Marcus Maye anxious to return to action, join Jets teammates

New York Jets safety Marcus Maye missed most of the 2018 season due to injury, and he’s still waiting for his chance to return to the field this year.

Since being drafted in the second round of the 2017 NFL draft, New York Jets safety Marcus Maye has looked like a budding star on the back end of the defense. But injuries derailed his second NFL campaign, limiting him to just six games last season.

Heading into the 2019 season, he’s still on the Jets’ PUP list (physically unable to perform) as he continues to recover from shoulder surgery. While his teammates are popping pads in training camp, Maye is relegated to hitting the weights and testing his mental toughness until he can return to the field.

New head coach Adam Gase knows Maye is champing at the bit to get back onto the field, but in the meantime, he’s doing all the right things to prepare himself for when that moment comes (via team senior reporter Eric Allen):

There is nothing he can do to speed up the process, so he’s just waiting to it feels right where he has all his strength back.

He is working extremely hard. He is killing it in the weight room and the training room, everything he’s done. He’s been unbelievable in the classroom. The coaches have been very pleased with how hard he’s been working and he’s dying to get out there.

Along with Pro Bowler Jamal Adams, New York’s first-round pick in that same draft, Maye gives the Jets one of the league’s most promising tandems of young safeties. Once he returns to full strength, opposing offenses will have a difficult time accounting for their complementary skill sets at every level of the field.

But for now, Maye will continue attacking his rehab and recovery the same way he attacks the ball when he’s between the lines. For now, that’ll have to be enough.

Where would you rank Adams and Maye among the NFL’s top safety tandems? Give us your take in the comment section!