I'm purposely leaving off Weeb Ewbank and the 1968 Super Bowl team because anyone can point to that with the obvious answer that they won it all and that's why it's #1. Plus, most of us here didn't see it so it's hard for most of us to discuss it. Still, if anyone thinks it shouldn't be there or wants to talk about it, go ahead. The entries for this poll and why I put them on: Walt Michaels, 1981: After four 500 or worse seasons including 4-12 in 1980, Michaels' 1981 Jets started 0-3. He looked to be a goner early in the year but stuck to his plan, the O-line and D-line (which became the Sack Exchange) he was developing came of age just in time. QB Richard Todd finally stayed healthy, had an offensive coordinator (Joe Walton) and started to play well, and the Jets finished 10-5-1, hosting the Wild Card Game vs Buffalo. After mistakes and turnovers got them in a hole, the Jets rallied and almost pulled out a win, kind of a microcosm of the entire season. Bill Parcells, 1997: Replacing Rich Kotite's 1-15 disaster in 1996, Parcells went 9-7 with almost the same exact roster. What jumped out most was that we suddenly had timeouts at the end of halves and games when we needed them, the special teams were better and penalties were down. Also, the good young players were put in position to make plays. Aaron Glenn was used in the return game to get him more chances to make a play, Keyshawn Johnson was able to use his size over the middle instead of tiptoeing around the sidelines. The season ended in disappointment though, a loss at Detroit in a game that would have gotten us into the playoffs. Oddly, a few bad coaching moves by Parcells cost us the game, which may hurt him in this poll. Herm Edwards, 2002: The Jets last division title, a lot of credit went to Chad Pennington, and rightly so, but Herm Edwards gets credit for a couple of things. First, he made the move to Pennington at 1-3, replacing popular and (up to then) successful Vinny Testaverde, who led the Jets to 10 wins and the playoffs the year before and previously the AFC Championship game. When the move to Pennington didn't work right away, Herm rallied the Jets at two critical junctures during the season. At 2-5 the infamous "you play to win the game!" rant leading up to a big upset win in San Diego, and after losses to the Raiders and Bears in December seemingly left them for dead, the Jets went into Foxboro and handily beat the defending Super Bowl champs, New England. Then they beat 12-3 Green Bay who was playing for a bye, 42-10, winning the AFC East. Then of course the big win over Peyton Manning and the Colts, 41-0 in the playoffs. Rex Ryan, 2009: A rookie coach taking over a team that had fallen apart at the end of 2008 and lost Brett Favre at QB. Went in with a rookie QB, Mark Sanchez, had the guts to start him, built the league's #1 defense in his first year, using most of the same players, bringing in a few Ravens with him but losing Kris Jenkins in October. Also used the O-line and RBs he inherited and let Shotty do his thing as OC, rallying the Jets from 4-6 to the playoffs and ultimately the AFC Championship game. For the purpose of this poll, it's the season individually, not what the coach's career overall. Unless you want to relate it to the season being discussed, for example both Michaels and Parcells made the AFC Championship game the year after what I think was their most impressive coaching job. Of course in Ryan's case we only have the one year to go with. My choice is going to be Walt Michaels. These days he'd be gone before he ever got to 1981, but he built that team from the ground up and just when it looked like he was about done the Jets became one of the best teams in the league, only shooting themselves in the foot in the playoff game. You?
If you did this poll in 2030 I guarantee you somebody not on the list would win it. That's because most people will only vote for what they saw. Rex Ryan did a great job of taking a 9-7 team last year and going 9-7 with it. If he'd figured out that he had a rookie QB and a fantasizing OC a little bit earlier then he might have won a game or two the Jets didn't deserve too. He did have a couple of great games in the playoffs though. That's a two game streak. If it makes him best Jets coach since Weeb all that says is that the Jets have blown chunks for most of their existence. Oops, forgot to vote: Bill Parcells from 1997 to 1999. No Jet's coach other than Weeb has ever had a 3 year run like that. 1997 took a 1-15 team the previous year that had won a total of 4 games over two years and was in playoff contention until the last few games. 1998 took the NFL's doormat two years before to the AFC Championship Game. 1999 took an team with no NFL caliber QB's after halftime of the first game to 8-8. That's just a ridiculously good three year run. If he'd had a real GM instead of himself the Jets would have won a Super Bowl in there somewhere.
He was a piece of shit in the season finale in 2000 and was up and down in 2001. I wanted Pennington to take over in November of 2001. Testaverde's sucky play was hurting the team. I know I have debated this issue with nyjunc and I think with you, too. Maybe instead of posting similar stuff again, we would do better to find the old threads and copy and paste stuff.
The case you could make against Rex Ryan was that if the Colts didn't lay down, then the entire playoff run is a mute point. Still, I choose Rex Ryan 2009. For me this was the most special season of being a jet fan. I was bit young to really remember the 1998 team. The 2002 team was a great job by Herm, but the last game leaves a bad taste in the mouth of jet fans. Winning two road playoff games with a rookie QB is what really stands out to me. The other thing is that I feel like when you get to the AFC Championship Game it really is a HUGE jump, even more so than getting to the divisional round. The thing that stands out to me about the job Rex did this year is really in the Charger game. I think many of us felt the jets could win, but personally I didn't think the jets would win playing JET FOOTBALL. Ground and pound and shutting down the chargers passing game really surprised me. I speak more from my heart though.
I thought Parcells' 98 season was the most impressive for our franchise. The move to Vinny, good halftime adjustments all season, added B Cox, Mawae, C Martin and Turd Ferguson. Best record in team history at 12-4 and AFCCG.
I edited it was a long post about how Herm Edwards sucks......but forget it. The Jets have Rex, I think its time to forget him.
From that list- Parcells. From 1-15 to 9-7 is more impressive than what any of the other coaches did.
He still led us to 10 wins in 2001 including 7 of the last 10 and our first ever win in Oakland to clinch a playoff spot. Vinny wasn't the only problem early in 2002 though. We had 4/5 of the OL either out(Szott) or playing hurt(Mawae, Thomas, Fabini), Curtis got hurt in game 1 and it was another month before he was effectrive again, we had 6 new starters on D but once we started to get healthy and Chad came in and gave us that jolt of energy we took off. Herm has his haters on here but one thing I think we can all agree on was he could motivate and keep a team together. In all our postseason seasons we hid adversity and he kept the team together until we ultimately righted the ship. It's hard to vote against that 2002 season BUT we were so awful prior to 1997 that I have to vote 1997. We had alot more talent than a 1-15 team has and we know BP is smart and doesn't walk into a situation w/o talent or high picks to work w/(w/ us he had both) but to turn those losers around itno winners in one season was incredible so I vote 1997.
Most pf Herm's players in 2001 had been coached up by Parcells. If Herm was a good coach he would have had more success in KC.
Most people on this board are too young. Michaels is the choice without question. That 1981 team came out of nowhere and was playing as well as any team in the NFL the last 10 or so games.
Has to be Parcells because he took a team of perennial losers and turned them into a real team. How soon we forget all those years of futility before he came in and rebuilt the entire organization. As for coaching, I always thought that the '99 season was his best. We had lost our starting QB in the first game, waisted time on Rick Myer before giving Ray Lucas the reigns and yet STILL played hard enough (the team NEVER quit) to almost (we were the hottest team towards the end of that season and I doubt many teams would have liked to face us if we did make the playoffs) made the playoffs that year. Some of you youngsters might not remember but it was pretty bleak for a LONG time before Parcells arrived and I dare say that the success we have been getting these past 10 years are a direct result of the changes he put in place.
The Jets were expected by most people to compete for the wild card spot in 1980. from Paul Zimmerman in the '80 SI football preview issue- Wel, the team went 4-12 and that lowered expectations for 1981. After consecutive 8-8 seasons to close out the 1970s, the Jets 1980 season was a classic case of taking a step back before taking two steps forward. 1980 was the step back year and 1981 was the big year with the playoff berth. I think the 1980 team was better than the 1996 team. In 1997, Bill Parcells had to turn around the entire culture of the team.
I loved what Parcells did but voted for Michaels because what he did with the sack exchange went on for years after.
Yeah, but the thread starter is clearly asking about the best single season coaching job as opposed to best coaching over a period of years.
Hindsight proves you to be correct, but in reality no coach, especially a rookie coach with a veteran team, is going to replace a proven veteran like Vinny with a novice like Chad in the stretch run. Vinny and the Jets won games at Indy and Oakland to make the playoffs, and had they just beaten 3-13 f**king Buffalo would have gotten the division and a bye. Also, Vinny did put up a couple of TDs vs the vaunted Raven defense (in Baltimore) early in that 2000 finale, which no other team could touch all the way through the Super Bowl. He did kill us later, namely the INT going into the half. I had you penciled in for one of the few Herm votes. My bad. I almost voted for Herm myself. You're probably right, but I felt it should be on the poll, even if enough people here didn't see it for him to win the poll. As someone who saw the 1968 season, do you have any memories of something Ewbank did or said that stands out? Maybe he benched somebody or threw a chair? We all have read about Namath, the Heidi game, the Oakland AFL title game at Shea etc, but aside from being a well regarded coach I don't remember reading much about Ewbank that season.
This is a good point, but to me--and I said it then--Parcells hurt us by sticking with Mirer for so long. When he did go to Lucas Lucas got hurt and we had to go back to Mirer for two more weeks, so maybe it didn't matter. But that was overall a good job, it just took too long to regroup. Losing Wayne Chrebet in the pre-season finale and Leon Johnson in the opener didn't help either, but that was a very talented team who just took too long to recover.
