NY Jets OC has discovered a fantastic tendency-breaking play

New York Jets offensive coordinator Tanner Engstrand is still learning the ropes in his first year on the job.

It’s been a roller-coaster ride for the former Detroit Lions passing game coordinator. The Jets’ offense has shown bright flashes at times, mainly in their season opener (32 points vs. Pittsburgh) and their pre-bye week victory over the Bengals (39 points and 502 yards at Cincinnati).

For the most part, though, New York’s 43-year-old play caller has been unable to get the team’s offense into a rhythm. Between those two explosions, the Jets had a six-game stretch in which they scored one touchdown before the fourth quarter.

In fairness to Engstrand, he is dealing with a limited cast of characters within the Jets’ offensive depth chart. His quarterbacks are well below average at processing defenses and pushing the ball downfield, while the team only has one remotely threatening wide receiver.

However, there are still areas within Engstrand’s control where he has clearly been enduring some growing pains. Among those, perhaps the main challenge for Engstrand has been figuring out how to be unpredictable.

Entering the Jets’ Week 9 bye, though, Engstrand is starting to show signs of progress in this area.

The play call that shows Tanner Engstrand’s improving knack for unpredictability

At many junctures of the season, Engstrand displayed predictable tendencies that allowed defenses to sit all over his play calls. It has often felt like defenses know precisely what is coming.

This is because Engstrand has fallen into habits that tip the defense off as to what he is likely planning to call. One of those habits involves his usage of backup tackle Max Mitchell.

The Jets have been using a package featuring Mitchell as a sixth offensive lineman. Mitchell has played 27 snaps as a sixth lineman, an average of about four per game across his seven appearances.

This idea makes sense in a vacuum. The Jets are a run-first team, and they want to punish defenses by putting more size on the field. However, Engstrand’s play calling with the Mitchell package has been very predictable, negating the advantage of having Mitchell’s size on the field.

New York has run the ball on 19 of Mitchell’s 27 snaps (70%). More than half of those snaps were on first-and-10, and just six came with fewer than three yards to go, so it’s not as if the ratio can be chalked up to the Jets using Mitchell primarily in goal-line or short-yardage packages. They typically use him to set the tone for a series of downs in the open field.

Defenses have used this knowledge to stomp out the Jets’ runs more often than not. The Jets have a success rate of 47.4% (9 for 19) on designed rush attempts with Mitchell on the field as a sixth lineman; the league average success rate on rush attempts is 49.3% this season.

It’s not as if the Jets have run the ball brutally with the Mitchell package (they’ve hit some nice runs with it), but their extremely run-heavy lean is indicative of Engstrand’s overall issues with predictability. This approach becomes especially troubling when you realize what the Jets are missing out on by not calling more passes with Mitchell on the field.

While it’s a tiny sample of eight plays, the Jets have a whopping 62.5% success rate (5 for 8) when throwing the ball with Mitchell on the field as a sixth lineman. For perspective, the league average success rate on pass attempts is 45.8% through eight weeks.

The Jets are averaging 7.8 yards per play when passing with Mitchell on the field, compared to 5.3 yards per attempt when running. Although the latter mark is still quite good, it pales in comparison to the passing success, especially considering the difference in success rate as well.

This disparity might seem surprising on the surface (shouldn’t more size and less speed/skill lead to better running and worse passing?), but it makes sense when you think about the chain reaction of placing Mitchell on the field.

If the defense sees an extra offensive lineman sub into the game, they are going to match up by removing a smaller defender for a bigger defender. It makes the defense more prepared for a run, but more susceptible to a pass.

So, even though the Jets have one fewer receiving threat on the field with Mitchell in the game instead of the tight end, they are still well equipped to throw the ball because the defense probably subbed out a quality coverage player for a subpar one.

Here are the personnel groupings thrown at the Jets across their eight passing plays with the Mitchell package:

• 4 times: 4 DL, 3 LB, 2 CB, 2 S
• 3 times: 3 DL, 4 LB, 2 CB, 2 S
• 1 time: 6 DL, 1 LB, 2 CB, 2 S

Putting Mitchell in the game instead of a tight end draws the defense into a base package, which means they sub out a fifth defensive back for either a linebacker or defensive lineman.

It creates a matchup advantage for the Jets’ other four passing weapons on the field. Mitchell being a non-threat as a receiver doesn’t hurt much, as the Jets will often use the tight end in Mitchell’s shoes to pass-block anyway. They are simply making the defense slower for the other four players to take advantage of.

That can be seen on this first-and-10 play against Miami. With Mitchell, Mason Taylor (TE), and Andrew Beck (FB) on the field, New York lures Miami into a traditional 3-4 package: three defensive linemen, four linebackers. This forces a linebacker (No. 25, Tyrel Dodson) to backpedal 20 yards downfield and cover Taylor’s over route, which he’s unable to do, and Fields hits it off play action for 27 yards.

If the Jets had a tight end out there instead of Mitchell, it’s possible that Miami would have responded with a third safety instead of a linebacker, giving them a better chance to shut down Taylor’s route. The Dolphins may have still matched the Jets’ 13 personnel with a 3-4 look, but it’s not guaranteed—throw a tackle out there, and the defense has no choice.

Using Mitchell is a creative way to deceive the defense into yielding favorable pass-game matchups. The Mitchell package is much better utilized for that purpose than to try and ram the ball between the tackles 70% of the time.

This is something that Engstrand may be starting to realize.

Through Week 7, the Jets passed the ball on just five of Mitchell’s 21 snaps as a sixth lineman (24%). In the Week 8 victory over Cincinnati, Engstrand threw the ball on three of Mitchell’s six snaps, a season-high 50%.

The results weren’t immediately there, as Justin Fields went 1-of-3 for nine yards on those pass plays (the run game also struggled, gaining five yards on three carries with one first down pickup and two stuffs).

Still, the fact that Engstrand began to lean more into unpredictability is a great sign of his development as a play caller. It’s emblematic of the revamped approach that facilitated New York’s offensive turnaround compared to previous weeks, when Engstrand tended to stick with his predictable run-run-pass patterns despite the continuous poor results.

The Jets mixed it up beautifully in Cincy. Late in the third quarter, still down 15, they mounted a six-play touchdown drive that began with two straight passes and was followed by four straight runs. In the fourth quarter, they had a five-play touchdown drive that started with four straight passes and was capped off by one run, followed by a nine-play touchdown drive where they alternated passes and runs in a nearly perfect rotation.

We saw a little bit of everything. Cincinnati never truly knew what Engstrand wanted to do on a given possession. It wasn’t about “running to set up the pass,” as it often was in the Jets’ previous losses, which is a futile idea when the defense will be sitting all over that run game due to your predictable approach. Engstrand hit them with the pass when they expected a run, and he used that success to set up the opposite, keeping that cycle in rotation for four quarters.

If Engstrand builds on the newfound unpredictability he displayed in Cincinnati, the Jets’ offense should flourish—whether that’s through the remainder of 2025 or in the future when they have better quarterback play.

As strong as the Mitchell package has been for the Jets’ passing game, Fields has left meat on the bone. On each of Fields’ two incompletions with Mitchell on the field against Cincinnati, Engstrand had someone open for a massive play.

On the first play, Mason Taylor was wide-open on a deep out-breaking route in the hole of the zone coverage, but Fields got the ball out late and placed it too shallow, allowing the underneath defender to recover.

On the second play, the Jets called a play action bootleg away from the strong side, where the defense was loaded up to match Mitchell and the two tight ends. It created a one-on-one for Arian Smith, who created separation in the end zone, but Fields elected to throw the ball away.

Despite the negative results due to poor execution, those clips exemplify how placing Mitchell on the field helps open up space for the downfield passing game. Throwing with six linemen on the field is an extremely advantageous move for the offense, and Engstrand is wise to begin leaning into it more than he was earlier in the year.

Engstrand was more unpredictable than ever in New York’s win over Cincinnati, and it translated to downright shocking results for an offense with a limited quarterback and Tyler Johnson as its WR1. His usage of the Mitchell package is a small indicator of the strategic growth that helped the young coordinator rebound from a two-game touchdown-less streak to a 39-point extravaganza.

And if he keeps it up, the Jets might finally have an offensive schemer they can trust.

As always, though, “keeping it up” is a challenge that not every player and coach can accomplish after an unexpected spike in production. Did Engstrand really learn anything about diversifying his playbook and deceiving defenses? Or did he have one flash in the pan against quite possibly the worst defense in football?

He’ll provide an answer over the next nine games.

Keep an eye on Engstrand’s usage of Mitchell. Though he is used sparingly, this seldom-known lineman is one of the best paths to clues regarding the development of New York’s offensive coordinator. If we continue to see Engstrand deploy a 50-50 pass-run split (or even heavier in favor of the pass) with the Mitchell package, it will signify an evolved vision for the offense as a whole, predicated upon unpredictability.