Jaguars GM Trent Baalke: ‘The Team Is Going To Look Different’ in 2024

The Jacksonville Jaguars have a lot more questions this year than they did last offseason. How will they address them?

This time a year ago, the Jacksonville Jaguars were entering the offseason with very few questions. 

Yes, the Jaguars had expiring contracts in the form of Evan Engram, Jawaan Taylor and Arden Key, but otherwise the Jaguars were set to return nearly every starter and key role player. 

This time around though, the Jaguars have more questions than answers as they enter the 2024 offseason.

“Last year we didn’t have a ton of cap space to work with. We’ve gone into free agency the first two years. Are we going to be more aggressive? We feel we’ve got a good nucleus of players," general manager Trent Baalke said on Thursday. 

"But this team is going to look different when we strap it up in April, when the offseason program gets going. The team is going to look different. Our team is going to look different, every team in the National Football League is going to look different. How much different depends on a lot of the discussions we’re going to have over the next couple of weeks.”

The Jaguars have some key pending free agents in Josh Allen and Calvin Ridley entering this offseason, while they have an abundance of questions on other players and their contract status, such as Cam Robinson, Brandon Scherff, Rayshawn Jenkins, Darious Williams, and more. 

Does that automatically mean the Jaguars and Baalke will be more active this offseason than last? Not quite. Baalke defended his team's inactivity in last year's offseason on Thursday, but it remains to be seen what that could mean for the team's future moving forward.

“I don’t live with regrets. That’s not how I operate. Are there decisions you look back on and say, ‘What if we would’ve done this? What if we would’ve done that?’ Should’ve, would’ve and could’ve all got beat," Baalke said. 

"You do the best you can, we felt we had a pretty competitive football team coming back. We still feel we have a competitive football team coming back. The season didn’t go our way. There were four teams left a week ago. We beat two of those teams, we lost a one-score game to another one and another one we were down by three points with four minutes left in the third quarter. We felt we had a competitive football team. We didn’t win the number of games we wanted to win and that’s on all of us, me included. Look no further than here. There’s some things that we have to do, we recognized it and we’re making those changes as we go.”