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As some of you know who have read this site over the years, I don’t get to heavy into this schedule stuff.
So often when the schedule comes out, analysis is done about how favorable or unfavorable a schedule is, but a lot of that stuff goes by the wayside once the season starts, in a sport with a 100 percent injury rate.
Everyone gets hurt, obviously to different degrees, and some can play through things, others can’t if the injuries are too severe.
So when it comes to football schedules, it’s not who you play, but when you play them.
Like when the Jets played Tampa Bay last year, and the Buccaneers had four starting offensive linemen out.
Did we know when the schedule came out that 4/5ths of the Tampa Bay line was going to be out?
Now Tampa Bay still won, which was shocking, and that is a big reason the Jets needed to blow up their defense this offseason, but you get the point.
Who knows what the state of these teams will be when you play them?
That is why I don’t go too crazy with schedule-stuff.
But with that being said, schedule releases are a lot of fun, so I don’t want to be a party-pooper. Here are some thoughts on the Jets’ schedule.
Taking a 30,000-foot view of the schedule, there is no excuse for the Jets not to be in wildcard playoff contention this year late in the season. In other words, still in the playoff conversation in early December.
I’m not talking about competing to win their division, but just hanging around at 7-6, 6-7, something like that, when the home stretch of the season starts.
First of all, on paper, after some heavy-lifting this off-season by Darren Mougey in the draft and free agency, their roster seems much better than last year. I know the game isn’t won on paper, but there is no doubt their depth is much-improved. Their depth was no good last year, and this problem reared its head in a few regards. Obviously, when injuries hit starters, but also at rotational positions like D-Line. When the backup came in, that was sometimes problematic. Also, the problem with poor depth is if a starter isn’t playing well, it’s harder to bench them because you don’t have a quality option to turn to.
Mougey did a really nice job of loading this roster with quality depth. Instead of spending most of the cap space on a couple of stars, he spread the money around, signing a lot of good starters, but also solid depth players, with the latest example being the addition of veteran wide receiver Tim Patrick.
So they have a much better roster, and you couple that with perhaps the most important off-season additions, the hiring of one of football’s top offensive minds, Frank Reich, to call the plays of that side of the ball, there is absolutely no excuse for them to be out of the wild card discussion in early December.
Look, as I said before, we won’t know the state of these teams, injury-wise, until the week of each game, but let’s just assume they are pretty much in one piece when the Jets face them (and so are the Jets for that matter), teams like Tennessee, Cleveland, Miami (twice), Las Vegas, Arizona and Minnesota are eminently beatable. So that is seven winnable games right there.
And really don’t think Green Bay, Detroit, or Chicago are juggernauts either.
As for New England, who on earth knows what to expect from them with all the distractions they are dealing with, and a much tougher schedule than last year?
With a much more talented defense than last year, and Reich calling plays for a solid game-manager like Geno Smith, and myriad offensive weapons and a solid offensive line, and if Chris Banjo’s special teams are good again like last year, there is no reason they Jets can’t go 9-8 or 10-7 (two of Smith’s seasonal records as the Seattle Seahawks starter).
May 15, 2026
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