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They have a PR issue here, and it will be interesting to see if they can get out of it . . .
What I’m talking about is the Jets’ organization, and the PR issue related to how many fans view their head coach.
Look, I don’t have polling date on his favorability rating with the Jets Nation, but you are a living in a cave if you think coach has a high “Q Rating” with the team’s fan base right now.
Fair or unfair, it didn’t take the Jets’ head coach long to become very unpopular with a lot of the team’s fans.
Obviously things didn’t get off to the best start for the Jets coach a year ago January at his opening press conference, when he had issues with his eyes. There are photos all over the internet of Gase’s wild eyes in the press conference.
Look, I don’t like writing about Gase’s eyes. It’s pretty low road stuff to be getting into how somebody looks, but the reality of this situation, is this press conference was a bad start for the coach. As the old expression goes, “First impressions are lasting ones.”
And then you had the battles last spring between Gase and Mike Maccagnan, leading to the firing of the general manager in May.
Then you had the Jets getting off to an awful start to the season, and finishing 7-9.
You throw a bunch of things in a hopper and the coach doesn’t seem particular popular with many in the fan base.
How do the Jets get out of this PR quagmire?
Because it can’t be easy selling tickets or marketing a team with a coach that seems pretty unpopular. People will say “winning” will help, but there aren’t any games until next September, so how do you deal with the long off-season coming up, all the tickets to sell, all the marketing to do.
I asked a former team executive, now in the media, how he would handle this.
He said he would make Joe Douglas the focal point this off-season. Not a bad idea. Their GM seems to be pretty popular with the fan base.
And maybe they should avoid pushing the coach on social media for a while, and let things calm down a little.
Yesterday, they posted a video of Gase wired for sound on Twitter with this message above it: “Hear more of Coach Gase mic’d up in the season finale of One Jets Drive.”
They might want to avoid this for a while, because this was like a batting practice fastball for the Gase-haters on Twitter.
You should have seen the vitriol in the comment section. A few examples:
“Fans hate this man. Are you so out of touch with your fan base?” tweeted 76 Train.
“No one wants to hear that bum,” tweeted Yeet Rangers.
“Why don’t you just fire him?” tweeted Izabella Luiza.
“Fire him already,” tweeted Alvaro.
“Who the hell wants to hear that? Fire him already,” tweeted Ryan Mondo.
You get the idea.
Look, I’m not looking to be negative and I don’t have any skin in the game.
I just cover whomever the coach is.
I am just dealing with the reality of this situation.
Fair or unfair, the Jets have a major PR problem related to their coach.
How are they going to get out of this mess?
This is above my paygrade. I’m not Howard Rubenstein. I’m not a PR guru.
But I will say the former league executive’s advice to the Jets is a smart.
Promote the heck out of Douglas the next few months, and stay low with the head coach.
January 14, 2019
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