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If you had a speaker box for the JL that was tuned for that speaker, you will have to make sure that the 'throw' of your new speaker is the same as the old one, or the box will no longer sound quite as good.
Brand doesn't matter so much as quality. I have seen brands that one model of speaker can be phenomenal, and another model can be crap. Best you can do is go out and listen to a bunch of them, and listen for what sounds the best, taking into account the throw distance of the speaker if you had a tuned box.
Another thing to look for is the material of the cone and the surround. A paper cone will give you a much more natural sound, but will be VERY hard to find nowadays, and if you tend to play your stereo so the entire town can hear it, you will blow a paper cone much easier. The next best thing is a Kevlar cone, which offers a nice tight sound, and resists being blown a lot better than paper. The lower end of the scale is your typical plastic cone.
Then you get to the surround. The surround should be a nice soft rubber when you touch it. If it feels too plastic, it will not give a very natural tone, and will make the bass sound a lot rougher. The surround should also be fairly hefty. If the surround is small, as in there is not much material between the cone and the metal cage, it will be MUCH easier to blow the speaker, and it will not push nearly as much air. A nice beefy surround is ideal.
The rest is all in the magnet, and the coil, which you will really only see if you listen to the speaker. Unless you are going for super high-end hand-wound coils, just looking at them will not tell you much, other than the fact that a larger magnet will tend to be much better than a smaller one.
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