🔥 Aaron Glenn Hot Seat Meter Week 4: Jets wasted their easiest chance to build momentum

For a coach under pressure to win, Aaron Glenn could not have asked for a better schedule to start the season.

An opener against your predecessor and a team still winless, a familiar division foe from your last job playing without their best player, a reunion with your former team, and a face-off with the man and scheme you battled with every single day for four years straight.

The result - one New York Jets win.

The current season narrative is wrong

Consensus from the public seems to be that Geno Smith is the lone bright spot of this season and that Glenn is just the latest Jets coach, doing what Jets coaches do, and losing painfully.

If you've been reading my Air Traffic Report series this season, then you know it may actually be the exact opposite.

Watching this week's game against the Chicago Bears, what I saw was a team that cared, a defense that fought despite being on the field for three of the game's four quarters, and a group that forced five turnovers (if you ignore penalties).

For a defensive-minded head coach, that's a day you can hang your hat on.

However, I also saw an offense that averaged 4.2 yards per carry (good), 5.4 yards per pass attempt (bad), and only scored twelve points (very bad).

The challenge is in deciding what parts are Glenn's fault.

Who/what is to blame for this loss?

The suspect list for this one is short. Injuries, a pathetic offensive showing, and a team-wide penalty party are hard wounds to overcome when trying to beat one of the NFL's premier teams and coaches.

Injuries are part of sports, so unless he Bobby Knight's a chair into a player's ACL, Glenn can't be blamed for this.

With those out, the next elephant was time of possession.

The Jets' defense was on the field for a total of eighty-nine plays. Fools may argue it's because they couldn't stop the Bears' run game. This is why they are fools.

For one, being without their star quarterback, controlling possession by running the ball was the Bears' entire game plan. As the team that leads the entire league in rushing, that's a good plan.

In fact, the Jets' defense actually held Chicago below their season average in yards per carry. Add what the Jets' offense did with the ball when they did have it (see above), the defense didn't get much help shrinking the gap.

That brings us to penalties, of which the Jets had twelve.

There are two types of penalties in football: discipline penalties and effort penalties. Discipline penalties must have a better PR team because most people paint all penalties in their light.

These are your boneheaded mistakes-- false starts, personal fouls, and other infractions that are the result of losing focus. More importantly, the type you can blame on coaching.

Of the Jets' dozen on Sunday, six were of this kind. However, seeing as three of those six were delays of game on Smith, who has regularly fought the play clock all season, I grant the coach some lenience.

The other six were the crimes of effort. Pretty self-explanatory, but these are penalties incurred while trying. Maybe I'm old school, but effort is something I appreciate on my football team.

In other words, work on it in practice, but then keep it moving.

The love triangle needs to break bread

A pattern is starting to surface that implies a disconnect between Glenn and the Jets offense.

This isn't shocking, given that he now calls the defense - a major responsibility, and not one a head coach normally has.

If Glenn has been preoccupied with fixing that side of the ball, while assuming he can leave the offense to two league veterans in Frank Reich and Smith, for a minute, can you really blame him for that?

After all the public shaming the Jets endured last year for the historic turnover void, for a proud defensive coach, I, too, would vow it will never happen again.

In any case, if this perceived disconnect is real, it's on Glenn as head coach to get it fixed.

You were right to rush to your eldest child, who was arrested for vandalism, but now your youngest is failing math. As the person in charge, you go where you're needed.

What impact will this loss have on coach's hot seat?

The Jets didn't lose this game because of Glenn. At the same time, as the head coach, everything is your fault.

We can speculate about all the reasons why the Jets are 1-3, or we can use our common sense and acknowledge that it's been a tight 1-3.

Personally, I think Glenn deserves credit for the many improvements that are clear within this team. However, this fanbase is understandably irrational due to the years of frustration that have built up beneath the surface.

If he is going to keep the wolves at bay, he'll have to do it through a remaining schedule that includes multiple unbeatens, last year's runner-up in the AFC Championship, and two contests with the team that was playing in the Super Bowl just eight months ago.

The power of public outrage, and the pressure it can put on a situation like this, should not be taken lightly.

The masses are in charge of cancellation, and patience is running thin.

Current heat: 8.4 ❤️‍🔥

Add us as a preferred source on Google

Follow