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One of the times Joe Douglas speaks during the year is at midseason, and that press conference took place on Wednesday
The best word to describe it might be “somber.”
We ran a clip on X of one of his presser comments, and a fan replied, “It looks like a hostage video.”
Surely he could not have been thrilled about having to do this amid a 3-6 season, another rough season, and he’s been through a few.
He’s human. It has to be eating at him.
“He’s hurting,” tweeted another fan who watched the clip.
Douglas was asked for this thoughts on Woody Johnson recently firing coach Robert Saleh.
“I think Colin Powell said it in a different arena, I serve at the pleasure of the owner, so my single goal is to help this team get to the goal of a championship,” Douglas said.
This answer is quite telling.
Douglas was hired in 2019 by Jets minority owner Christopher Johnson, who was his boss the first two years.
Woody Johnson came back from overseas in 2021 and took over as the owner again, became Douglas’ boss, and this was a game-changer.
Christopher is a hands-off owner who lets his football people do their thing. Woody is very hands-on.
Douglas signed up for one set-up and all of a sudden he was given another.
I’m sure many of you have been through the same thing – hired by one boss and he or she is replaced, and the job you were hired for changes.
Douglas contract is up after the season, and he was asked if he has talked to Woody Johnson about his future.
“Woody and I talk every day and I am not going to get into details about any of our conversations but our singular focus right now is the Cardinals and trying to improve on this record,” Douglas said.
But if they don’t make an amazing run to grab a wildcard spot, there is a chance they will have another GM next year.
And it might not just be Woody’s decision, but Douglas might want a change of scenario.
Now, if Christopher is back in the majority owner role and Woody gets another ambassadorship, maybe that will change things, but that stuff takes time to get approved.
If the Jets do make a GM change, whether it’s Woody’s decision, or Douglas has had enough, some in-house candidates could be one of their co-player personnel directors Greg Nejmeh or Jon Carr, college scouting director Jay Mondelesi and senior football advisor Phil Savage . . .
Why didn’t things work out with Mike Williams and the Jets? The wide receiver was traded to Pittsburgh early this week for a fifth-round pick.
“Mike obviously was battling coming back from a severe ACL injury,” Douglas said.
He did everything he could and obviously, not being part of OTAs, not being able to be part of a majority of training camp, just could never really get that synced up.”
That isn’t just GM-speak. It’s what happened. Williams missed the entire off-season and almost all of camp, and playing catch-up during the season, wasn’t able to truly get on the same page with Aaron Rodgers.
A big problem was that Williams is not a speed merchant anymore after myriad injuries, but is still very good on 50-50 balls. However, QBs and WRs need a lot of work to get on the same page on these kinds of passes, and it just seemed like Rodgers and Williams weren’t on the same page on some of these 50-50 throws. Now, if they had a chance to work with each other in the spring and summer, it might have been a different story . . .
One of the key players for the Jets at Arizona will be Haason Reddick. Not just because he’s a terrific edge-rusher, but because of his great feel for how to deal with Kyler Murray. Reddick and Murray were teammates in Arizona for two seasons (2019-20), so the defensive end has a good feel for the QB’s unique skill set.
Also, Reddick is 6-1, and when you are dealing with a short, faster QB who likes to make plays with his feet, it’s hard for tall ends like 6-5 Michael Clemons and 6-6 Eric Watts to get their pad level low enough to wrap him up. That should not be a problem for Reddick.
Reddick plays very low to the ground, like on his sack of C.J. Stroud late in the Jets win over Houston, where he dipped under right tackle Tytus Howard.
Another important player for the Jets in this game is linebacker Quincy Williams, who uncharacteristically has had some tackling issues the last few games. Jeff Ulbrich talked to him about it.
“There was a small element of pressing, so it was a good conversation that we have had and (Mike) Rutenberg with him this week of just playing a cleaner brand of football and those plays will come, as long as you just do your job, those plays all ways do come to
you,” Ulbrich said.
Jets need a huge game from Williams to help stymie the Cardinals’ rushing attack, especially Murray and tailback James Connor.
November 7, 2024
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