"But you learn the kind of spotlight, the kind of pressure you are under, how important it is to be in the right situations and to trust the people around you. I can tell that I can trust the people here, and I've learned quite a lot to bring family back into that process."
Esiason, for one, thinks Sanchez has the ability and personality to succeed in his new surroundings. The rookie will graduate from USC this month with a degree in communications and is expected to receive a contract that guarantees him at least $30 million. Esiason stressed the distractions that come along with the job will add a layer of difficulty to the already daunting challenge.
"Twenty-two years old? [Thirty] million guaranteed? Manhattan seven miles away? Every young athlete has got to deal with the pitfalls of that," Esiason said. "And here in New York, whether it be Darryl Strawberry or Plaxico Burress, there are a lot of guys that have been swallowed up by all of that. But by the same token, there have been guys like Derek Jeter who have handled it absolutely fantastically, and they go down in history as one of the great all-time icons in the history of a New York franchise.
"All of us are hoping beyond hope that that's what Mark Sanchez will become for the Jets, and that in due time, 10 years from now when we're talking about him, hopefully you're talking about a couple of Super Bowls under his belt and about four or five Pro Bowls, and you'll realize that that trade on draft day was certainly worth everything that you gave up for him. I just hope that he doesn't get derailed."
Lucas seconds that, and says the key for Sanchez will be pouring all of his efforts and energy into the task at hand, while tuning out the static and off-the-field distractions that are always there.
Asked if he had a favorite New York place to celebrate after a good day on the job, Lucas didn't hesitate.
"Yeah," he said. "Home."
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sam.farmer@latimes.com
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BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX
Jets quarterbacks
The Jets' primary starting QBs since the Joe Namath years, and their records as the primary starter:
*--* QUARTERBACK SEASONS RECORD Richard Todd 1977, 1979-83 38-44-1 Matt Robinson 1978 6-5 Pat Ryan 1984 6-5 Ken O'Brien 1985-91 48-49-1 Browning Nagle 1992 3-10 Boomer Esiason 1993-95 15-27 Frank Reich 1996 1-6 Neil O'Donnell 1997 8-6 Vinny Testaverde 1998, 2000-01 31-14 Ray Lucas 1999 6-3 Chad Pennington 2002-04, '06-07 31-27 Brooks Bollinger 2005 2-7 Brett Favre 2008 9-7 *--*
Source: pro-football-reference.com
