What can Harrison Phillips, Jowon Briggs bring to Jets’ defensive line?
General manager Darren Mougey has taken a proactive approach to addressing the depth on the interior defensive line, as he added two new faces in separate trades with the Cleveland Browns and Minnesota Vikings last week.
Just hours after the Browns announced that they had traded the promising youngster Jowon Briggs to the Jets for an exchange of future picks, news broke that the Jets had also acquired veteran Harrison Phillips.
The 29-year-old Phillips, who spent his first four seasons in the AFC East with the Buffalo Bills, had been acquired from the Vikings for a late-round pick and a pick swap.
For the past few years, the Jets have struggled to find a satisfactory answer to the question of who would start alongside Quinnen Williams at defensive tackle. This move signifies the importance of Williams to the organization, as the 28-year-old enters the second year of a four-year, $96 million contract extension.
Phillips, who is under contract through next season, gives New York a viable option to start next to Williams in the short term. He started all 51 games for the Vikings over the past three seasons, anchoring a defense that ranked second in the NFL against the run last season and eighth in 2023.
While he's not necessarily a Pro Bowl-level talent, Phillips has played well enough to earn two contracts with the Vikings worth several million dollars per year. As a measure of his run-stopping abilities, he ranked fifth in the NFL for run defense grade on the analysis site Pro Football Focus in 2021. He also racked up an impressive 92 tackles in 2023, which was the third most ever by an NFL defensive lineman.
Briggs could, in theory, be a longer-term option. The 2024 seventh-round pick spent most of his rookie year on the Browns' practice squad but made six late-season appearances and looked the part in a rotational role, playing 22 defensive snaps per game. He is still only 23 and was also playing well in preseason, but the Browns have a logjam at the position after drafting Mason Graham with the fifth overall pick, so they were happy to obtain draft capital in a deal for Briggs.
For now, Briggs brings the Jets a rotational option with arguably more upside than any defensive tackle currently on the Jets roster, although it remains to be seen how big his role will be in 2025.
The main area that these two additions provide an immediate upgrade is in terms of their strength in the trenches, which should boost the Jets' run defense. Phillips posted an impressive 41 bench press reps at the 2018 combine, which represents the second-highest total by anyone over the past 10 years. However, Briggs wasn't far off that number, as he posted 39 at his pro day last year. This strength is apparent on film for both players, as they are each capable of taking on a double-team without being driven back off the line of scrimmage.
In their search for a potential starter to pair with Williams, the Jets brought in three low-cost veterans in free agency: Derrick Nnadi, Jay Tufele, and Byron Cowart. However, none of them would be as effective in holding up against the run as Phillips has been, and the Jets hope Briggs will also be. As a result, the Jets traded Nnadi back to the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday afternoon.
When Williams is paired with someone who can't take on double-teams, he will be forced to take on more of those responsibilities himself, limiting his own production and making him more prone to becoming worn down over the course of a game. The Jets organization has obviously been aware of this for years and even added space stuffers Al Woods and Leki Fotu over the past two seasons, only for both to hardly ever be available due to injuries. Hopefully, that has now been addressed.
Neither Phillips nor Briggs offers as much in the pass rush as they do in the running game, with Phillips never having had more than three sacks in any season and Briggs limited to 12 sacks in five years during his college career. However, Phillips' production in that area increased with the move from Buffalo to Minnesota, as he has had 6.5 sacks in the past three years after having just 1.5 in four years with the Bills. Briggs is young enough that this is still an area where he will keep developing, too.
However, their biggest impact in that area will be to enable other players to remain fresh and be deployed situationally, which should benefit the unit as a whole. If their presence helps to keep Williams fresh, and the improvements to the run defense land opposing teams in more passing situations, this is also going to make a huge difference to Williams' potential numbers.
When asked about Phillips, head coach Aaron Glenn - who is obviously familiar with him, having coached with the Vikings' NFC North rivals in Detroit - praised his abilities as a run stopper but also his mentality and character, so it sounds like confidence is high that he will provide a positive impact. Briggs may take longer to be a major contributor, but he will benefit from the mentorship of both Phillips and Williams as he seeks to make his own impression.