New York Jets proprietor Woody Johnson made some headlines on Tuesday by offering some support for head coach Aaron Glenn, whereas additionally throwing his workforce’s quarterback and large free-agent acquisition — Justin Fields — underneath the workforce bus for his or her 0-7 begin.
It’s the kind of factor you don’t usually hear from an proprietor, particularly simply seven video games right into a season.
Make no mistake, the Jets’ quarterback state of affairs is a giant downside.
The Glenn experiment may additionally be an issue given how little progress the workforce has constructed from Week 1 to Week 7, and the way Tyrod Taylor didn’t actually enhance issues when he entered the sport on Sunday. It appears like it should be a one-and-done situation here with the pinnacle coach.
The Jets have plenty of issues, once more, however the greatest downside of all of them is the person that retains pointing the finger at everyone else within the group. It is Johnson. He is the issue, regardless of how a lot he tries to maintain passing the buck on to different individuals.
Johnson stays frequent denominator via years of failure
There’s a purpose dangerous groups that stay dangerous are all the time in that place. The rationale often resides on the high of the group. The Jets are exhibit A for the way this occurs.
Johnson initially bought the Jets in January 2000, and has owned the workforce ever since. Within the 25 years since his buy, the Jets have had simply 9 profitable seasons, six playoff appearances, 5 10-win seasons, one division title, no seasons with greater than 11 wins (a mark they reached one time) and nil Tremendous Bowl appearances.
The furthest they reached was back-to-back AFC Championship video games in 2009 and 2010 underneath former head coach Rex Ryan and quarterback Mark Sanchez.
That isn’t plenty of success. In case you have a look at it from a collective, big-picture viewpoint, the Jets’ 174 common season wins underneath Johnson’s possession are twenty sixth out of 32 NFL groups. Their six playoff wins are nineteenth, whereas their 12 complete playoff video games are solely twenty fourth.
They haven’t truly appeared in a playoff recreation since their most up-to-date AFC Championship look in 2010. A 15-year playoff drought within the NFL is sort of unthinkable given the parity of the league and the way the system is about as much as assist groups quickly enhance.
The Jets haven’t been capable of determine it out.
Underneath Johnson’s possession the Jets have had 9 totally different head coaches, together with three that caught round for 3 years or much less. They’ve had seven totally different common managers, 26 totally different quarterbacks begin at the very least one recreation and 10 totally different quarterbacks begin at the very least 10 video games. That features 4 totally different quarterbacks taken within the first spherical (Chad Pennington, Sanchez, Sam Darnold and Zach Wilson) and three extra taken within the second spherical (Christian Hackenberg, Geno Smith and Kellen Clemens).
Aside from some temporary flashes of success with Pennington and Sanchez, all of them failed in New York. A few of them (Smith and Darnold) went on to search out extra success after leaving the Jets.
The purpose right here is that the scapegoats maintain altering.
It is all the time a unique head coach that’s the downside, a unique common supervisor, a unique quarterback. All the fundamental figures within the group maintain altering and taking the autumn for the workforce’s failures apart from the one particular person on the high that’s in the end answerable for all placing all of them into place.
Johnson has not solely confirmed he’s incapable of selecting the correct individuals to guide his group, he has additionally merely created a shedding tradition and shedding setting.
Shedding breeds losers, and that’s all of the Jets have identified underneath Johnson’s watch. No head-coaching change, common supervisor change or quarterback change goes to repair that so long as he’s making the selections and setting the tone.
They will eliminate Justin Fields, they will fireplace Aaron Glenn and so they can draft one other quarterback on the high of the draft. They will do all the identical issues they’ve stored doing for 25 years and counting. And so they also can watch the outcomes all keep the identical. They will additionally watch all of these individuals depart for a greater group and discover extra success.
