The timing of Robert Saleh’s firing is difficult to explain, but it fits the Jets’ pattern

While it’s nearly impossible, it’s important to divide the fallout from the New York Jets’ firing of coach Robert Saleh into two distinct categories.

First and most obvious: This is a move that stunned Florham Park Tuesday morning, according to people familiar with the situation. Saleh was obviously under pressure to win, but the Jets will be playing in six days for a chance to clinch first place in the AFC East. Saleh came to work on Tuesday expecting to continue preparations for the team Monday Night Football Matchup against the Buffalo Bills. The Jets are sixth in defensive EPA per game allowed this year and first in the league since Saleh took the job in 2021. The Jets also allowed the fewest points per drive during that period. Saleh was tasked with eliminating the organizational toxicity that had built up since the collapse of the Rex Ryan regime, and he oversaw the development of the team’s best young defensive players since Darrelle Revis. The team won seven games last season with a combination of Zach Wilson, Trevor Siemian and Tim Boyle and is now just five games into a season with Aaron Rodgers, a quarterback Saleh wanted to hold accountable despite his freewheeling nature obvious stranglehold on the organization.

The second and perhaps less obvious: Jets general manager Joe Douglas is entering the final year of his contract. Interim head coach Jeff Ulbrich is a legitimate head coach candidate, and if the team had defeated the Denver Broncos in Week 4, he would be considered one of the most sought-after head coaches on this year’s carousel (Ulbrich was one of our potential head coaches). List in 2023). On the defensive side of the ball, he would be considered neck and neck with someone like Minnesota Vikings DC Brian Flores. Ulbrich is also, like DeMeco Ryans, Dan Campbell, Antonio Pierce and several other trendy recent additions, an honorary member of the former player’s club, which tends to hold weight especially in troubled locker rooms and on teams that employ veteran quarterbacks. In addition, Ulbrich is, according to experts in the coaching industry highly recommended from the same Shanahan tree from which Saleh was plucked. Combine the political benefits, job preservation and the need to satisfy Jets owner Woody Johnson’s bizarre and premature desire to fire a coach (coincidentally after the Jets lost on British soil, where Johnson was recently US ambassador and, I can only assume, was surrounded by some of them). his former colleagues) and you have the recipe for an absolute eye-catcher. It should not be lost on anyone that Johnson was not the one who hired Saleh, as this happened while Johnson was overseas and his son Christopher was acting owner.

Johnson is making an aggressive bet that the eventual tailwind of a coaching change will replace the prevailing emotions in the building Tuesday, which were one of shock, confusion and some hints of disbelief as the organization prepared for a critical division game against a talented opponent also comes away with defeat.

During his time as Jets owner, Johnson constantly wavered between which coaches and executives he viewed as suitable leaders. He dumped the reserved Eric Mangini for Rex Ryan, the ultimate Joker. He allowed Ryan general manager Mike Tannenbaum to spend aggressively, then fired Tannenbaum after two trips to the AFC title game for John Idzik Jr., who turned to Johnson about his salary cap and fiscal conservatism. Then Johnson fired Idzik to hire Mike Maccagnan, which allowed Maccagnan to re-sign Revis and Antonio Cromartie, sign Le’Veon Bell to a top contract and undo much of the digging Idzik had attempted as general manager. These chaotic, near-constant upheavals laid the foundation for one of the NFL’s worst rosters before Saleh arrived and a deep-seated cynicism had to be addressed.

Although Saleh ultimately had a 20-36 record, it’s safe to assume that they realized it would take time to pull the organization out of the quagmire. A year ago, the Jets beat the Philadelphia Eagles 5-0 and were one errant pass interference call away from knocking off the Kansas City Chiefs, who went on to win the Super Bowl. Saleh coached the Jets to a victory over the Bills in the team’s season opener Rodgers lost four snaps in the season.

However, as the organization began to hit the fast-forward button on its rebuild, culminating in the signing of Rodgers as a mentor and later full successor to Zach Wilson, Saleh likely found himself in ownership’s crosshairs. We can now interpret endlessly the failed handshake between Saleh and Rodgers like a Zapruder film. We can watch the two’s tête-à-tête-tête-à-tête over Rodgers’ staccato cadences over and over again. However, it was inevitable that Johnson’s impatience would only last for a limited time. Despite the unrealistic nature of Johnson’s expectations – that a modern NFL offense would immediately achieve top league status with a 40-year-old quarterback coming off a torn Achilles tendon by firing the club’s defensive-minded head coach – he has now turned around to someone else in the hope that they will be fulfilled.

When the seismic nature of this decision has time to settle, Johnson will have to grapple with his own record and the specific perception it has created for the franchise around the NFL.

Again, we shouldn’t discount Ulbrich’s ability to see through this locker room and turn the franchise around midseason. It may turn out that this is a completely wrong intention, which ultimately leads to positive results. And Johnson had better hope, because if Ulbrich doesn’t get his way, he’ll be left with burned-out farmland with little to build on and a job that top head coaching candidates will avoid.

Someone will take the job because with only 32 positions available, there is always someone curious and brave enough to believe they can make a difference in a given building. However, after what happened with Saleh and the way he was treated, we can assume that these candidates will not necessarily be well prepared for the future. Then again, who’s on the Jets?