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The people who claim they know who are the favorites for the Jets jobs (HC and GM) are probably just guessing.
Some fans were upset when ESPN’s Dan Graziano said he thinks the Pittsburgh Steelers offensive coordinator Arthur Smith is going to get the HC job.
One thing you must understand is that if you are an “insider” you have to come up with stuff, whether it’s there or not.
It’s like if you are a corn farmer, you have to keep producing corn. That is your job.
Graziano’s statement is likely more a hot take than a sourced-based opinion.
The people saying that Aaron Glenn is the leading candidate, are also likely guessing, as well as being driven by other things not related to football.
People ask me who I think they are going to hire and I say, “Right now, I have no flippin’ idea.”
And I’m not going to pretend I do.
The other day the Jets’ preeminent Jets insider, SNY’s Connor Hughes, announced: “Rex Ryan I heard is completely out, that is not gonna happen with the Jets”
This is an example of why he is the top Jets insider. The sheer volume of his Jets scoops is quite impressive. Nobody else on the beat had this or has reported it since Hughes’ announcement. He’s on another level.
But I have an issue with this information getting out.
It’s well-documented that the Jets are interviewing myriad candidates for their GM and head coaching positions.
Why would it leak out that one is out of the running?
Whatever you think of Rex as a candidate, is it fair to say he’s out of it and all the other candidates are still in it?
Isn’t it better protocol to decide to hire a head coach and that is when the other candidates find out they didn’t get the job?
Are we going to now see it come out that this person is out and that person is out, before they make a final decision?
Or was this scoop on Rex just “logical guessing?”
What I mean by that is it didn’t come from the team, but it’s fair to assume he’s not getting the job. It’s hard to see the Jets going backwards here. He already had the job for six years, and got fired. It’s fair to assume they are not going down that rabbit hole again.
And you could argue that what hurts Ryan’s candidacy (which is over according to Hughes) the most isn’t his Jets stint, but his next head coaching gig in Buffalo, which lasted just two seasons. Well actually not even two seasons. He was fired in December of his second season and replaced by Anthony Lynn.
Unlike people like Bill Belichick and Dan Quinn, who learned great lessons from their first head coaching gigs, Ryan didn’t seem to. In his defense, he went right from the frying pan to the fire – hired by Buffalo not long after he was fired by the Jets. Belichick and Quinn took a step back for a while, going back to being assistant coaches, and did much better when they got a second bite at the apple with plenty of time to reflect on what went wrong the first go around.
Ryan needed to change some things, including his staff, from his Jets stint, but did not.
But when it comes to insiders claiming they have a good feel for who the Jets are going to hire, take a caveat emptor approach. May the buyer of this information beware.
If this search is being handled correctly, nobody should know what they are thinking until they make their announcements.
This isn’t the time for anybody in that building to try to be a big shot and provide insiders with scoop material on the process. And my gut tells me that is not happening.
January 15, 2025
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