It’s OK to look at the facts – and the Jets’ history – and be skeptical. The team is 2-9. They were 0-7. Glenn’s hand-picked quarterback was benched before Thanksgiving. The New England Patriots are in their first year with a new coach and are already competing for the No. 1 seed in the AFC. The Chicago Bears lead the NFC North and have also hired a Lions assistant.
For all the things you can point to as positives for next year — which we did on Wednesday — the list of reasons to be pessimistic is equally long. After all, Glenn isn’t the first Jets coach to preach patience when wins don’t come right away.
When we looked at it on Wednesday, the glass was half full. Here the glass is half empty.
1. Quarterback Question
That was the reasoning behind the signing of Justin Fields as a free agent last March. The Jets were a rebuilding team without a clear quarterback option after moving on from Aaron Rodgers. Why not buy a lottery ticket and see what happens? Ultimately, Fields proved to be what he always was (in many ways, he was even worse). It’s fair to criticize the Jets’ valuation, even if the process largely makes sense; However, Fields’ contract is not crippling.
Aside from his performances against the Pittsburgh Steelers and Cincinnati Bengals, Fields was mostly a disaster. The Jets made the same mistake with him that they did with Zach Wilson in 2021, handing the starting job to Wilson without any workload. Would Tyrod Taylor (who Fields beat out in training camp) beat him in actual competition?
The Jets are still entering the offseason with a major question mark at the single position that is most important for any organization taking part in a rebuild. The Patriots turned things around with coach Mike Vrabel as they have Drake Mays. To a lesser extent, the same is true of quarterback Caleb Williams and first-year coach Ben Johnson in Chicago. The Jets don’t have Maye or Williams. Rebuilds succeed or fail based on quality quarterback play. The Lions rejuvenated Jared Goff and never looked back. New York did not rejuvenate Fields, and the offense that was supposed to highlight his best skills was never perfected.
The Jets will also have to answer in 2026 whether they have the coach and environment to develop a franchise quarterback.
“I think the first thing I do is I look within myself and say, ‘What is it that I can do better?’ And there are definitely some things I can do, and I’m not going to reveal all of them,” offensive coordinator Tanner Engstrand said. “I always want to look at myself first and see: Am I making sure I’m putting him (the quarterback) in the right position, at the right time? And I just have to continue to evaluate it on a daily basis. We’re in the situation we’re in and we’ll move forward with that.”
The prospects considered to be the top in this draft class – Fernando Mendoza, Ty Simpson, Dante Moore – are flawed in different ways. Many think Moore won’t declare anyway, and the Jets could be just one or two wins away from being out of a win-win situation. They’re ranked No. 4 behind two teams that don’t need a quarterback (Tennessee Titans and New York Giants) and one that does (New Orleans Saints). Right behind them, the Las Vegas Raiders, Cleveland Browns and Arizona Cardinals are likely at QB.
And no, the Jets aren’t going to tank for better draft positioning – as they shouldn’t.
Glenn said, echoing former Jets’ Herm Edwards, “I’m going to tell you the line you guys have heard before: We play games to win.”
2. Lose, same-old-Jets style
Jets fans are around the block. He’s heard many Jets coaches justify a bad season by pointing out how many close games they played and how, if they changed a game here or there, things would look much different. But, at least here, there has been no victory.
During the Robert Saleh years, New York consistently lost close games that it should have won. This is an understandable way of expressing optimism that things will get better, but the way the Jets lost this season is the same way they have lost the past several seasons: unconscionable mistakes at non-existent times, such as goal-line fumbles from Breece Hall (against Baltimore) and Braylon Allen (Miami), Xavier Gipson fumbled a game-changing kick return against the Steelers in Week 1, and Isaiah Williams Making a joke in Miami.
There have been troublesome penalties, downs and mental errors throughout the season – as well as some confusing coaching decisions. This is a young team (the Jets have given more snaps to first- and second-year players than any team in the NFL), so it makes sense to some extent.
The Glenn-led Jets have yet to give reason to believe this team will overcome those errors next year.
3. Lack of identity on defense and coordination questions
Before the season, Glenn often refused to answer questions about whether he wanted the Jets’ identity to be on offense or defense. It wasn’t hard to figure out who they were, or wanted to be offensive: a smashmouth running team. They have mostly been like that, although a poor passing game has held them back.
What is the team’s identity on defense? There is no clear answer, and this is the 13th week. This is not a defense that forces change (more on that momentarily). The jets do not constantly bother passersby. They aren’t fundamentally sound – especially in terms of tackles, where as of Monday they had the seventh-most missed tackles in the NFL. And it rarely feels like they have a schematic advantage over their opponent.
Defensive coordinator Steve Wilks arrived with a reputation as an aggressive play-caller, but blitzing rarely generated pressure early in the season, and now the Jets do not blitz at all. From Weeks 1-7, they threw on 31.6 percent of snaps – seventh-most in the NFL – but the Jets still ranked 31st in pressure rate and 26th in sack rate. Since Week 8, they have only thrown on offense 22.1 percent of the time, which ranks 25th. His pressure rate (18th) and sack rate (18th) have both increased, but not enough to make a real impact.
The defense has performed well on third down (eighth) and keeping teams out of the end zone after reaching the red zone (56.1 percent touchdown rate, which ranks 12th). But most of the bad has outweighed the good. Areas where they rank near (or near) the bottom of the league: 27th in points per drive, 27th in EPA per dropback, 32nd in turnover margin, 28th in pressure rate, 28th in sacks and 29th in first downs. They ranked 30th in completions allowing 10 or more yards, 30th in percentage of completions ending in a first down or touchdown, 28th in splash play rate, 29th in explosive pass rate, 26th in scoring defense, 30th in yards after catch per reception and 32nd in fourth down conversions.
And of course, it’s not the worst.
4. No takeaway
We’re in historic territory when it comes to the Jets’ inability to force turnovers. He has one takeaway in 11 games, and zero interceptions. (Technically, he has zero takeaways in the US. His one takeaway was a forced fumble in London against the Denver Broncos.)
how is that possible?
Linebacker Quincy Williams said, “I can’t really answer that because it’s something we talk about every day.” “It’s something we work on in practice. We see it done in games – it just hasn’t gone our way.”
Interceptions involve some level of luck – but not that much.
“I certainly don’t want to say that people aren’t in position, and I don’t believe in luck,” Wilkes said. “So, if you want to say so, we have to make our own luck.”
The Jets are the first team in NFL history to play the first 11 games of a season without a shutout. They are currently on pace for the lowest takeaway in NFL history (or at least since interceptions became an official stat in 1940). The San Francisco 49ers finished with seven takeaways in 2018 – two of them were interceptions. The 2020 Houston Texans, 2021 Jacksonville Jaguars and 2024 Jaguars finished with nine takeaways. The Jets have one.
TruMedia has tracked turnover percentage since 2000. The 2025 Jets rank 830th out of 830 teams with takeaways on 0.8 percent of opponents’ drives during that span. (The 2018 49ers ranked 829th at 3.9 percent.)
New York is starting two rookies in the secondary (cornerback Azariah Thomas and safety Malachi Moore) after losing Souce Gardner and safety Andre Cisco to a season-ending injury, but it’s not as if the defense was performing as well as it did when everyone was still here.
It’s conceivable that the Jets’ inability to generate turnovers on defense (or get consistent stops) leads to Glenn making a change to defensive coordinator — or at worst, getting more involved in defensive play-calling in 2026.
5. Lack of proven weapons
As far as their receiving corps, the Jets can only rely on Garrett Wilson in 2026, and he is coming off an injury-plagued season. John Mecchi (nine catches, 110 yards, two touchdowns) and Adonai Mitchell (three catches, 52 yards) have shown talent in two games, but no one should be confident of being anything more than a No. 3 receiver in 2026.
This is fixable. I expect the Jets to add a starting-caliber receiver in the NFL draft and free agency. Some notable receivers set to hit the open market this offseason: Deebo Samuel, Jakobi Meyers, Jaun Jennings, Wan’Dale Robinson, Alec Pierce and Romeo Doubs.
6. The hands of Breece Hall still being ignored
Perhaps one day, a Jets coach will draft Hall as a pass-catcher. Glenn spent the offseason promising that it would come, but it didn’t. Hall has been targeted four or fewer times in eight of 11 games and never more than six times. Hall ranks 24th in route runs and 11th in targets among running backs. He finished third in both categories in 2024, and eighth and first in 2023; Hall, somehow, is being used even less as a pass-catcher now than he was before.
Hall is the Jets’ most dynamic playmaker. It’s a big swing against Engstrand that he hasn’t yet figured out how to utilize him in the passing game, even if it’s fair to factor Fields’ struggles into that equation.
7. Holes on Defense
The Jets can feel good about six key players on their defense in 2026: defensive ends Will McDonald and Jermaine Johnson, cornerbacks Brandon Stephens and Jarvis Brownlee, and defensive tackles Harrison Phillips and Jovan Briggs.
Among that group, however, McDonald has been inconsistent (seven sacks, four in a game), and Briggs has never been a full-time starter. At linebacker, Jamion Sherwood is disappointed after signing a big contract, and Quincy Williams will be a free agent and looks unlikely to return. In the secondary, Moore and Thomas are still unproven. The Jets will need talent at all three levels.
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