Anyone else remember the days when Jerry was the football equivalent of an oil “wildcatter”? A wildcatter is a speculative oil driller who takes great risks to find oil where most would not even consider. Wildcatters take high risks to achieve high rewards. That was the young JJ. Old JJ doesn’t take many risks anymore.
When JJ was a wildcatter, he was the most aggressive GM in the league. It wasn’t always good. Sometimes it was bad. But he was aggressive. Here are some examples.
- Hiring Jimmy Johnson out U of Miami was a great risk
- The Herschel Walker trade
- Signing Deion Sanders as a FA
- Making trades for big play WRs (yes they were bad trades, but he was being aggressive)
- Signing La’el Collins as an UFA (a guy with first round talent but had a criminal inquiry at time of draft)
I know I’m forgetting some moves. Point is. Where did the wildcatter go?
These days, the NFL wildcatters are Les Snead, GM of the rams who has made more aggressive moves than any other GM. Or Jason Licht, GM of the Bucs who aggressively pursued Tom Brady and has made multiple FA signings. Or Brett Veach, GM of the chiefs? Tons of trades and FA moves. Their teams have won the last 3 SBs.
What happened to our wildcatter?
