Let the football people do their thing

Let them do their thing.

Woody Johnson is a nice man. I’ve met him several times.

And he does want to win. His heart is in the right place.

But it’s best for him to not turn into Carolina’s David Tepper or Cleveland’s Jimmy Haslam and try to micromanage the football operation.

That almost never works when an owner does that.

While he owns the team, so he can do whatever he wants, the best approach in the NFL is to let your head coach and GM run the football operation.

Johnson hurt Joe Douglas’ ability to do his job recently when he said the Jets “didn’t have a backup QB” last year, when then man who was the backup, Zach Wilson, is going to be traded.

How does is help Douglas do his job effectively when he will try to trade a player after the owner said the player essentially didn’t exist last year?

When Christopher Johnson was the acting owner, and hired Douglas and head coach Robert Saleh, he said he was going to take a “light touch” as owner. In other words, let Douglas and Saleh run the football operation with little interference.

And since Christopher Johnson hired Douglas and Saleh, not Woody Johnson, sometimes you wonder if the connection Woody has with Douglas and Saleh is as strong as his brothers had.

Woody didn’t hire these men. Christopher did.

But the ownership approach has changed, so you wonder how Douglas and Saleh feel about the parameters they came in under changing.

Would one or both have taken their respective jobs if a different person was doing the interviewing? People connect differently with different people.

Woody Johnson said last week – “[Robert Saleh] is going to concentrate on offense. He has [defensive coordinator] Jeff [Ulbrich] to do the defense. We have good special teams. It’s offense, offense, offense. Get the quarterback moving. Get the line moving. Work on the run and do all that you have to do to win.”

Saleh has been in coaching since 2002, and that was the last year he coached on the offensive side of the ball. In 2002, he was entry-level offensive assistant at Michigan State. From 2003-2020, all his jobs were on the defensive side the ball, with myriad stops on the college and NFL level.

So even if the owner wants the coach more involved in the offense, is that going to make a huge difference?

And this isn’t meant to be disrespectful to Saleh, who is a knowledgable football man. Of course he should be involved with his offensive coaches and give his two cents, but not sure how he’s going to fix this offense.

So asking Saleh to get more involved in the offense really isn’t going to help much. He’s not Bill Walsh.

Aaron Rodgers returning will help.

But Christopher and Ira Axselrad need to try to convince Woody to back off the football operation a little, and follow through on Christopher’s promise to take a “light touch” with Douglas and Saleh.

The owner getting more involved in football decisions in the NFL almost never works.

February 16, 2024

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