Robert Saleh’s brother just torched the Jets after another humiliating loss

The fallout from Sunday’s loss to the Dallas Cowboys didn’t just stay inside the New York Jets’ locker room. It’s now reached the family of their former head coach.

David Saleh, the brother of ex-Jets head coach Robert Saleh, took to social media on Monday to unload on the organization after its humiliating 37-22 defeat to the Cowboys.

His post wasn’t subtle, indirectly calling out owner Woody Johnson and pointing to the franchise’s stunning defensive collapse since his brother's firing in October of last year.

"Last year, the Jets were 2-3 playing for first place in their division when Woody Johnson declared that 'the best roster in franchise history needed a spark.' Since then, the Jets' defense has gone from first to worst, donning a record of 3-14."

David Saleh

David Saleh tagged Johnson in the post, ensuring that the Jets' owner would see the criticism firsthand and adding even more pressure to an already beleaguered organization. This was salt in the wound for a Jets team already drowning in criticism, and it came from a name fans know all too well.

Jets still can't escape the ghosts of Robert Saleh's past

Saleh's brother has a point. The Jets shockingly fired Saleh after a 2-3 start to the 2024 season, with owner Woody Johnson hoping to "provide a spark" to a team that entered the year with legitimate Super Bowl aspirations.

Instead, interim head coach Jeff Ulbrich took over, and it quickly became clear he was in over his head. The Jets went just 3–9 the rest of the way after firing Saleh, while a defense that had ranked among the league leaders before the coaching change plummeted to the bottom three in EPA per play allowed.

The hope was that new head coach Aaron Glenn could instill a new culture in Florham Park and reignite a defense that had become stagnant and underperformed under Ulbrich. Neither of those things has happened through five weeks.

The Jets' defense has arguably been the worst in the NFL through five weeks, and while there are certain personnel shortcomings the staff can't overcome, there's enough talent on that side of the ball that they shouldn't be this bad.

Glenn’s Jets defense is blitzing on 31% of snaps, the seventh-highest rate in the NFL. Despite the frequent pressure, they’re only getting to quarterbacks 28% of the time, the lowest rate in the league. Opposing offenses are exploiting the mismatch, exposing a defense that looks overmatched despite aggressive scheming.

That’s a coaching problem. Over half of the Jets’ blitz packages have been five-man rushes, and opposing offenses have had no problem picking them apart, routinely neutralizing pressure and exploiting the gaps left behind.

The Jets' coaches, from Glenn to defensive coordinator Steve Wilks to the entire assistant staff, have routinely put their players in impossible positions, forcing them to execute schemes that consistently fail and exposing them to unnecessary mistakes and big plays.

Robert Saleh wasn't a very good head coach with the Jets. His shortcomings have been well documented to this point. But at least Saleh was able to hang his hat on maximizing the talent at his disposal on the defensive side of the ball.

Glenn hasn't been able to do that. The same issues that existed under Saleh — snowballing mistakes, lack of discipline, poor effort — remain problems with Glenn in charge. With that in mind, yeah, maybe David Saleh has a point.

Glenn hasn't fixed the Jets. If anything, he's made them even worse. There's still time to turn things around, and no one should be rewriting the narrative on Saleh's time in New York, but serious alarms are going off around Florham Park.

If changes aren’t made soon, this season could end up as one of the most historically inept campaigns in franchise history.

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