Getty New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers and head coach Robert Saleh speaking during a media function.
If anyone knows what the New York Jets are about to go through in 2023 it is Eric Mangini.
The longtime NFL coach was the head honcho for the Jets in 2008 when the team acquired superstar quarterback Brett Favre in a blockbuster deal with the Green Bay Packers.
“They’re getting a pissed off Aaron Rodgers, which is exactly the Aaron Rodgers you want,” former Jets coach Eric Mangini told Rich Cimini of ESPN in a column posted on Wednesday, June 14. “When he was pissed off about Jordan Love, he won the MVP. When he was pissed off about his contract, he won the MVP. When Jordan Love wasn’t an issue and the contract was taken care of, not as great. Now he’s pissed off. It’s perfect.”
However, Mangini is also intimately aware of what happens if you don’t deliver in that kind of season. The now 52-year-old was fired following the 2008 season when the Jets failed to make the playoffs after an 8-3 start to the season.
“I would say embrace it [the pressure] because it’s real and it’s not going away,” Mangini issued a warning to current Jets head coach Robert Saleh. “It better work. If it doesn’t, odds are someone else will try to make it work next year.”
The Writing Is on the Wall for Jets Head Coach Robert Saleh
Saleh is entering his third year as the head coach of the Jets. In those first two seasons, Saleh went 4-13 (2021) and 7-10 (2022).
In 2008 Mangini was entering his third season as the head coach in New York.
However, the main difference between the two is immediate success. Mangini went 10-6 in his first year and went to the playoffs. In Mangini’s second season, he went 4-12 and the pressure was on heading into a pivotal third year.
Saleh doesn’t have the benefit of proven success on his Jets resume to date. All the chips are in the middle of the table ahead of the 2023 campaign.
Jets Owner Woody Johnson is paying “nearly” $60 million in guarantees for Rodgers in 2023. If the star quarterback plays a second season that paycheck will increase to $108 million for A-Rod, per Cimini.
On top of that financial commitment, there is also the inherent pressure of losing. The Jets have had one winning season in the last 12 years and haven’t been to the playoffs since the 2010 season.
That is the longest playoff drought among the four major sports leagues, per Yahoo Sports.
On March 28 Johnson emphatically stated, “I’m not the patient sort. We’re in the win business. We have to win now,” per Zack Rosenblatt of The Athletic.
If Saleh doesn’t deliver in 2023 he is likely going to face the same fate that Mangini did over 15 years ago.
Aaron Rodgers Is More Motivated Than Ever With Jets in 2023
Rich Cimini wrote a long column on Wednesday, June 14 about veteran quarterbacks that changed teams late in their careers.
A commonality among the passers in their second act is motivation.
Former NFL quarterback Dan Orlovsky said Rodgers was “run out of town” by the Packers this offseason.
Rodgers’ perception of the Packers coming out of his darkness retreat was that they were “shopping” him around the league in trade talks which was a pivot from what they told him earlier in the offseason.
That “contentious divorce” as Cimini described it has provided “additional ammunition” for A-Rod heading into 2023, “according to those who know him.”
Some have speculated that Rodgers fell off a cliff last season. However, Jets fans have compared his “down” 2022 statistics to that of their own team’s history and came away impressed.
Rodgers’ numbers were down by his own standards of his career but in New York, they would all rank among the best of all-time in a single season in Jets history.
When you consider his broken thumb and the team falling apart around him in Green Bay, there is plenty of optimism that a major turnaround is coming in 2023.
