Vick vs. Smith: Who’s the safe bet to start at QB?

Guest piece from Stephen Griffin.

With sports gambling on the horizon in New Jersey, the toughest bet might be one of the first: Who should the Jets start at quarterback?

The next NFL season should be an interesting one for sports betting fans, particularly in the northeast. Sports gambling has been a bit of a grey area in the U.S. for some time now, but things may be changing significantly in the coming months. This is because of some potentially significant sports gambling and online gaming breakthroughs in the New Jersey area, where Partypoker and parent company Bwin.party have struck partnership deals with the NHL’s New Jersey Devils and the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers. Couple this with the fact that the same gaming sites are playing enormous roles in New Jersey’s newly legalized online gambling scene, and we have two enormous new players in the sports betting market emerging in this part of the country.

A February article in iGaming Business detailed the partnership agreements between these gaming companies and the professional sports franchises in Philadelphia and New Jersey. It also brings up the possibility of increased gaming regulation ultimately leading to the overturning of legislation that currently prohibits Internet sports betting in New Jersey, which means that by the time football returns we just might be looking at a broader range of legal sports betting options.

But the ironic thing for NFL fans in New Jersey (where all of this gambling expansion is taking off), and specifically Jets fans, is that the most interesting betting scenario may already be unfolding. Large scale, legal online sports betting likely won’t be implemented any time too soon (perhaps by the start of the season, if fans are lucky), but Jets fans have something very important to worry about before ordinary betting scenarios like game outcomes and point spreads are even of concern. Specifically, who would fans bet on to start at quarterback between Geno Smith and newcomer Michael Vick?

It’s not exactly an enviable decision for Rex Ryan and Co. to have to make. Not because the competition between the two is so tight, necessarily, but rather because neither one seems like a surefire pick to lead the Jets to a successful season, to say the least. The basic rundown? We all know the Michael Vick story: an athletically dominant QB whose best years are long behind him, who can look like an MVP one moment and an automated turnover simulator the next. Geno Smith, meanwhile, is a superb athlete with natural ability who showed brief flashes of ability in his 2013 rookie campaign, but was largely erratic and unreliable. Here’s a closer look at both options.

Michael Vick

It’s pretty clear that of these two quarterbacks, Vick has the higher ceiling and the greater talent level. Sure, he was average to below-average in his 2013 stint with the Eagles, and he was utterly supplanted by the surprising Nick Foles. But Vick, as mentioned, can still look like an MVP in a given game. And can we really say that about Geno Smith?

There’s also the recent report from CBS Sports that LeSean McCoy has made it known he expects Vick to be the starter. McCoy used the words “way better” to describe Vick in comparison to Smith, which is probably a little bit reckless for an offensive star who ought to be working on building a relationship with the organization’s young QB. Nonetheless, this may be an indication that the team itself trusts Vick’s upside and experience more than Smith’s raw talent and youth.

Geno Smith

If that seemed like a completely compelling case for backing Vick as the likeliest starting QB, wait just a minute. McCoy may be ready to declare his favorite, but ESPN’s Jon Gruden—perhaps as good a QB analyst as there is in sports media—said just this Tuesday that the Jets’ QB battle is a “two-horse race,” citing Smith’s mental and physical strength in persevering through a tricky start to the season last year.

It may be hard for true Jets fans to admit, because the stats just don’t support that Smith had even a mediocre rookie season. He finished the season with 12 TDs and 21 interceptions, with a meager 66.5 passer rating. Yet, Gruden may have a few points. It’s not as if Smith had a well-oiled machine with which to make a rookie statement, and he did show some toughness and raw ability. There’s an argument to be made for nurturing his skill early, rather than sitting him behind a league veteran.

Ultimately, it’s probably too early to tell. Even if sports betting does become more accessible in the near future, you may want to hold off on this one until the preseason. If I had to bet, I’d give the slight edge to Vick, because the Jets tend to follow the general New York/New Jersey franchise mindset of “win now at all costs,” and Vick is the better “win now” choice. But if nothing else, we can at least all agree on one thing: whoever gets the job will be a better option than Mark Sanchez!