Many point to Zach Wilson and that this season hinges squarely on him and although that is partly true, I actually put more of an emphasis on this 2nd year coaching staff. They have to help elevate these players to the next level! I am not suggesting that we will be firing coaches after this season, but if they don't get some of these players to "pop", that might be cause for concern. What are your expectations for the coaching staff? To me, wins and losses is a bare bones discussion. I want to see 2nd, 3rd, 4th year players take it to another level. That comes from excellent teaching and development.
Yeah. Some don't do it as good as others. Tons of pressure on the coaches to get this young squad to improve.
There were a few articles last year that there was an emphasis on hiring a CS that could develop young players as well as hiring more assistant coaches to have more coaches for young players. In regards to developing ZW Gregg Knapp was a big part of the CS and their plan for his development. All the injuries and his passing slowed his development. Cavanaugh did not seem to work and I give them credit for bringing in Beck especially since he could then work on what the CS wants him to work on all off season. I love that they upgraded the team around Zach so hopefully the focus will be on developing him slowly and building his confidence. In regards to your win expectations I strongly disagree. 4 to 5 wins but playing more competitive games seems to be about right. 11 to 12 new starters, extremely young team, facing 7 top 8 defenses the 1st 10 games, being underdogs in our 1st 11 games. Progress is not going from really bad to suddenly winning progress is just playing competitive football. There is a learning curve for young teams. Learning to win happens after they learn to play competitively. For example the 1977 team was a much improved team but posted a 3rd straight 3-11 season. They played competitive football with the wins coming the year after they started playing competitive football in 1978. Taking games into the 4th quarter and learning how to win is progress. 7 or 8 wins sounds like crazy talk to me. This season is about seeing the offense and defense develop. Seeing the OL stay healthy and grow together. Seeing AVT develop into a top guard. Seeing Moore, Davis and Wilson stay healthy. Seeing our defense develop a pass rush and be a top 25 defense. See ZW play with more confidence, get the ball out a lot faster, show more consistent mechanics and improve his accuracy. Wins/losses are not important. This team is not going to the playoffs but they do need to take games into the 4th quarter, stay healthy and see growth from our young players particularly ZW. But, in what is essentially year one of the rebuild (as last year had so many injuries it was hard to field a team most weeks) wins and losses really do not matter.
Look at what Buck Showalter has done for the Mets after the rookie manager debacles. I'm not sure this CS is experienced enough at being successful as a group to teach these kids anything as they're all learning as they go. The CS has an idea of what they want to do and what to look for BUT, what they don't have is a record of success to show for their efforts. We'll see what happens this year though as I think they realize they have to show improvement or the honeymoon is over.
I think coaching is part of it, but I think the players will progress due to continuity also. Experience, continuity, & coaching will play a big part in the progress of the team.
Penny, you make a very important point. Normally, a young player (rookie, sophomore, etc.) comes in and learns a lot by watching the older players around them. Most locker rooms already have a veteran culture that sets expectations in terms of work ethic, attitude, etc., and a rookie looks around, takes stock, and understands what they need to do to succeed. When a rookie isn't doing something right, there's a roster full of veterans there to smack them in the back of the head and say, "hey, here's how we do that." Whether it's a particular blocking technique or just "hey, keep pushing those weights until you get to failure on each set," the rookies should be getting constant veteran verbal feedback and should constantly have veterans setting the example. That doesn't happen when you have a very young team. It's like a bunch of 12 year old boys talking about sex -- no one is learning anything. The rookies may look around and get a very wrong impression about what level of effort and intensity is necessary to be successful, and they can develop bad habits that aren't constantly corrected by veterans showing them how it's done. The 2022 Jets will be one of the youngest teams in the NFL. More than half of our offensive starters will probably be in their first or second year in the NFL. JD did a great job bringing in vets like Tomlinson/Uzomah/Conklin to help, but the number of star veterans on offense is very slim. It's on the coaches to fill in the gaps. That's a tall order, but that's why Saleh is getting the big bucks. The coaches need to be out there doing all the culture-enhancing/expectation-setting things that all those missing veterans would otherwise provide. The good news is that all reports suggest the young guys have a really strong work ethic. CJ did an interview recently in which he mentioned how impressed he was with how hard the young guys are working, and that he hadn't seen a work ethic like that among young players in a long time. That's awesome, because I suspect that's one of the most difficult things to get into a young player's head. But there are a lot of other things, and we have to hope that the coaching staff can fill in where the veterans are missing.
From what I've seen...and I don't want to jinx it... Joe Douglas has picked up players with solid character. That alone should make coaching this squad a bit easier... and fits right in with Saleh's oft-said mantra of team lifting up individual players. We've all seen teams implode around "super star" players with a "me first" attitude... fuck that. A young skilled & motivated team with a few good locker room types mixed in is a good foundation for success.
The success of this team depends on the development of one player, Zach Wilson. The CS (Saleh and Lefleur) has to raise his game by at least two notches. I say two because he was a disappointment as a rookie, that's negative one notch. That's what this CS has to concentrate on. Everything else will fall into place.
Actually, I think the greatest teacher will be the schedule itself. It's not an easy schedule to open the season. As an old Jets fan (I saw their one SB win), it's been a while since I was lookin'-forward to a season. Aside from how Joe Douglas has transformed the team, a pretty tough schedule poses a great challenge/opportunity, for all the younguns to be thrown into the fire. They'll quickly grow up... or blow up! A great learning year... ...of course, it's all contingent upon Zach choosing to win, over being "the Man." He has talent around him... will he see it and work with it, or will he choose, as last season to try to do too much? Coaches can only do so much... it's up to the players to push themselves to be champions.
The Coaching Staff was hired by the GM and can be just as easily fired by the GM FTMR the former NFL cellar dwellers Browns started to make big strides after they replaced Freddie Kitchens with Stefanski Anything can happen ..right?
Not as a HC but Saleh was on the staff in Seattle when they rebuilt that team, he was also on the staff at Jacksonville when they rebuilt and made their run and was on the staff of the 49ers when they rebuilt that team. Saleh know what a successful rebuild looks like. Can he orchestrate the rebuild as the head guy remains to be seen. Our coordinators are pretty green but THE OC has pedigree and demonstrated some success last season. The DC we wills ee what he does with a semi-healthy team and a ton of new weapons. This team wins less games if the defense is ranked last again.
we do have vets at all the positions really to teach the younger players QB flacco RB coleman WR davis O-line fant (and now tomlinson) TE uzomah D-line lawson, curry, Q LBer mosley CB none S joyner so really outside of CB we have that already with our young team
Don't count on experienced mentorship for Zach. "I'm never trying to be that guy, I don't know, I don't necessarily see veteran players as always being the best mentors, including myself. When it comes down to it I'm a team guy, I have great relationships, whatever role it is I'm going to do it. I don't necessarily think bringing in a veteran quarterback means he's going to be a great mentor." -Joe Flacko
Think I’ve said his before but 4-5 wins is simply not acceptable and everyone will be at risk of a firing if that happens.
TIL that this is year 1 of our rebuild. We got 4 top 36 picks and spent 90 million in FA. But we should be happy with 4-5 wins?
I don't think wins/losses are a good measure of progress at this early stage in the rebuild. A team simply does not go from being completely awful to suddenly winning skipping over all the phases in between such as learning to play competitive football, learning to win and eventually winning. The best example I can give is the 1977 Jets. A lot of parallels from that team to this team. On paper they had the same record at 3-11 for the 3rd straight season. But, if one looked closer they were a vastly improved team with emerging developing young talent that played tough competitive football all year. The wins lagged behind and did not come until 1978. But, make no mistake 1977 was when substantial progress began. This team is similar. Young and developing. Unfortunately in year one of the rebuild the team suffered significant injuries and did not have the depth to field replacement level talent. No one is on the hot seat this year. The FO office has a plan and a great process in place. It may or not work out but the process and plan is still sound. No ones job is in jeopardy will even be hot until 2024. After the last 11 years I understand and feel the frustration. I don't know if the FO plan will work. Going from losing to winning is difficult but their process has been solid and the best we have seen from a Jets FO since the late 70s. No guarantees and as Jets fans we should always expect the worse. But we should also have some hope and excitement as the FO has done a great job in giving us a chance to turn things around. I just think wins/losses is a poor measure of measuring success this early in the rebuild. I would be happy to see the Jet games competitive after the 1st quarter, happy to see us play well against good teams, happy to have a top 25 offense and defense and happy to see our young players develop. Screw the wins and losses. I want to see ZW get the ball out signigantly faster, show more consistent mechanics, play with confidence and show more accuracy. After the last 3 years I would be thrilled to see our team not have the worst injuries in the league and stay relatively healthy. We each could likely write a laundry list many pages long of ways this team could improve over the last few years. No offense, but I think we are setting ourselves up for dissapointment if we are going to judge the teams progress by wins/losses.
