New York Jets ‘top priority’ is to re-sign linebacker Jordan Jenkins

The New York Jets ‘top priority’ is to re-sign linebacker Jordan Jenkins. Here are all the details and how much it’ll cost the team.

The New York Jets are on a three-game winning streak and they want to keep things rolling next week vs the Cincinnati Bengals.

Speaking of keeping things, that’s something they’d like to do with linebacker Jordan Jenkins.

ESPN’s Rich Cimini revealed on social media that retaining Jenkins is the “top priority” for the New York Jets ahead of free agency.

He actually broke it down into tiers of importance:

• First-tier: Jordan Jenkins.
• Second-tier: Brian Poole, Robby Anderson.
• Third-tier: Kelvin Beachum, Brandon Copeland, Neville Hewitt, Tom Compton, Alex Lewis.

The New York Jets already checked one of those items off the list prior to their tilt vs the Oakland Raiders on Sunday. Ryan Griffin signed a three-year extension with the Jets on Saturday evening.

He was originally part of that second tier of importance for the Jets to retain, per Cimini.

So how much will he cost?

The team wants to get this done ahead of free agency for two big reasons.

First off they really like Jenkins and want him to be a part of their core future. Secondly, if Jordan reaches unrestricted free agency his price tag will inevitably go up via a quasi-bidding war.

He’s still young (25 years old) and has gotten better every year of his professional career. In 2019 he already has missed two games and he’s still on pace to shatter his single-season career-high for sacks.

Despite the exponential increase in sacks every year, he still only has 17.5 for his career which should put a ceiling on his yearly average cap number.

Green Bay Packers linebacker Preston Smith signed a massive four-year $52 million contract that included $16 million fully guaranteed last year which is a $13 million per year average.

Rich Cimini suggested he won’t go that high because of the sack differential between the two players, but he “should wind up somewhere north of $10 million per season.”

Right now the Jets have over $60 million in available spending money, but there’s at least another $19 million that’ll become available via cap casualties. In other words the green and white will once again have a plethora of cash available to retain as many of these pending free agents as they please.