Let's Talk About Quinnen

Edition #728

Good morning ☕

If we lose this Sunday to the New England Patriots who just lost by 16 points to a 1-5 Jaguars unit, it may be time to fold the team.

Instead of moving on to draft news here at TJW, we may have to completely shift our focus. Maybe gothic architecture, Saturday Night Live skits or baseball card collecting.

Because if we’re talking draft before Halloween again, I’m not sure anyone will have the stomach to read it.

But, we’re Jets fans. Were gluttons for punishment. We keep coming back for more, it’s like a drug, an unhealthy obsession. I don’t mind losing, I love the game more than I love winning. But it’s the way we find new ways to lose that’s depressing. And while I don’t need a dynasty like the 2000s Patriots, the 2020s Chiefs, the 70s Steelers or the 60s Packers…I would like a playoff appearance every no and then to get excited about.

The only people watching that Jets/Patriots game are the fans of the teams, maybe a little time out of the limelight is what this team needs. Maybe they’ll be more to come, as if things stay the same I can see the Jets getting flexed out of primetime down the stretch.

Grab your morning coffees ☕, or bourbons 🥃 (we are talking Jets after all), and let’s get going.

• Aaron Rodgers believes that the Jets need to adjust their mindset when it comes to how they win, pointing to the history of the team always relying on defense…at least recently - "In New York, good, bad or indifferent, for the last long stretch, it's been win with defense, a lot of defensive head coaches, and it's kind of been at times in spite of the offense. We saw last year a lot, our defense would hold them to 13 points and lose, 12 points and lose, 17 points and lose. And offensively I think we need to adjust that mindset. Instead of like 'Hey, let's go play well,' it's 'Hey, let's win the game on offense.' "

• Interim head coach Jeff Ulbrich is trying to teach a new mindset, a new approach - "Brick talks about heart-mind-fist, " Rodgers said. "Heart is why you play, for your teammates and the love of the game. Fist is the violence part of it, controlled violence in a collision sport. But the mind, the mindset is so very important. And I think if we can start to think about things in that way ... let's go win it on offense, let's not hang around and wait for the defense to get us a stop or a big turnover, or teams to have an impact play. Let's go win this game on offense and have the mindset of scoring on every possession."

• Remember how we’ve been talking about how players are trying to do too much and not doing their primary jobs which is impacting gaps, well Quincy spoke about it yesterday - "The biggest thing to fix for us right now is gap discipline," Williams said. "We have been playing teams that don't shy away from the run game and with that being said – the teams we play going forward aren't going to shy away from it. We need to have everyone populating to the ball and be focused on the small details."

• Quincy also believes that Reddick will be able to help the team in run defense, just by being disciplined he’ll help the team - "I am very excited that [Reddick] is here," Williams said. "I know that he is very excited to get into the playbook so that he can start helping us pick up some W's. He is that can help us do that. He is good with the pass rush and in run defense."

• Robert Saleh is back on the sideline, he’ll be working with long-time friend Matt LaFleur over in Green Bay. He’ll be working with the offense giving them suggestions based on how he’d scheme against them, which I’ve always thought is a good idea - "Yeah, I think it helps," LaFleur said. "Having a defensive mind talking offense and helping us with things he might be able to see, kind of similar scheme stuff, things the defense might be looking for, it helps."

  He added, "I think he's got an elite defensive mind. But that's why I want him on the offensive side, so he can help us attack the defenses."

• CBS had a clarifier on the agreement between the Jets and Haason Reddick - Reddick will make a minimum of $8.7M which is the rest of his base salary. He then has $5.34 million in performance based incentives. So in total he could earn $14.05 million this year, which is just below his original $14.25 million 2024 salary. But if you look at the performance based incentives I’m not sure he’s getting close to that $14.05 million mark

  • He has an escalator for his sack production. $500k for getting 8 which rises to $1 million if he hits 9, $1.5 million for 10 and $2.5 million for 12.

  • $500,000 if he makes the Pro Bowl

  • $791,628 if he plays in 40% of the remaining defensive snaps

  • $2 million if he’s on the active roster and the Jets make the Super Bowl

I wanted to put this in it’s own little section as I think it’s pretty notable that a guy who had been here for less than a week felt the need to stand up after the loss and talk to the team about their energy and how they support and celebrate each other

Davante Adams was asked about his speech yesterday and here’s what he had to say and I’ve got to admit…I’ve got a lot of time for it.

"It's not my personality to see something that's not right and just let it go on. There was a lack of energy and urgency out there, and it was apparent. I had reservations about speaking up too early and being too vocal too early, but I said, 'f that,' because we don't have time. I wouldn't have been able to sleep if I didn't speak up on it. I've gotten a lot of good feedback. A lot of these guys in here haven't been anywhere else where they've won and had that urgency that it takes to be a good team. This team being so talented, it's a waste to have a dead sideline like that. I'm not here to be the savior. I'm here to help shift this culture more than anything. I'm trying to enforce a winning mindset on these guys."

A lot of things haven’t panned out as we imagined they would.

We never thought we’d be sitting here at 2-5.
We never thought we’d have a new head coach.
We never thought we’d be questioning the defense
We never thought we’d be questioning our QB.

At least I didn’t.

But here we are in week eight with a must-win game on the docket, and when I say must-win I mean last chance saloon.

If the Jets walk out of Foxborough with a loss on Sunday afternoon and head to face the Texans at 2-6, the season is over.

The conversation will shift to whether we’ll be in the running for the number one pick in the draft, and that’s about as depressing as you can get for a “win-now” team.

With that embarrassing loss to the Steelers the vaunted Jets defense has fallen out of the top 10 in scoring defense, sitting 11th at 20.7 points allowed per game.

And while they’re still inside the top 10 in terms of total yards allowed and some other key metrics, they’re now outside the top 10 in opponent 3rd down conversation percentage allowed (34.09%) and opponent red-zone touchdown scoring percentage allowed (54.55%).

The defense are trending in the wrong direction and the offence isn’t doing enough to cover the difference.

Some of the downturn can directly be attributed to injuries. Losing Jermaine Johnson was huge, losing Chuck Clark, D. J. Reed and Michael Carter II were key losses.

We knew this defence had talent, but what we didn’t know was how the depth held up. Apparently the answer to that is not very well at all.

A quote from Aaron Rodgers got me thinking: