Jets General Manager Mike Tannenbaum Speaks Out On The Trade For Tim Tebow
NEW YORK (WFAN/AP) - General manager Mike Tannenbaum joined WFAN's Boomer & Carton on Thursday morning to clear up many of the questions surrounding the Jets acquisition of quarterback Tim Tebow from the Denver Broncos.
Tannenbaum said quarterback Mark Sanchez is, and will remain, the Jets starting quarterback and Tebow will be a situational player. "Mark is the starter, Tim is the backup," Tannenbaum said.
Listen to the full interview with Mike Tannenbaum.
Regarding Tebow's the addition of a fourth quarterback to the Jets roster, Tannenbaum said, "depth at quarterback is not a bad thing."
The trade came under scrutiny immediately after it became public. WFAN's Mike Francesa criticized the Jets for making the move for non-football reasons - selling jerseys and selling seats. The Jets share a stadium and compete for fans with the Super Bowl-winning Giants.
Tannenbaum refuted that the trade was made to attract attention to the franchise. "My singular charge here is to win games," he said. "That's what I'm evaluated on."
New York recently signed Sanchez to a three-year contract extension after falling out of the hunt for Peyton Manning, a vote of confidence for a quarterback whose pride took a serious shot at the end of last season as the Jets finished 8-8 and out of the playoffs. Some players questioned his leadership abilities, but Sanchez recently vowed to be the guy the franchise can lean on.
The trade was completed hours after the sides initially agreed to a deal, which was hung up when the Jets balked at repaying Denver more than $5 million for a salary advance due Tebow. The two sides agreed to split that cost, and Tannenbaum said the team was "comfortable with the compensation."
Carton questioned why the Jets tweeted that the deal was complete before it was finalized.
"Typically, you announce you have an agreement in principle, then work out the details," he said. "We wouldn't have sent out that tweet if we weren't comfortable where we were in the process."
He said there was a disagreement about how to handle the salary advance after Denver received the papers.
"We knew what the contract was," he said. "We had read it. --- We felt it was one way; they felt it was another. Based on that, they were well within their rights to assess their different possibilities of what to do and their alternatives."
Jets cornerback Antonio Cromartie openly questioned the move, tweeting, "Y bring [Tebow] in when we need to bring in more Weapons for @Mark Sanchez let's build the team around him. We already signed to 3 year ext."
Tannenbaum responded that "our guys are certainly entitled to their opinions," but stressed that the move was ultimately beneficial for the franchise.
"This is a great way for us to change the pace."
Tannenbaum repeatedly referred to Sanchez as "our guy" and the team's unquestioned starting quarterback."Mark's our guy, he's going to continue to be our guy."
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