NY Jets aren’t being serious if they don’t upgrade this position

“Every decision that me and [Darren] Mougey make is to win, and win now.”

That’s what Aaron Glenn told the media back in February, less than two months after he was hired as the New York Jets’ head coach.

Now sitting at 0-5 one month into his debut season, Glenn was forced to reevaluate those comments earlier this week.

“What you didn’t say is what I said, ‘I’m not thinking about the Super Bowl, I’m not thinking about playoffs, I’m thinking about building a foundation,’” Glenn stated. “That’s exactly what we’re doing.”

Glenn’s clarification makes sense, as it aligns with the goals he communicated throughout the offseason. While Glenn did say he wants to “win now,” he also consistently reiterated that the primary goal is to establish a sustainable foundation, not necessarily to pursue a championship in 2025.

Glenn summarized these goals with the following statement, which was delivered a few days before the season opener.

“What would define a successful season? I want to be a team to where the fans will look up and say, ‘We’re proud of that team.’ And if they say that, I’ll be happy. I’ll be happy, because within that, I know that wins will come.”

Unfortunately for Glenn, he is quickly learning the harsh reality that even these realistic, development-focused goals can still only be accomplished by winning games.

That means Glenn and general manager Darren Mougey should be doing everything in their power to collect as many victories as possible over the next 12 games, even at 0-5 and with the playoffs out of reach.

The Jets must start at a position that they should be able to upgrade by picking a name out of a hat.

New York’s desperate situation on the edge

Going into the 2025 offseason, edge rusher was one of the Jets’ top needs.

New York had a starting duo of talented first-rounders in Will McDonald and Jermaine Johnson, but both players carried significant question marks. McDonald needed to improve his run defense to avoid being a one-dimensional player, while Johnson was coming off a torn Achilles.

With two high-ceiling, low-floor players in the starting lineup, depth was vital for the Jets at this position. But with their top projected backups at the position being players like Micheal Clemons, Eric Watts, and Braiden McGregor, it was clear that New York needed to prioritize strengthening the back-end of the depth chart.

For whatever reason, though, Mougey almost entirely neglected the edge rusher position during the offseason. His most notable moves were non-guaranteed free agent signing Rashad Weaver and fifth-round pick Tyler Baron.

It is organizational malpractice to pay such little attention to a premium position in desperate need of help.

Unsurprisingly, Mougey’s neglect has led to congruent results. The Jets might have the worst-performing edge unit in football thus far.

Here are the cumulative metrics of the Jets’ edge rusher unit (via Pro Football Focus) and where they rank among 32 edge units through Week 5:

• Overall Pro Football Focus grade: 54.0 (31st)
• Pressure rate: 7.6% (30th)
• Missed tackle rate: 26.7% (32nd)

New York’s edge unit is the only one ranked in the bottom three of each of those categories.

However you slice it, the Jets’ edge rushers have been atrocious this season. Considering it is perhaps the most valuable defensive position, it can be argued that, despite all of the scrutiny directed at New York’s back-end defenders, it is actually the edge rushers who are most responsible for the Jets having the league’s 31st-ranked scoring defense.

Poor depth is the culprit. An injury to the starting duo struck quickly, and Mougey is paying the price for being complacent with a shoddy group of backups.

Since a strong performance in a game-and-a-half to start the season, Jermaine Johnson has been sidelined due to injury, and his absence has been glaringly obvious. Will McDonald is on his own out there.

McDonald leads the Jets’ edge rushers with 11 total pressures and two sacks on 102 pass-rush snaps (10.8% pressure rate). Every other Jets edge rusher besides Johnson—which comprises the trio of Micheal Clemons, Tyler Baron, and Braiden McGregor—has combined for seven total pressures and no sacks on 189 pass-rush snaps (3.7% pressure rate).

In fact, Clemons, Baron, and McGregor have combined for just as many missed tackles (7) as total pressures (7). To put into perspective how bad that 1-to-1 ratio is, consider that the league-average edge rusher in 2025 has a 7-to-1 ratio of total pressures to missed tackles.

The numbers are bad enough on their own, but on top of the bad tackling and total lack of pass-rush juice, the Jets’ edge rushers often seem completely lost on the field. Their awareness is often so poor that the Jets might as well have 10 players on the field.