,334. It may not seem like a tremendous difference, but for a Jets team that has only $6.2 million in cap space, the extra space helps a lot.

Did the Jets make the right decision?

Despite Pinnock’s slightly better ranking than Adams’, the truth is that Adams’ skills better fit what the Jets are trying to do defensively. They don’t play a lot of single-high, certainly not with a safety 15-20 yards off the line of scrimmage regularly. They rarely blitz their safeties, which is something Pinnock does pretty often with the Giants.

Adams’ play in the slot is far more important to the Jets’ defense. They want him to be more impactful in the run game, too, which he delivered in 2023. He’s certainly not an above-average player, but the Jets’ decision still makes sense in hindsight. The price difference, while not drastic, is also a factor, as is Adams’ potential team control for one more season.

This might seem like a cop-out, but the best answer is that letting Pinnock go didn’t particularly matter. Sure, he became a starter, which would have been nice for the Jets to have. Still, Adams fits better in their scheme, which means it was the right decision for them at the time.