How These New Mantras Can Help the Jets This Preseason and Beyond
With a new coaching regime, new expectations, and new mantras, the New York Jets are entering the 2025 season preaching patience. Over the last few weeks of training camp leading up to the first slate of NFL preseason games this weekend, the Justin Fields-led offense wasn’t giving much to be excited about. Despite an entirely different offense, the Jets were seeing the same old results from years past. While there’s definitely room for concern, new head coach Aaron Glenn is consistently preaching that it’s too early to be worried. In past seasons, the offense has looked tremendous during training camp, but the transition to the regular season has never matched up. Hopefully, with a different approach, the Jets are able to rewrite the script.
This season is already different from anything under former head coach Robert Saleh for a number of reasons. Recently, a number of players have admitted during press conferences that Saleh lost the locker room, leaving players to take matters into their own hands. Safety Tony Adams admitted that “the last coaches preached discipline and we didn’t listen.” Several other players, like Alijah Vera-Tucker, Breece Hall, and Garrett Wilson, have also discussed how players should be held accountable. Saleh lost the locker room and had a hard time holding players accountable for their mistakes, leading to the team being a league leader in penalties and sloppy play on both sides of the ball. While it’s certainly too early to crown Glenn as a total game-changer in the locker room, it’s admirable to see how he is holding players accountable in practice before the real games start.
In the past, the Jets sat most of their starters during the preseason slate. Last season, Aaron Rodgers did not see the field before the regular season began, and several other offensive starters saw minimal time. This season, Glenn is making sure that the starters are on the field, giving them the chance to gain chemistry with each other before the regular season begins. While there is a risk in doing this, a push like this from Glenn shows fans that the Jets are going all in this season. While only time will tell if the Jets can take this new mentality and improve upon what they put on the field last season, so far, everything from their new coach is looking promising.
