Nobody Better Than New York Jets Defensive Duo in 2024

No other NFL team can make the same claim. The New York Jets‘ highly-touted defense includes two of the league’s Top 10 rated linebackers.

CBS Sports ranked both halves of the Jets’ starting linebacker duo amongst the NFL’s best ahead of the 2024 season. Making the Jets the lone franchise with two Top 10 representatives, writer Jordan Dajani listed Quincy Williams at No. 4 overall and placed CJ Mosley into the No. 6 slot.

The author defined linebackers as those who “patrol the second level of the field, and are asked to both lay the lumber on running backs, and cover pass-catchers downfield.” Being productive every down linebackers, Williams and Mosley are rare “special weapons” on a modern-day NFL defense.

San Francisco 49ers‘ defensive leader Fred Warner claimed the No. 1 overall ranking followed by veterans Roquan Smith (Baltimore Ravens) and Demario Davis (New Orleans Saints). Warner, Smith and Williams are all separated in age by less than one year.

Williams, who will turn 28 years old on August 28, has emerged as a top-tier starter since being released by the Jacksonville Jaguars in 2021. He has recorded 100+ tackles in each of his three seasons with the Jets. The linebacker’s tackle-for-loss totals have increased each of the last three years.

CBS Sports accurately described Williams as a “a player that has gotten better and better each year,” and noted “it’s impossible to watch the Jets defense and not notice this guy flying around all over the field.”

In 2023, Williams did not miss game em-route to career highs in total tackles (139) and tackles-for-loss (15). He also made his first-ever professional interception. The result was an All-Pro First Team selection.

In a race against Father Time, the 32-year-old Mosley is holding up well. As CBS Sports noted, “Mosley may have turned 32 this summer, but he hasn’t slowed down yet.” Meanwhile, the statistics are there to support that claim.

Mosley has made no fewer than 152 tackles in any of the last three seasons. He also logged 16 passes defensed over that span. The former Baltimore Ravens’ first-round draft pick has made 45 consecutive starts for New York since Week 6 of the 2021 campaign.

CBS Sports called the grizzled veteran “one of the best mike linebackers of the last decade.”

As a duo, Williams and Mosley are the NFL’s highest-graded according to Pro Football Focus. The analytics outlet placed New York’s linebacking corps atop3 its 2024 position group rankings.