The New York Jets are on the bubble.
No, not the playoff bubble—the tank bubble.
Sitting in the NFL’s basement at 0-6, the Jets are on track to earn the No. 1 pick in the 2026 NFL draft.
Since it’s so early in the season, though, Jets fans are collectively unsure whether it’s time to go full tank mode just yet. It feels as if the fanbase is teeter-tottering between rooting for a turnaround and embracing the tank.
Tanking for the top draft selection was not on the fanbase’s radar entering the season. Progress was the expectation, not regression. The Jets’ over-under win total was 6.5, which is 1.5 wins above the team’s 2024 record. With a new head coach and general manager leading a roster with many building blocks, Jets fans wanted to see their team set a strong foundation for the future by playing 17 weeks of competitive football.
So far, the Jets have fallen well short of those expectations. It leaves the fanbase split into multiple factions going into the team’s Week 7 matchup against the Carolina Panthers.
Some Jets fans are holding out hope that the team will turn things around and put together the foundational season that was promised. Other Jets fans have already had enough of the 2025 team and want to see it finish the job that the 2020 team could not.
Ahead of Sunday’s game against Carolina, I pitched a Twitter poll to Jets fans asking what their rooting approach will be during today’s game and moving forward. Across 350+ votes, here are the results as of this writing.
- Win as much as possible: 24.9%
- Focused on young guys: 18%
- Apathy: 29.9%
- All in on tank: 27.2%
You can still drop in your vote below.
There are essentially four factions of Jets fans right now.
Team Win (#3: 25%)
With 11 of 17 games remaining, there is still plenty of time for Aaron Glenn to mold the 2025 season into a successful one relative to the Jets’ pre-season expectations. These fans prefer to see the team’s new coach figure things out and build momentum going into 2026.
It’s a mindset that makes plenty of sense. If Glenn wins the next 11 games, many fans will be singing a much different tune. Sure, that’s incredibly unlikely, but the ever-optimistic Jets fan will always hold out hope for the best-case scenario until it’s officially squashed.
Pipe-dream playoff hopes aside, Glenn still has a realistic path to winning the entire fanbase back over. If the Jets can finish with anywhere from six to eight victories over the next 11 games, a lot of fans will buy back in. Glenn might even be able to turn many fans with a 5-6 record if the wins are high-quality enough and the losses are competitive.
Glenn has struggled mightily, but we’ve only seen about one-third of his debut season. A strong two-thirds can override what we’ve seen over the first third. It is completely understandable that many Jets fans still hope to see a night-and-day turnaround come to fruition, even if it is difficult to envision at the moment.
Team Young Guys (#4: 18%)
These fans aren’t necessarily rooting for wins and losses, but with the playoffs out of the question, their top priority is seeing the team’s young players perform well. With both eyes fixated on the future, these fans can only get excited if they see a big play made by an up-and-coming player who could make that same play in a January 2027 playoff game.
Most likely, these fans would tell you that they’d love to see the team win as many games as possible if those wins are led by young players who can be part of the solution for years to come. However, they might be slightly irked by victories led by lame-duck players who are unlikely to return.
Team Apathy (#1: 30%)
Too beaten and battered to care either way, these fans watch Jets games looking like Homelander in that one clip.
Team Tank (#2: 27%)
The adversaries of apathy.
These same fans couldn’t imagine being apathetic, so they would rather see their team be No. 1 at something. Hey, winning is winning, right? Even if that winning entails being the best at losing.
Fans watch football in search of the glory that comes with winning. So, when they can’t get that glory through winning games, some fans elect to try and replace it through the glory of winning the No. 1 overall pick. It’s an exhilarating Bizarro World replacement for the playoff chase.
If you ask these fans their motivation for wanting the Jets to tank, it likely involves one or both of two goals.
One, they want the team to land the best quarterback prospect in the 2026 draft (a title that Francisco Mendoza is quickly seizing).
Two, they are fed up with Aaron Glenn and want to see him go one-and-done before he ruins the team’s incoming rookie quarterback.
For some tank fans, their motivation could revolve entirely around pushing Glenn out of town. Glenn’s harshest critics might be deathly afraid of a mediocre Jets finish (three to five wins of unencouraging quality), as it would ensure Glenn’s return without doing enough to inspire faith in his ability to develop a prized quarterback. Therefore, they would rather see the bottom fall out, and they are most focused on this aspect of tanking as opposed to getting any particular quarterback.
Some tank fans, though, might either be a fan of Glenn or merely resigned to the idea that he will return no matter what, meaning they are rooting for the tank solely in pursuit of a quarterback.
It’s up to you, New York, New York
It’s nobody’s right to tell other fans how they should root for their favorite team.
If you’re Team Tank, but your buddy wants the Jets to win every game even if they’re 0-16, you need to sit back and let him scream “Where’s the flag??” with the same fervor that you would if the Jets were 16-0.
If you’re Team Win, but your dad is all aboard the Francisco Mendoza train, let him pre-order that No. 15 jersey.
And if you’re Team Apathy, your stoicism is admirable in a world where fans on both sides of a winless football team are still boiling with red-hot emotion despite watching that same team miss the playoffs 15 years in a row. Enjoy your calm; just don’t tell fans on either side that they are too passionate about their favorite team.
Every fan is entitled to root for whatever they want. Maybe your goal is to see the Jets record as many Scorigamis as possible. Maybe you just want both teams to have fun.
It’s up to you; don’t let me or anyone else tell you the “right” way to root for the Jets.
Football is entertainment.
