Content available exclusively for subscribers
Some thoughts on the announcement today . . .
I’m talking about the Jets announcing their new coaching staff.
First off, I want to start with something I might have mentioned before.
The Jets have three top-shelf department heads – Adam Gase (offense), Gregg Williams (defense) and Brant Boyer (special team’s). Jets fans should be excited about this.
Obviously Gase is the head coach, but he’s also going to run the offense and we all know he has a fertile offensive mind.
Williams has one of the top defensive minds on the planet, and I think he should be a head coach, but that is another story. If you are going to tell me all these copy-cat 30-something hires are better head coaching candidates than Williams, I would debate you on that.
Clearly Williams “Bounty-gate” deal in New Orleans is hurting his ability to get a head coaching job. That is quite obvious.
So the Jets are very fortunate to get a defensive coordinator of this magnitude.
And we all know what an amazing job Brant Boyer did as special team’s coach last year.
This is one of the best trio of offensive, defensive and special team department heads the Jets have had in quite some time. The Jets should have some excellent game plans.
And on special teams, Boyer’s assistant, Jeff “Hammer” Hammerschmidt, has been retained. These guys go way back with each other and work well together. They’re both Arizona Wildcats.
The hiring of Jim Bob Cooter as running back coach is intriguing. Cooter was a rising star in Detroit as an offensive coordinator, but got thrown under the bus after last season because Matt Stafford was inconsistent. The year before Cooter was universally praised for his work with Stafford.
But to add Cooter to the Jets’ offensive laboratory of ideas is a coup for Gang Green. Jets offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains and Cooter are two guys who get a great deal of respect around the NFL for their offensive creativity. You throw them in the room with Gase, and expect some cutting edge game plans from Gang Green moving forward.
Frank Pollack is a terrific offensive line coach.
I’m not going to go down the whole list today, but just want to mention Joe Vitt, hired as outside linebackers coach. As most of you know Vitt is Gase’s father-in-law. He also worked with Williams in New Orleans.
Vitt is a Jersey-guy, so this is a great way to wrap up his career in his home state. While he’s been coaching out of the area for a while, he still has a Jersey Shore house, where Adam, his wife and their kids, would visit every year before training camp.
Also, the Jets retained Dennard Wilson as secondary coach, which might surprise some people since the Jets struggled defending the pass the last couple of years. But he’s got a good reputation around the NFL, and some of his issues were related to some bad player personnel decisions by the Jets’ front office. He needs more instinctive corners to compliment Trumaine Johnson (who obviously isn’t going anywhere and his issues aren’t instinct related, but speed). The Jets have too many other corners who lack sophisticated eyes in coverage.
February 8, 2019
Premium will return by 9:30 pm on Monday.