The Jets have reportedly made a rare player-for-player offseason trade, as Adam Schefter reports Gang Green has agreed to send EDGE Jermaine Johnson to the Tennessee Titans for DT T’Vondre Sweat.
The trade cannot become official until the new league year starts on March 11, but Johnson made a social media post soon after the news was broken that seems to confirm it:
The deal makes Johnson the eighth of the Jets’ 11 first-round picks from 2015-22 to end up being traded away, and the third in the last four months as head coach Aaron Glenn and GM Darren Mougey have made a complete overhaul of the Gang Green defense.
Johnson was the third of the Jets’ three first-round picks at No. 26 overall in 2022, the second draft under then-new Gang Green coach and now new Titans head coach Robert Saleh, but his tenure was marred by injury, including a torn Achilles that cost him almost all of 2024.
He played in just 47 of 68 possible games over four seasons and recorded 13 sacks and 131 tackles as a Jet, and the team did not deal him along with Sauce Gardner and Quinnen Williams despite reported interest at last year’s trade deadline – but per Schefter’s report, the deal coming now perhaps reinforces that the Jets will go with an EDGE with the No. 2 overall pick in the draft.
With the move, Johnson also reunites with new Titans defensive line coach and defensive run game coordinator Aaron Whitecotton, who was the Jets’ DL coach under Saleh from 2021-24, and he will finish out his rookie deal on his $13.4 million fifth-year option in Tennessee.
In return, the Jets get a player with less cost and more control – Sweat is counting just $1.7 million against the cap and is signed through 2027 – and a 366-pound run stuffer who could better fit the scheme if Gang Green decides to continue using more 3-4 fronts.
Sweat was a second-round pick (No. 38 overall) in 2024 and has 85 tackles and three sacks in 29 games over three years – but he, too, has missed significant time, including five games with an ankle injury last year.