The New York Jets have a .000 win percentage and an average point differential of -12.0. This team stinks!
That’s the nature of Week 1 in the NFL. For a whole week, one game represents a team’s entire season. You’re either an undefeated juggernaut on the road to glory or a winless circus on the road to October mock draft simulations.
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The Jets are part of the latter group. After months of hype, the Jets laid an egg in their season opener, falling 32-19 to the San Francisco 49ers in a game that was not as close as the score suggests. A roster that looked “stacked” 24 hours ago is now apparently littered with unfixable holes.
As ugly as the Jets looked on Monday night, it is important to remember that this was the single hardest game on their schedule (on paper). Some of the problems that existed against the 49ers will not be problems against the Titans, Patriots, or Broncos.
However, some of the problems that existed against the 49ers are real, and may indeed persist against any NFL team.
Today, we’re here to weed out the two groups. Which Jets problems are real, and which can be written off as a product of season-opening jitters in a cross-country road game against an elite opponent?
Lack of pass-rush juice
The Jets could hardly lay a finger on Brock Purdy. While they sacked him twice, one was a scramble back to the line of scrimmage for no gain, and another was courtesy of an unblocked Micheal Clemons on a busted play in garbage time. Outside of those two plays, Purdy was never sacked and was only knocked down twice.
Some might argue this was due to a quick-passing plan from San Francisco, but that’s not the case. Purdy held onto the ball for extended periods of time and still was rarely pressured.
Across 32 dropbacks, Purdy averaged a relatively long 2.74 seconds from snap to throw (per NFL Next Gen Stats), which was above the 2023 league average of 2.67 and above his own 2023 season average of 2.65. Despite holding the ball longer than normal, Purdy was still pressured on just 28.1% of his dropbacks, much lower than both the 2023 league average (35.9%) and his own 2023 season average (35.2%).
Throughout the night, it caught my attention how little talent the Jets had on the defensive line at times.
There was a play midway through the third quarter where the Jets had Braiden McGregor (UDFA rookie), Jalyn Holmes (practice squad call-up), and Micheal Clemons (one of the NFL’s worst pass rushers in 2023) on the field at the same time. That’s a trio you’d expect to see in the preseason. The play resulted in a 34-yard deep completion to fullback Kyle Juszczyk, thanks to Purdy having 3.53 seconds to throw without being pressured.
A defense that relies heavily on its four-man rush will not live up to its potential if it is throwing lineups like that onto the field.
Yes, they were facing the San Francisco 49ers, an offensive juggernaut. Nonetheless, this is an issue I can envision persisting against other teams. While the 49ers are an elite team, their offensive line featured average-at-best starters at four of the five spots. Pass-blocking is one of the rare things San Francisco was not great at in 2023. The Jets had a favorable opportunity to make some noise up front in this game, yet they were completely stonewalled.
New York lost three of its five best pass rushers from the 2023 season: Bryce Huff, John Franklin-Myers, and Quinton Jefferson. The only replacement they added who is at least as accomplished as any of those three players is currently sitting on his couch. Without that player on the field, the Jets’ pass rush is massively downgraded compared to a year ago. That is not something to be brushed aside.
The Jets are banking on in-house development to make up for their losses and their absent star, but there were no signs of hope on Monday. Outside of Clemons’s unblocked sack, the Jets got zero sacks and zero QB hits from the combination of Clemons, Jermaine Johnson, Javon Kinlaw, Solomon Thomas, Will McDonald, Takk McKinley, Braiden McGregor, and Jalyn Holmes on a combined 104 pass-rush snaps between those players. Quinnen Williams had the only other QB hit of the game by a Jets defensive lineman.
This is not going to be an elite defense with that type of pass-rush production.
Overreaction?: No
Charmin Ultra Soft run defense
Jets fans licked their chops when it was announced that Christian McCaffrey would be out, only for Jordan Mason to embody the second coming of McCaffrey. Mason ran for 154 yards on 28 carries, carving the Jets defense with apparent ease. Deebo Samuel added 23 yards, and the 49ers finished with 180 rushing yards overall.
The main issue for New York’s run defense was how easily Mason got through the first level. The Jets’ back-end defenders did a nice job of preventing him from breaking off any home-run plays, but Mason was able to get positive yardage at will. Mason was only stuffed at or behind the line of scrimmage on 2 of his 28 carries. That’s a 7.1% rate, which ranked third-lowest among running backs with at least 15 carries in Week 1.
Mason’s consistent success helped San Francisco set up a plethora of third-and-short situations. This made it difficult for the Jets to get stops on third down.
While this is a problem worth monitoring, I would not overreact just yet.
For one, this is the San Francisco 49ers we are talking about. If there is one area where you can trust them to be successful on a weekly basis – whether McCaffrey is out there or not – it’s the run game.
Kyle Shanahan can scheme up the run game like nobody else, and he put on a clinic last night. Shanahan knows Robert Saleh’s defense is susceptible to power runs up the middle, so Shanahan attacked the Jets straight up the gut all night long. This was a match made in hell for the Jets defense, and it was going to be a problem no matter who was in the backfield. Before McCaffrey, Shanahan never had a problem cooking up elite run games with low-investment running backs, and he proved that he can still do it.
I don’t think the Jets run defense will struggle as much against teams that are not coached by the most notoriously great run-schemer in the NFL today. However, I do expect the Jets run defense to have more games like this throughout the season. Stopping the run is not the strength of this unit. They are not built to stop the run schematically, and they are not built to stop the run from a talent standpoint. The Jets’ defensive tackles are soft against the run outside of Quinnen Williams. Between-the-tackles runs will likely be their kryptonite throughout the season.
Most teams aren’t the San Francisco 49ers, though. I doubt the Jets will struggle this much against the run on a weekly basis. Still, the issues we saw on Monday will probably show up again when the Jets run into a team that is built to exploit them.
Overreaction?: Sort of
Breece Hall’s disappointing start
It was a night to forget for Breece Hall. He ran for only 54 yards on 16 carries (3.4 YPC), lost a fumble, and dropped a wide-open pass.
There isn’t any reason to expect this to continue, though.
Firstly, Hall did not have issues with fumbles and drops last season. In 2023, Hall had 2 fumbles on 299 touches, while he dropped 4 passes compared to 76 receptions.
As for the run game, this feels like a performance that should go down as an outlier when the season is all said and done. Hall entered 2024 with a career average of 4.8 yards per carry behind atrocious offensive line play. It does not seem likely he will continue to average 3.4 yards per carry behind this reconstructed Jets unit, provided they stay healthy.
To be clear, this was certainly an underwhelming outing for said reconstructed offensive line. The Jets’ run game against the 49ers’ run defense was New York’s greatest advantage on paper going into the game. San Francisco was mediocre against the run last season and lost some of its best run defenders going into this game. In addition, the 49ers are particularly susceptible up the middle, making them vulnerable to the Jets’ new power-based run game. We saw this mismatch transpire on the other side of the field.
While the 49ers successfully exploited the weakness of the Jets’ defense, the Jets could not do the same to San Francisco’s defense. The offensive line struggled to carve holes all night, frequently allowing Hall to be contacted early. Hall accumulated -10 yards before contact, per NFL Next Gen Stats, the second-worst mark of Week 1. Yes, negative 10.
The Jets offensive line must be better in the run game. This was a brutal run-blocking performance – there is no other way to describe it.
However, this unit has too much talent to continue playing this poorly. Until the run-blocking issue persists for multiple games in a row, I would expect them to bounce back.
Overreaction?: For now
