One of the most important measures of an NFL coaching staff is how well they optimize the talent at their disposal.
A large part of an NFL team’s ceiling will always be determined by the amount of talent on the roster, which is mostly outside of a head coach’s control. The head coach’s job is to get his roster as close to its ceiling as possible, given its collective talent level.
Aaron Glenn continues to struggle in that aspect with the New York Jets. His management of the running back position is a prime example.
What are the Jets doing at RB?
With Breece Hall sidelined going into the Jets’ Week 4 contest against the Chicago Bears, it seemed like a prime opportunity for New York to see what both of their 2024 day-three draft picks could do: Braelon Allen and Isaiah Davis.
Instead, we got the Braelon Allen Show™.
Allen played 94% of the Jets’ offensive snaps, with Davis replacing him for just two plays (6%). Davis received no touches, while Allen was given all 14 of the Jets’ rushing attempts plus two targets.
This… makes little sense.
New York’s affinity for Allen continues to run opposite to the results produced by the Wisconsin product. On a day where the Jets were desperate for explosive plays to keep up with Ben Johnson’s offense on the road, they relied heavily on a plodding, 250-pound running back who continues to prove that he may be the least explosive runner in the NFL.
Allen carried the ball 14 times for 59 yards on Sunday, a mediocre 4.2-yard average, but he consistently left meat on the bone. It was a solid run-blocking performance by the Jets’ offensive front, which earned a 67.2 run-blocking grade from Pro Football Focus, but Allen failed to register a run for more than 10 yards across his 14 carries, and even his two receptions were held to a combined 8 yards.
This continues a career-long trend for Allen, who has displayed poor efficiency since entering the NFL. After Sunday’s loss, Allen is up to 170 career touches, and he still has yet to record a rush or a reception for more than 20 yards.
Meanwhile, on just 103 career touches, Davis has already recorded five plays for more than 20 yards.
Overall, Allen’s career yards-per-carry average is down to 3.7 after a sluggish start to 2026 (3.6 in four games). That’s nearly two full yards behind Davis’ career average of 5.6.
Davis also comfortably clears Allen in the passing game, which makes it bizarre that the Jets did not even elect to use Davis as a third-down back in Chicago. While Allen is averaging just 5.0 yards per target in his career, Davis is averaging an impressive 6.5, a very good mark for a running back; for perspective, Breece Hall’s career average is 6.7.
On top of all that, Davis has a more reliable set of hands. According to PFF, Davis has one career drop against 30 receptions (3.2% drop rate), while Allen has five drops against 27 receptions (15.6% drop rate).
The only advantage in Allen’s favor is pass protection. Allen’s massive frame projects well for blocking, and it translates to the numbers. Per PFF, Allen has yielded three total pressures on 57 career pass-blocking snaps (5.3% pressure rate), compared to Davis’ nine total pressures on 71 career pass-blocking snaps (12.7% pressure rate).
In every other area, though, Davis has been decidedly better. Perhaps one could argue that Davis accrued some of those numbers in garbage time or on third-and-long, which is fair, but the gap in efficiency is too wide in too many areas to justify Allen receiving 100% of the backfield touches in a Hall-less game. At worst, it should have been 50-50, but there is an argument that Davis should have the advantage.
The way the Jets have utilized these two players in 2026 is grossly misaligned with their respective resumes. Allen has received every non-Hall touch out of the backfield through four games, despite Davis having significantly better numbers in most areas.
That simply does not add up.
And it continues an alarming trend under Aaron Glenn that has now carried into October of his second season: He consistently struggles to optimize the team’s talent.
Nobody expects the Jets to win the Super Bowl this season, but after an offseason rife with coaching changes and roster upgrades, they should also be competent enough to avoid a performance that has only been matched in NFL history by a debuting expansion team.
The reason why the Jets are playing so far behind their own expectations, as low as those expectations may be, is because of strange decisions like the Allen-Davis backfield split.
Splitting the backfield touches in Chicago would probably not have saved the Jets in a game where they were outgained by over 300 yards, but these small miscalculations add up, contributing heavily to Glenn’s 4-17 record as a head coach.
When a team gives 100% of the backfield touches to a player whose career efficiency is markedly worse in most areas of the position compared to the alternative option, the coaching staff is actively worsening his own team through poor talent optimization.
Glenn and the current Jets coaching staff struggle to properly evaluate their own backup running backs. Why, then, should they be trusted to properly evaluate the 2027 quarterback class?
That is a question that the Jets organization must grapple with over the next 13 games.
