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So much news on this front around the league, but not with the Jets . . .
Talking about assistant coaches coming and going.
What spurred me to write about this today was seeing the Giants hiring Penn State’s defensive line Sean Spencer. Sure he’s a very good coach. That school has turned out some good ones.
But it made me think how it’s good for the Jets to finally have some continuity on their assistant coaching staff, which is good for the players.
While young Giants defensive linemen like Dexter Lawrence and B.J. Hill will have to learn a different way of doing things from their new position coach, and new scheme, under coordinator Patrick Graham, the Jets’ young defensive linemen like Quinnen Williams and Kyle Phillips will have the same position coach (Andre Carter) and same scheme/coordinator (Gregg Williams).
So far the Jets only assistant coach that left, that we are aware of, is assistant secondary coach Steve Jackson, who went to Cincinnati to become the Bengals’ secondary coach.
Now there could be some changes moving forward, but it looks like most of the staff is coming back. And for an organization that has had constant turnover on the staff, this is good for the players. Continuity in the NFL is very important, and the Jets haven’t had a lot of it in recent years.
Many fans, and some reporters, including one who just left the beat, called for the Jet to fire offensive line coach Frank Pollack.
Why?
I’m no special-pleader for the man, and have no real relationship with him outside asking him questions in press conferences, but how was it his fault that the team had nine different offensive line combinations in 16 games due to injuries? How is it his fault the GM/coach forced a new center on the unit in early August, after the group had been working with somebody else the entire off-season?
And honestly, at the end of the year, Pollack had the patchwork line playing pretty well, even with two offensive tackles (Connor McDermott and Brent Qvale) playing guard.
“I think you saw it down the back stretch where we were able to protect Sam (Darnold), we did a great job picking up stunts, we did a great job picking up blitzes,” Jets GM Joe Douglas said after the season.
Some fans, and the retired reporter, called for QB coach/offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains to be fired. Not sure why? He doesn’t call the plays, Adam Gase does, and Loggains has a good reputation as a QB coach around the NFL. Did you want Same Darnold to have three QB coaches in three years? You get the sense Darnold is happy to have some continuity after two different system and staffs his first two NFL seasons.
Look, I’m not putting all the Jets’ assistant coaches in Canton, but for once, the Jets’ players will have some very strong continuity going from one season to the next, which should be helpful to the maturation process of many.
January 31, 2020
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