A decent segment of the New York Jets fanbase woke up grouchy on this Victory Monday.

The team entered Sunday in possession of the fourth overall pick in the 2026 draft, with a chance to climb to first with certain results. But after defeating the Atlanta Falcons by a narrow score of 27-24, the Jets dropped three spots to seventh, their worst-case scenario in terms of the draft order.

And it’s exactly what Aaron Glenn and the New York Jets needed to accomplish—even if it’s to the chagrin of pro-tank fans.

The same fans who cursed at their TVs when the Jets won a “meaningless” game will likely find themselves cheering in due time, and when it happens, it can be traced back to games like this one.

Glenn, Jets are achieving what they absolutely had to

When the Jets started this season 0-7, it was incredibly difficult to find reasons to be optimistic about the future of the franchise under Glenn’s leadership. It was the worst start for a head coach in Jets history, which is a shocking feat given that this organization has employed coaches like Adam Gase and Rich Kotite.

Glenn put himself in daunting company with that type of start. Of the 17 NFL head coaches to lose their first six games with a new team since 1980, just four of them (24%) eventually led that same franchise to the playoffs.

Once Glenn added himself to this group, his mission statement for the rest of the 2025 season became crystal clear: Build a case as to why Jets fans should believe that he can beat these odds.

Glenn is getting it done.

Of the three coaches in recent history to achieve success after starting 0-6 or worse, two of them made the most sense as models for Glenn to emulate: Dan Campbell and Kyle Shanahan. While Cincinnati’s Zac Taylor also overcame a bad start, it mainly happened because he lucked his way into Joe Burrow; there isn’t much about Taylor as a coach that stands out. The Bengals never showed signs of life in Taylor’s first season, or even his second after Burrow was injured.

Campbell and Shanahan, though, started planting the seeds for future success as soon as their debut seasons, even with their atrocious starts. Here is a look at how Campbell and Shanahan started and finished their debut seasons:

  • Campbell (2021 Lions): Started 0-8 (-13.8 point differential), finished 3-5-1 (-3.9 point differential)
  • Shanahan (2017 Niners): Started 0-9 (-10.7 point differential), finished 6-1 (+6.3 point differential)

Now, let’s compare that to the trajectory Glenn is on after the Jets’ most recent victory…

  • Glenn (2025 Jets): Started 0-7 (-7.7 point differential), since 3-2 (-3.0 point differential)

The Jets are on the right track.

New York’s point differential hasn’t jumped quite as significantly as Detroit and San Francisco’s did, as the Jets’ three wins were close (combined +11) while their two losses were by double digits (combined -26). Improving in this category would make the Jets’ future under Glenn look even brighter.

However, it’s important to note that the Jets’ winless start was much more competitive than Detroit’s and San Francisco’s. The Jets were outscored by just 7.7 points per game compared to the Lions’ 13.8 and the 49ers’ 10.7. New York’s performance indicated that they were due to win some games at some point, and now, those wins are flowing in.

The next step for New York is to pick up some blowout wins. Luck is finally evening out for the Jets in close games, as their one-score-game record has improved to 3-5 with three straight wins, but they are still 0-4 in games decided by multiple scores. For Glenn, it would send a promising message if he can manage at least two games where the Jets put everything together and run a team off the field.

If the Jets can do that, their late-season turnaround will start to truly resemble those built by Campbell and Shanahan. Campbell’s Lions improved their point differential by 9.9 points per game after their 0-8 start, while Shanahan’s 49ers improved by 17 points per game after starting 0-9. So far, Glenn’s team has improved by just 4.7 points per game in that department, which is noticeable, but not quite as substantial.

However, there’s a major caveat working in Glenn’s favor: He’s pulling it off despite the Jets playing without arguably their three best players to start the season.

The Jets traded Sauce Gardner and Quinnen Williams after the first of the five games in this turnaround stretch; Gardner didn’t play in the first win against Cincinnati, anyway. On top of that, the Jets have only had their star receiver, Garrett Wilson, on the field for a half-game out of the five.

Pulling off this turnaround despite a massive decrease in talent is a testament to Glenn’s coaching—and how much he has progressed after a tumultuous start. This is the type of on-field success he needs to achieve in 2025 to build optimism about his future after starting as poorly as he did.

Despite the team getting much worse in terms of on-paper talent, the young Jets are learning how to compete. They staged a road comeback in Cincinnati, during which they executed in seemingly every big moment in the second half. Then, they gutted one out at home against the Browns on the strength of their special teams and defense.

While the next two games resulted in defeats, the Jets stayed surprisingly competitive in two road games as massive underdogs. They were 13-point underdogs in New England and 14-point underdogs in Baltimore, yet they trailed by just one score early in the fourth quarter of each game. The Jets pulled off an against-the-spread push against the Patriots and covered against the Ravens.

Then, coming home as 3-point underdogs against the Falcons, the Jets gutted out their second fourth-quarter comeback in the last five games.

The Jets still aren’t playing pretty football by any stretch of the imagination, but nobody should expect glamorous performances with the roster they’re putting on the field right now. The pieces expected to lead dominant football in Florham Park won’t be wearing green until the Jets utilize the heaping pile of long-term assets they’ve built up throughout Darren Mougey’s first year as the general manager.

For now, the Jets’ ceiling is limited due to their on-field talent. However, the coach in charge of the current operation will be here for the long haul, which is why the team’s short-term performance is crucial for its future. What we see from the Jets in 2025 will serve as an indicator of the foundation Glenn is building to support the team’s long-term construction. And if that foundation is flimsy, it will not matter what pieces the Jets build upon it with; the tower will collapse.

Over his last five games, though, Glenn has started to inspire legitimate faith in the culture he’s creating. Optimism around Glenn is no longer limited to press-conference quotes, physical practices, ties to Bill Parcells, and sideline dances; he’s producing tangible results on the field.

The Jets were 0-7. Glenn was stockpiling an extensive list of egregious game-management blunders. Sauce Gardner and Quinnen Williams were traded, and Garrett Wilson was injured.

Things were bleak. Sure, the Jets got a treasure chest of assets in return for Gardner and Williams, and their trajectory had them on track for the No. 1 pick. But there was no reason for Jets fans to trust that the people tasked with utilizing those assets would make them count.

Now, the Jets are starting to give their fans some reasons to believe that the men leading their football team can be trusted to turn this organization around. Going 3-2 since losing perhaps the three most important players on the team is a sign that Glenn might be figuring out this whole head coaching thing, and that some of the young pieces stepping up into bigger roles can be part of the solution.

Belief is something that can be contrived, but the only way to establish trust from a fanbase is to win football games. At last, the Jets are getting it done; draft position be damned.

As appealing as the No. 1 pick can be, why should Jets fans believe that the quarterback they choose with that selection would ever be successful in New York if the people drafting him were bad enough at winning games to land that pick in the first place?

With as many future picks as they have, the Jets are equipped to trade up for a quarterback if they need to. It decreases the pressure on them to successfully tank their way into their desired quarterback prospect.

For that reason, the Jets can comfortably win games in the short term without hurting their future (to a significant degree, at least; it would still be ideal to draft a quarterback without sacrificing assets to do it; just ask the Panthers). And the Jets need these wins; they set the foundation for future success.

Securing these “meaningless” wins was what Campbell and Shanahan did to prove that they deserved a chance to turn things around after a poor start. Now, Glenn is following in their footsteps. It’s precisely what he’s needed to accomplish since the moment New York’s season went off the rails.

If Glenn and the Jets continue progressing down the stretch of the season, it won’t matter where the Jets end up in the draft order. When you have the right regime (HC/GM), they do not require excellent draft position to build a team. Only below-replacement-level coaches and general managers (such as Taylor and the Bengals, as evidenced by how bad the team looks without Burrow versus how good they are with him) are so heavily reliant on draft position to succeed.

And if Glenn is a below-replacement-level coach, then yes, the Jets will suffer from falling in the draft order. But if Glenn is a below-replacement-level coach… the Jets aren’t going anywhere regardless.

Barring a catastrophe, Glenn will be the Jets’ head coach at least into the 2027 season; the trade deadline ensured it. For that reason, the Jets need Glenn to be a net-positive at the head coaching position if they plan on ending their playoff drought anytime soon.

Every win he gets down the stretch here in 2025 improves the odds that he is, indeed, a net-positive coach. That matters a whole lot more than a couple of slots in a draft that proves itself to be an utter crapshoot on a yearly basis.

Jets fans wanted reasons to believe in Glenn, right? Well, he’s providing them with some. On a 3-2 run (with two decently competitive losses) immediately following a mass exodus of talent, he is on track to build a mid-season turnaround that is equally impressive, if not more so, than the one he contributed to in Detroit four years ago.

While there’s no guarantee that the Jets’ ensuing seasons will be as successful as the ones that followed in Detroit, the odds continue rising with each win. That wouldn’t be the case if the Jets kept climbing the draft board.