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He checked a major box.
He’s called plays before.
Talking about the Jets hiring of Nathaniel Hackett as offensive coordinator.
They knew they couldn’t replace a first-time play-caller with a first-time play-caller.
Hackett has called plays at various places, including with the Jacksonville Jaguars, Buffalo Bills and Syracuse.
He had the offensive coordinator title with the Green Bay Packers from 2019-21, but head coach Matt LaFleur called the plays.
Not saying Hackett is Bill Walsh, but has plenty of experience calling plays.
It wouldn’t have made a lot of sense to fire Mike LaFleur and replace him with another guy, where it would be guesswork on whether he could call plays effectively.
“It was important to get an experienced guy,” said Robert Saleh on Thursday after the Hackett hiring.
Hackett was hired as head coach of the Denver Broncos in 2022, but didn’t last the season, so some might question this hire, but Saleh said, “He got to Denver because of his work as an offensive coordinator.”
So maybe he’s not a great head coach, but is a good offensive coordinator. Some guys just aren’t made to be head coaches.
During a media Zoom call with Saleh, there were some technical issues, and one writer cracked, “This isn’t a good omen for Nate Hackett.”
I don’t think it will make a difference.
Some people will now connect the Jets to Aaron Rodgers, because Hackett worked with him in Green Bay. If the Jets are willing to pay Rodgers $50 million this year, and send a couple of first-round picks to Green Bay for the soon-to-be 40-year-old QB, that is perhaps a possibility. Woody Johnson likes to make big splashes.
But Hackett’s connection to Rodgers should have nothing to do with this hire, and I don’t think it did. A big part of it was Saleh worked with Hackett before (in Jacksonville), and there is familiarity, as there is with new offensive line coach Keith Carter, who worked with Saleh in Seattle.
Some would argue that sometimes it’s good to go outside your comfort zone, like the Giants Brian Daboll did with coordinators Mike Kafka (offense) and Wink Martingdale (defense), who he didn’t work with before hiring.
Carter replaces John Benton, who is a good offensive line coach, but had a DUI. In March, Benton was pulled over by the State Police around midnight on I-287 for a motor vehicle violation. The police suspected he was under the influence, and he was arrested and charged with DUI.
That drinking and driving contributed to the Jets moving on from him. He has a good reputation as an O-Line coach, and was the San Francisco 49ers’ line coach when they went to the Super Bowl during the 2019 season.
Carter worked under coordinator Arthur Smith in Tennessee, and Smith is from the Shanahan coaching tree, so he’s familiar with the scheme. Smith left to become the Atlanta head coach, but they kept running a lot of his concepts. And before that Carter worked under Titans coordinator Matt LaFleur, who comes from the same tree, and obviously Hackett worked under Matt LaFleur in Green Bay.
So expect the Jets to run a very similar system as they ran under Mike LaFleur, but they expect Hackett to run it better, with his experience.
You get the sense that Saleh wanted to stay in a Shanahan-type system, which a couple of years ago he called, “The best scheme in the world.”
January 26, 2023
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