Who is most to blame for the NY Jets' offensive struggles?

While I’m not surprised to see NY Jets quarterback Zach Wilson perform at a subpar level, I’m actually dumbfounded to witness the weekly ineptitude of the entire offensive unit as a whole.

Every hint of momentum gets wiped out with the most egregious of penalties, a careless drop, or the worst of them all, a signature Zach Wilson turnover.

His cult followers and family alike will be quick to inform you that he has only thrown one interception in the last four games but will omit he has thrown the same number of touchdowns in that span and has lost four fumbles during that time.

When you look at overall scores (one) and overall turnovers (five) there’s no positive spin to be had. One touchdown in four games is ugly enough, but having five turnovers during that span is downright hideous.

But this isn’t at all the trial of Zach Wilson — he’s actually better this year than he’s ever been in his NFL career. We cannot say the same for Nathaniel Hackett.

Nathaniel Hackett has been a major issue for the NY Jets offense

Look at Russell Wilson, the Denver Broncos quarterback, who has a whopping 18 touchdowns in nine games so far (second in the NFL). His 18:4 touchdown-to-interception ratio is only second to C.J. Stroud’s 15:2 ratio, but last year, with Hackett calling the plays, he looked more like Russell Brand than Russell Wilson.

With Hackett running the show, Super Bowl QB Russell Wilson had 12 touchdowns and nine interceptions in 15 games. In the two remaining games after Hackett was fired, he immediately improved with four touchdowns and two interceptions during that time.

It should be obvious that it was by far the worst year of Russell Wilson’s 12-year noteworthy career. It was the only year he ever had a passer rating less than 92 (84.4), he had the lowest completion percentage of his career (60.5), the only year he ever had less than 20 touchdowns in a season (16), and the most he’s been sacked in a season (55).

At the time of Hackett’s firing, his Denver Broncos ranked 23rd in the league in red zone scoring percentage, which was supposed to be his specialty. In those two remaining games, after he was fired, Denver shot up to second in the league. You cannot make this stuff up — it’s all there on TeamRankings.com.

Here’s my last stat for this Hackett burial: In Nathaniel Hackett’s last 17 games as a play-caller, his offense has generated one or fewer touchdowns 14 times — 82% of the time.

So, what do you get when you take a struggling kid who is the only QB in the history of the NFL to be dead last in passer rating twice in a row and give him a coach who almost derailed the entire career of a Hall-of-Fame quarterback? You get the worst offense in the NFL, which is the worst in the league's history in multiple statistics.

When you have two historically underqualified guys running the show (with complete job security) in the two most important positions of an offense, I don’t think blaming the offensive line or a relatively high drop rate matters too much.

A fish stinks from the head down, and so does this offense — Hackett’s extremely questionable personnel usage, lack of discipline from his unit, and predictable play-calling have left this team dead in the water.

But that coaching ineptitude doesn’t excuse the indecisiveness, inaccuracy, and consistent mistakes made by the third-year signal caller.

It actually enhances those things and boggles an offense that would be struggling to perform even with perfect discipline and play execution. With each passing week, it seems like there is no point for Aaron Rodgers to rush his recovery.

Of course, if the Jets beat the Bills and the Dolphins miraculously lose to the Raiders, perhaps there will be hope for that speedy recovery, but it all starts with a road win in Buffalo today.