This summer, the New York Jets gave 2010 second-round draft pick Vladimir Ducasse one more opportunity to unseat 2009 sixth-round draft pick Matt Slauson for the starting left guard job. Two days before the Jets open the 2012 preseason, the competition is over, Manish Mehta of the New York Daily News reports.
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The 6-foot-5, 315-pound Slauson has started 35 straight regular and postseason games and is coming off a season during which he was one of two Jets players (left tackle D'Brickashaw Ferguson was the other) to play every offensive snap. Slauson not missing a snap is a testament to his toughness, as he played the entire season with a torn labrum, rotator cuff and biceps in his left arm that were surgically repaired this offseason.
Slauson had been scheduled to earn $1.308 million in base salary this season and hit unrestricted free agency in 2013. According to Jenny Vrentas of The Star-Ledger, Slauson took a pay cut last week, receiving a $435,000 signing bonus and lowering his base salary to a fully guaranteed $615,000.
In his two seasons, Ducasse has appeared in just 19 of 35 total games and was inactive for two of three playoff games. When active, Ducasse has played in less than 7 percent of the Jets' regular season offensive snaps, but he did make his first NFL start in 2011 as a sixth offensive lineman in a 37-10 win over the Kansas City Chiefs.
