Jets Dysfunction Continues, and Eagles Make an OC Decision

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1:07Diante Lee:Welcome to the Ringer NFL Show. I'm your host, Shiel Kapadia. Today, we got a couple big news items we got to get to. One is with the New York Jets and the dysfunction around the New York Jets. What is happening there with Aaron Glenn and his coaching staff? And does this team have a long-term plan? We're going to talk about that. And then the Eagles finally filling their offensive coordinator vacancy hiring Sean Mannion, a bit of an unknown from the Green Bay Packers, their quarterback's coach. Is this a smart hire? Is this a hire that's going to blow up in their face? We'll talk about all that.

1:42Diante Lee:My guest today is the Ringers' Deontay Lee. Let's take a break. We'll come back with Deontay. The Ringer NFL Show is presented by FanDuel FanDuel's got it all Same game parlays, quick bets for jumping in live And your way so you can build the bet that fits your play Plus don't miss out on the NFL playoffs all month long Download the FanDuel app or head to FanDuel.com Slash Ringer NFL to get started 21 plus and present in select states Or 18 plus and present in D.C., Kentucky, or Wyoming Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com, call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut.

2:37Diante Lee:All right, we are back here on the Ringer NFL show with my friend Deontay Lee from the Ringer. We're taking a little spin around the NFL. I can't keep up with all the news, So we're going to get to some of the stuff that's been happening that we haven't talked about yet, Deontay. And let's start with the New York Jets. I'm sorry, Jets fans. You're probably like, we don't need this attention right now. But there's some wild things going on with the New York Jets and their coaching staff. So a lot of this is from my friend Zach Rosenblatt from The Athletic. Last Thursday, Deontay, multiple coaches who thought they were coming back were actually fired.

3:13Diante Lee:So they were let go. They're sitting there through the cycle. As all these other coaching staffs are being filled, they think they're safe with the Jets. All of a sudden, Aaron Glenn says, nope, we're not going to keep you guys. So they do that. Offensive coordinator, he wants Tanner Engstrand, who is his past offensive coordinator, to stay on but not call plays. He wants to hire a veteran coach like Frank Reich or they reached out to John Gruden or somebody else. So he wants Engstrand to stay, but he doesn't want him to call plays. A demotion of sorts to which Engstrand says, thanks, but no thanks.

3:48Diante Lee:Mutual parting of ways. So you have that. And then on the defensive side of the ball, he needs a new defensive coordinator. He's talking to Wink Martindale, former defensive coordinator in the NFL. And then at Michigan, Martindale thinks, all right, cool. Go to, go to the jets work for Aaron. Glenn has him in person. And Glenn tells him, yeah, we want you, but I'm going to call place, which apparently Martindale did not know. So instead, no, thanks. And the Jets say, I'm going to hire Brian Duker from the Miami Dolphins, but Aaron Glenn is going to call plays. I saw you tweeting, Deontay, that this, I can't remember your exact words, so I won't put words in your mouth, but you are alarmed, it sounds like, by what's happening with the New York Jets.

4:31I think, to paraphrase, it was something along the lines of like, in terms of like the first 13 or so months on the job, it's hard to think of something going much worse than how it's been for Aaron Glenn, right? Like some of this is taking bad bets, right? And I'm not going to pretend as though he had all of the options at his ready. And this was totally something that only for him, only him to blame, right? You have to choose the quarterbacks that are available. He tries to make a bet on Justin Fields, hey, get a guy in that's low cost, has started in the league before, that doesn't work out.

5:03The issue there is staying committed to a guy that is showing you that he wasn't the guy for as long as he did. So that was part of the problem. And then you think about staffing, right? You make a move mid-season with your defensive coordinator. You guys sell about your defensive pieces, right? You send Sauce Gardner to Indianapolis. You send Quentin Williams to Dallas. And those were sensible moves in terms of setting up 2027 and beyond, right? I wouldn't even say for 2026, but really seven and beyond. But that means that you're getting worse, right? The thing that is supposed to be his stamp, which is defense, isn't improving at all.

5:35There's no market improvements. If anything, I would say it looks even worse now than it did in the last year under Robert Sala and Jeff Ulbrich, right? When they were just trying to hold that thing together. And then you get to this point where you're trying to demote your OC and now you ultimately have to part ways. You try to bring in a DC and then you're kind of undercutting him by saying, actually, my head coach is going to call the plays. Which means I got like Wink Martindale is never signing up for that gig. He's never signing up for that gig. It's just all these things that are happening kind of in succession that make you ask.

6:06Does Aaron Glenn, does this regime with he and Darren Moogie, like, do they actually have a firm grip of the wheel here? Or is this just more just Jets incompetence kind of infecting everybody in this process?

6:19Diante Lee:Okay, so here's my question, because you just mentioned two aspects of the organization, coaching and front office. And my question, Deontay, is, because they didn't fire Aaron Glenn. I thought, you know, midway through the season, I thought they might just, this might be one and done. That's been happening more in the NFL. I thought he might be gone, but then they trade Quinn and Williams. They trade sauce Gardner. And then the indications are Glenn's going to come back, but we're going to kind of reshape how we view our organization. So my question is, is this an organic tank? I don't know if that's a real thing or not, or if I just made it up, you know, something you can go buy at whole foods or whatever, organic tank Deontay.

6:57Diante Lee:Cause I'm looking at it saying they got those picks for 2027, which is supposed to be a great draft. And I know people say that we'll see if it actually is going to be a great draft, or not, but they're keeping Aaron Glenn. It seems like they're letting him do whatever he wants with his coaching staff. He's got full autonomy. It's kind of a train. It seems like a train wreck from the outside, from the reporting. He looked completely overmatched last year as a head coach. There are no signs this off season that suggest that it's going to be a lot better. And so I'm wondering if the front office is going, yeah, he could, you know, hang out, do whatever he wants here for the year.

7:34Diante Lee:We can do whatever we want. We'll build through the draft. We're going to try to draft some good young players. We're going to avoid bad contracts with trades and free agency. He can try to win. This staff can try to win. It's probably not going to matter because we all watched what it looked like last year. And then you know what? We can do a reset after next year. We'll fire Aaron Glenn after next year. We'll draft our quarterback next year. and we'll try it over again with these young players. Is it possible that something like that is happening with the New York Jets? I think you're giving me an optimistic case that I can buy, right?

8:09And I think that if you're laying this out, if you're really analyzing it, you would say, all right, Darren Mugi, Aaron Glenn, hire together, right? Your timelines are linked. So if you're giving your GM a long road, you're going to give your head coach a long road, in theory, right? Maybe, yeah, maybe. In theory, right? That's very much a theoretical thing. Brandon B and Sean McDermott would disagree. They might disagree for sure. I think you look at the way that they traded away their most impactful defensive players in Quinto Williams and Sauce Gardner midseason. That would also suggest that everybody is aware that 2026 is about as low stakes a season as there could be for any franchise in the NFL.

8:47So you understand that as well. I think the thing that's just been most concerning to me is kind of what we keep coming back to, which is, does this guy who is making decisions in Aaron Glenn know what he is doing? Does he have a clear idea of how he wants to build the infrastructure of his staff, how they practice, how they play, how they game plan, how they want to approach decision-making in certain ways? And I would say, outside of how well they played on special teams, I don't think there was ever a single Sunday when I was going through power rankings and I had the Jets on TV where I felt like, oh, okay, this game let me know what an Aaron Glenn coach team is supposed to look like.

9:23I don't think we ever really left a week of football feeling that way about this team on either side of the ball. And you just never want to be in a position in your second year as a head coach where you're turning over both your coordinators, right? That is the telltale sign that somebody does not have a firm grasp on what they're trying to do. We saw this in Tennessee with Brian Callahan, right? With all the changeover in the style of play. You know, the way that how tense it seemed like Aaron Glenn was getting around the midseason point when they're asking him about Justin Fields and asking him about the lack of a passing game.

9:53And it just feels like this thing is totally doomed for him to maybe get a third of the way through the 2026 season. The team is losing. You excuse the coach. You dismiss the coach. You kind of play out the string and now you're going to have a GM that's probably going to feel really safe because I did my job in getting us this war chest of all these picks that we can use. to turn over this roster, right? So if I'm Aaron Glenn, I am very much stressed out. I don't feel like, oh, 2026 is an anything can happen type of year. This 100 % has to be a, we can go five and 12, we can go six and 11, but we've got to look like the way the Saints looked in the second half of the season in 2025, where we are very competitive in our division.

10:35We're winning games, we're competitive in games. We shouldn't be by conventional wisdom. I just don't know if I see it when you look at their quarterback situation

10:42Diante Lee:Shannon, when you look at this defense right now? It sounds crazy, but when you were throwing out 5-12, 6-11, I'm like, I don't see it. That sounds like it's out of reach. That feels like it's out of reach. That feels out of reach. And we're in the end of January. I mean, they could make a lot of moves, but I think it could be one of those things. And I don't want to give them the benefit of the doubt for anything. They've been a train wreck franchise under Woody Johnson. There's no doubt about it. Jets fans feel like punching bags. I get it. I feel for Jets fans. But the organization doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt.

11:11Diante Lee:but I could see this being a situation where Moogie, the DM, or the GM is in the ear of ownership saying, here are my ideas for how to build it. We're going to trade these guys. We're going to get picks. We'll explain it to Aaron. He'll be on board for now. And it kind of doesn't matter. I mean, he's got no choice. Yeah, he's got no choice. Honestly, he has no choice in the matter. Right. So, man, I just have a hard time seeing Aaron Glenn coaching the Jets in 2027. I hope he proves me wrong. I hope he does what you said. And some of the moves, I actually understand them. He wants to call the defense because the defense stunk last year and he feels like he's coaching for his job.

11:47Diante Lee:I get that. Just, you had a lot of time to figure this out. You weren't competing for a playoff spot. You want to change offensive court. You want to change offensive play colors. I get that too. You had time to figure that out. You should have had a plan. You should have been ready. Season ends. Hey, I want this guy. I want this guy. Here's what we're going to do. It's three weeks after their season end, they start looking for an offensive coordinator. I mean, come on, that that is the dysfunction that has permeated throughout the New York Jets for a very long time and why it's really been hard to take them seriously.

12:17Diante Lee:So I'm sorry, Jets fans. I 2026. I don't see a light at the end of the tunnel. Watch a lot of college football. Read the new and improved rigor draft guide. Check out Deontay's takes on the prospects this year and next year. Root for some young players. And then maybe in 2027, you can figure something out. but I know you don't want to hear that because you had reset after reset after reset. Unfortunately, I feel like that's what it looks like right now. This is unavoidable. I feel like this is going to be an unavoidable piece of this process. There's nothing they could actually do this offseason to actually make them competitive in the AFC.

12:51Diante Lee:Anyway, that I can see. Unless some quarterback lost their mind and said, I want to be traded specifically to the Jets for those first round picks that they just acquired. There's no way that a quick turnaround is coming. And I think that the last piece I would say, and this is really what concerns me about Aaron Glenn, whether he's calling the defense or not, you looked at guys that were good under Robert Sala and Jeff Ulbricht get markedly worse. I think that was probably the thing that was most concerning. The fact that Quincy Williams was kind of being pulled off the field. When I was watching Quincy Williams and he was playing under Robert Sala, that looked like one of the best inside linebackers in football.

13:25there's no way that that guy goes from being at that level to barely playing for the next head coach. And that's not a poor reflection on the development of play under this regime. So I think something has got to change in a major way if we want to see Aaron Glenn last past the 2026 season, hell, past the midway point of the 2026 season. This one definitely feels like we are headed towards an ugly end in New York for him.

13:49Diante Lee:A Callahan. Let's start calling it a Callahan. Because we all knew kind of what was going to happen last year. Immediately, yes. That's what this feels like. We all know what's going to happen with Aaron Glenn here. All right, we'll see what happens with the Jets the rest of this offseason. Let's take a break. We're going to come back and talk about the Philadelphia Eagles. This episode is brought to you by Mint Mobile. This January, quit overspending on wireless with 50 % off unlimited premium wireless. Plans start at$15 a month at mintmobile.com slash ringer NFL. Limited time offer, upfront payment of$45 for three months, $90 for six months or$180 for 12 months.

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15:21Diante Lee:All right, we are back here on the Ringer NFL show. Got some breaking news on Thursday that the Eagles finally landed their new offensive coordinator, Sean Mannion. Deontay, I feel like I have to get his bio out because I feel like a lot of people are probably like me, like, wait, 2015, I remember coming out of Oregon State, spent some years in the league as a backup. Yeah, he spent nine years in the league as a backup and his only coach for two years, two years with the Green Bay Packers, first an offensive assistant, then the quarterback's coach, and so the Eagles did this, hey, we're going to cast a wide net.

15:56Diante Lee:Maybe we didn't get our first or second option. We're going to look for the best candidate. And this is the guy they land on. And this is win now time for the Eagles. Howie Roseman said as much after the season. So what do you make of this hire, Sean Mannion coming over from Green Bay as their quarterback's coach? And now he's tasked with get this offense right, right away, because we're trying to get back to the Super Bowl. What do you think? I think the most optimistic case that you can make is that Philadelphia is doing what it always likes to do with this coaching hires, which is to make a very inspired off the beaten path.

16:31We went through and did this thorough process of interviewing a bunch of candidates. We did background on all these candidates and we found this guy that nobody in the NFL was ready to give this responsibility to. But look at us, Philadelphia Eagles were ahead of the curve once again. I cannot wait until they make a reference to Andy Reid being a quarterbacks coach under Holmgren in Green Bay however many decades ago. And he didn't have play calling experience either. And then that guy came in and revolutionized both the West Coast offense and the Philadelphia Eagles as a franchise. I would not be surprised if you hear that as a selling point.

17:07And there are some ways in which I can buy into this being a good idea. I think that when we talked earlier in the day and off camera about things like having a guy that fits the profile of a team that needs the most out of its quarterback. I think that getting a former quarterback, even if he doesn't have play calling experience, is the right move in that instance. Go get a guy who's been in the room, who has sat in Jalen Hurts' seat, who understands how a quarterback sees the game and can communicate to them in a way that he would understand. You would also, I think, take the last two years of Jordan Love's career once Sean Mannion became the quarterback's coach.

17:45And you would say, this is a guy who was clearly helping to push his quarterback to push the ball deep downfield, to take chances vertically, to be able to read out progressions aggressively, to understand coverage and know when you can push the ball downfield. And all of those things I think are real pluses on Mannion's resume, right? I think to me, the only real hangup I have really does come back to whether or not a coordinator that does not have play calling experience and has not even had a coaching job for a half decade yet. is he going to have the gravitas in a room where there is going to be as much internal pressure as there will be in Philadelphia, right?

18:24What's going to happen if he and Jalen genuinely do see something differently? What's going to happen if Nick Sirianni wants the offense to look a certain way? How much of a thumb is he going to put on the scale? And does Sean Mannion, from a personality perspective, have enough gumption to be able to stand up in those rooms and say, no, I was hired here to do this task. You asked me to come here to help develop our offense and get the most out of it. This is my vision for how we best accomplish that. And whether or not they're going to be receptive to it when that happens. So it's just so many things that I think are up in the air.

18:59Doesn't mean that it's going to be a bad hire. Doesn't mean for sure it's going to be a knockout. But I think that we're probably not going to know what kind of offensive coordinator this guy even is until about six to eight weeks in the season. And for a team, like you said, that wants to win right now, that feels like a very tricky proposition to try to thread the needle on.

19:16Diante Lee:It's boom or bust. It's high variance. It's interesting. It absolutely is interesting, more so than hiring kind of one of those veteran OCs who are like, wait a minute, is Matt Nagy? He's the guy who's going to elevate this offense in 2026. So I like the risk that they're taking here. The ways you outlined in which it goes wrong, you hit the nail on the head. I mean, first of all, we have no idea if he can do the job or not. He has not done it. He has not called plays. He has not schemed up an offense on his own. He's completely unproven. And I think the Eagles went into this process hoping to get someone who was proven, who they could say, this guy has a resume.

19:54Diante Lee:He's going to come in. He's done it before. But once those guys were off the table, the Mike McDaniel, the Todd Munkin, whoever else that maybe they had on their list initially, now you had to decide, do we want to go with someone who's done it before, but might not have been great doing it? Or do we want to just take a risk on someone? And so I applaud, you know, I do applaud them for saying, let's take a risk. We did our research. The other thing I like Deontay is that he doesn't have any connection to Nick Sirianni. That part I love. Or Jalen Hurtside. Because you hear me, you're probably tired of hearing me ripping coaches all the time.

20:26Diante Lee:Oh, he hired this guy because they were drinking buddies in college. Oh, he hired this guy because they were both GAs at this school. Oh, he hired this guy because they were both quality control coaches. And what do I always say? I say, cast a wide net, look around, try to find the best candidate. Don't just hire someone because you knew him 10 years ago. And as far as I can tell, Jalen Hurts has no relationship with Sean Mannion. Nick Sirianni has no relationship with Sean Mannion. Howie Roseman has no relationship with Sean Mannion. So at least that can indicate to us that they actually did try.

20:58Diante Lee:Now, whether they succeed or not, I don't know, but they tried. And the other point you made is a big one, which is that they need someone to come in and say, your offense didn't work last year. It hasn't worked for the large part of two years, the passing game specifically. And there are things we need to change. And Jalen, I know you don't like to do certain things, whether it's thrown over the middle, whether it's getting under center and running play action. And Nick, I know you have your certain ideas for how the offense should run. I want to work with you guys. I'm open to your ideas. But at the end of the day, I was hired to do a certain job.

21:34Diante Lee:And these are the things I actually think we need to implement to be a better offense? And to your point, does he have the personality to be able to get that across to those guys without them saying, no, that's not how we do stuff here. We're going back to how we do it. We're going back to what we're comfortable with without rubbing people the wrong way. The personality aspect of this, I feel like is a huge, huge deal. I'm with you 100%. And I think if you're Sean Mannion, you have to go in and pull up a reel of all those big time throws that you saw from Jordan Love last year. And you bring up the fact that, hey, not only were we doing this, we were not turning the ball over at a high clip when we were pushing the ball down the field.