Last year, with quarterback Aaron Rodgers injured, receiver Allen Lazard eventually became a forgotten man in the Jets’ offense. He ultimately caught 23 passes for 311 yards, he was a healthy scratch for at least one game, and he likely would have been released but for a $10 million fully-guaranteed salary in 2024.
With Rodgers back, so is Lazard. The sixth-year wideout shows up in the starting lineup, based on the Jets’ first unofficial depth chart of 2024.
Of course, that’s largely because newcomer Mike Williams remains on the PUP list, after last year’s early-season torn ACL with the Chargers. Once Williams is able to play again, Lazard likely will be relegated to the second-team.
The other starting receivers are Garrett Wilson and Xavier Gipson. Undrafted in 2023, Gipson also serves as the No. 1 kickoff and punt returner.
The depth chart shows three new starting offensive linemen, in Tyron Smith, John Simpson, and Morgan Moses. Rookie first-rounder Olu Fashanu is the second-string left tackle, behind Smith.
2023 first-rounder Will McDonald is a second-string edge rusher, behind Jermaine Johnson. Free-agent acquisition Javon Kinlaw is listed as a starting defensive tackle, with Quinnen Williams.
As the first weekend of the preseason approaches, one of the common questions will relate to which key players will play in the games that don’t count, and which ones won’t.
For 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy, who’s in his first “normal” training camp as the full-time starter (last year, he was still coming back from elbow surgery), his reps for Saturday’s visit to the Titans remain to be determined.
“We haven’t talked about that, so just taking it one day at a time,” Purdy told reporters on Sunday. “I think it all just depends on how practices go and my reps and how I’m feeling and stuff. But, I’m sure we’ll make a decision here as the game comes closer.”
After Purdy, Josh Dobbs and Brandon Allen are battling for the backup job. Both of them undoubtedly will play extensively in Tennessee.
Purdy was also asked at his press conference about his rash of interceptions; his prior comments came in a visit to KNBR radio.
“I take pride in protecting the ball for our offense and our team,” Purdy said. “And so obviously, I’m mad when I’m not completing the ball to our guys and it’s going to the defense. I’m hard on myself and the coaches are, too. We have a standard here. So it’s not [that] we’re just going out and just because it’s practice it’s okay to throw picks. No, there’s still a standard here. But with that is, I know you guys have heard me say this all over the media, but now’s the time to be trying out some stuff in terms of throwing some windows and some tight coverages and whatnot. But you know, I still have to grow. I still have to be better and I’m hard on myself with it. But now’s the time to do it. I remember last year coming off my UCL at practice, I was throwing some stuff, and I threw multiple days of picks. But you get into the season and you’re ready for those moments and you’re ready to execute and protect the ball. So that’s where we’re at in the time of year.”
Purdy’s irritation with the interception depends on how the interception happened.
“It depends on what kind of pick it is,” he said. “If I’m trying to fit it in a window and trying to just be aggressive or I just couldn’t see a guy, those are the questions you have to ask yourself. And that’s what I do, ask myself. And obviously, I get pretty mad at myself in terms of, ‘Dude, you turned the ball over and you can’t do that.’ So it’s finding a way to grow mentally for myself in terms of, ‘Dude, you can’t do that.’ Or, ‘Hey, I was being aggressive here and we’re just trying it out and I’m seeing if I can do it with this guy and that kind of window or that kind of look.’ But at the end of the day, I’m not out there trying to just throw the ball up and act like it’s camp and I don’t care, because I do.”
It makes sense, but seven picks in two practices are still a lot of picks. Eyes will be on him whenever he plays in the preseason. And he’ll need to be ready to minimize turnovers in a Week 1 Monday night duel against Aaron Rodgers and a very competent Jets defense.
That game happens in only five weeks.
Last year, Jets training camp became a combination of Hard Knocks and hero worship, with cameras and microphones capturing the fact that players were in awe of the massive upgrade at quarterback. This year, the upgraded quarterback is trying to upgrade the rest of the team.
As explained by Rich Cimini of ESPN.com, Aaron Rodgers is pushing his teammates toward a higher standard.
“I’ve heard stories of Peyton Manning and Tom Brady -- not to compare them -- but it’s the same thing,” coach Robert Saleh said. “The expectation and the standard is high. As a quarterback, he’s trying to operate at a certain level of efficiency, which means people around him need to be efficient at the same level. When he’s not feeling that as a group’s leader and voice, he voices his opinion.”
That’s good. It’s necessary, especially for a team that hasn’t had a franchise-caliber quarterback under center since a one-year experiment with Brett Favre from 16 years ago. The best quarterbacks not only play at a high level but also hold their teammates fiercely accountable to do the same.
It’s one thing to hear it from the coaches. It’s another to hear it from someone who’s out there, putting in the work.
That’s why it’s no big deal if cameras capture images of Rodgers and others (like receiver Garrett Wilson) having animated conversations. Rodgers is trying to make everyone around him want to get the absolute most out of what they have.
Center Joe Tippman (who sailed a snap over Rodgers’s head during a Saturday scrimmage) has been a target for Rodgers.
“He can take me jumping his ass a little bit and getting on him,” Rodgers said of Tippman, via Cimini. “Sometimes you need to do that.”
He’s absolutely right. (I’m able to compartmentalize my opinions about Rodgers and his opinions.) Rodgers himself has said that, if things don’t go well this year for the Jets, everyone is getting fired — him included.
He also knows that he has one or two more shots to cement his legacy as something other than an all-time great talent who underachieved in the championship category. In the AFC, it’s not going to be easy to make the playoffs much less climb to the top of the playoff tree, in 2024.
So, yes, Rodgers needs to act like two quarterbacks who not all that long ago ruled the conference. Manning and Brady. Great players who were assholes when the circumstances called for it. Every great quarterback needs to be able, willing, and ready to unleash that edge when it’s needed. If the Jets are going to have any chance to compete with teams like the Chiefs, the Bengals, the Ravens, the Bills, the Texans, the Jaguars, the Browns, the Dolphins, and the Steelers, Rodgers needs to be ready to flip that switch at any given moment.
The Jayden Daniels era in D.C. begins on Saturday.
Via multiple reports, Commanders coach Dan Quinn told reporters on Sunday that Daniels will play in the team’s preseason opener at the Jets.
It’s no surprise, but it’s never entirely clear how coaches will approach the distribution of reps in a three-game preseason. And there’s also a calculated risk to shifting any quarterback from the no-touch practice rules to full-contact football.
Daniels should be able to protect himself. He enters the NFL as one of its most physically gifted quarterbacks. The 2023 Heisman Trophy winner can both throw and run his way out of trouble.
It’s unclear how long he’ll play. Other options on the roster are Marcus Mariota, Jeff Driskel, and undrafted rookie Sam Hartman.
It’s also unclear whether the Jets’ starter, Aaron Rodgers, will be playing in that same game.
Aaron Rodgers is back and, according to his head coach, as good as ever.
“He looks like he never missed any time,” Robert Saleh told reporters after a Saturday scrimmage, via Rich Cimini of ESPN.com.
Rodgers, who missed almost all of 2023 with a torn Achilles tendon, led the offense for 42 plays during the practice. Per Cimini, Rodgers completed 19 of 30 passes for 210 yards. Three of the incompletions were drops, and one was a spike to kill the clock.
The effort included a shotgun snap by center Joe Tippman over Rodgers’s head for a 22-yard loss.
It remains to be seen whether we’ll see Rodgers in any of the three upcoming preseason games. Saleh has said it’s his “instinct” to not play the 40-year-old quarterback. Rodgers responded to that by saying it’s “news to me.”
Here’s something that isn’t news to anyone — the Jets start the season with three games in a 10-day span. And Rodgers has taken four snaps in real game action since January 2023.
Five-time Pro Bowl wide receiver Jarvis Landry is still trying to catch on with another NFL team.
Landry tried out with the Jets on Thursday. It’s at least the second time this offseason that a team has brought Landry in, as he took part in Jacksonville’s rookie minicamp. The Jaguars didn’t sign him, and so far the Jets haven’t either.
The 31-year-old Landry was a 2014 second-round pick of the Dolphins who spent four years in Miami, four in Cleveland and then had a brief stint in New Orleans in 2022. He didn’t play at all last year.
Landry led the NFL with 112 catches in 2017, but his production had been declining for years by the time he joined the Saints. He would seem to be a long shot to ever play in another NFL regular-season game, but it’s possible some team could give him a chance to prove himself on a 90-player training camp roster.
Also trying out for the Jets was wide receiver Isaiah Winstead, who got some attention for his highlight reel in this year’s UFL season, and who signed with the team afterward. The Jets also signed receiver Brandon Smith and cornerback Tre Swilling and released tight end Kevin Foelsch and receiver Marcus Riley.
The Jets’ other tryouts were defensive end Brevin Allen, defensive tackle Robert Cooper, linebacker Jeremy Lewis and receiver Sam Pinckney.
Tarik Cohen recently said he was all the way back from his previous injuries and ready to compete for a spot on the Jets’ roster. Now he has changed his mind.
The 29-year-old Cohen is retiring from football, according to multiple reports.
Cohen was a 2017 fourth-round draft pick of the Bears who was a first-team All-Pro kick returner in 2018 in addition to playing running back, but he suffered a devastating knee injury in Week Three of the 2020 season and hasn’t played since. During an attempted comeback in 2022, he was livestreaming a workout when his Achilles tendon ruptured.
Although Cohen was hoping the NFL’s new kickoff rule would give him an opportunity to do what he did best, in the end he decided that it’s time to hang it up after a brief career that saw some impressive highlights but ended in disappointment.
After Aaron Rodgers said he looked forward to playing with Davante Adams again, the receiver and his agents were compelled to make it clear the receiver is staying in Las Vegas. For now, anyway.
Rodgers stoked the rumors of a reunion with Adams during the American Century Championship golf tournament in Lake Tahoe earlier this month, telling a reporter, “I love Davante. I can’t wait to play with him . . . again.”
On Monday, Rodgers was asked about his comment that ignited the Adams-to-New York rumors.
“Well, I do love Davante, for sure,” Rodgers said, via Rich Cimini of ESPN. “That particular [reporter] was a tad bit irritating. Those are things where it’s like somebody is asking the same question over and over and over, and I just give him something and get rid of them.”
With a smile, Rodgers added, “Yeah, but I think I was talking about golf.”
Adams has 622 catches for 7,590 yards and 69 touchdowns in 108 games with Rodgers, and he made the Pro Bowl five times with the Packers.
Aaron Rodgers played 10 snaps in the third preseason game in 2023 in his first season in New York. It was more plays than he played in the regular season as the quarterback tore his Achilles in his fourth snap of the season opener.
Jets coach Robert Saleh said this week that his “instinct” is that Rodgers won ‘t play in the preseason this year.
Rodgers, who has not played a game since that Week 1 game of the 2023 season, was asked how he felt about not playing in any of the team’s three exhibition games.
“News to me,” Rodgers said, via Erich Richter of the New York Post.
Rodgers is 100 percent recovered from his Achilles injury, and, in fact, had planned to return last season if the Jets had remained in postseason contention. So, he’s ready to play a game. The only question is: Will that come in the preseason?
“I don’t have any restrictions. I am doing keepers and roll-outs,” Rodgers said.
Aaron Rodgers and Garrett Wilson have had some animated conversations in recent days, with the videos of the two in discussion going viral. The receiver said earlier Wednesday that the discussions between the two are “truly enlightening.”
Rodgers called the perception he and Wilson are at odds “bullshit.”
“It’s a whole lot of nothing in the end,” Rodgers told Kay Adams on Up & Adams.
In his news conference, Rodgers said it was perception versus reality, with the videos not what they seem without the audio.
“He’s got to get on my page, but I have to get on his page, too, because he’s got a whole book that I need to understand fully -- skill set and ability and feel and rhythm and all the different things that he does out there,” Rodgers said after practice, via Rich Cimini of ESPN. “So those are good conversations. They might appear to be much more heated than they are, but there’s usually a smile on our face afterwards -- at least one of us.”
Twice in the past four days, Rodgers and Wilson have had passionate conversations after miscommunications on the practice field. Both appeared disagreements.
Rodgers saw it more as a give-and-take.
“The best ones have always done that, and I enjoy those,” Rodgers said. “I love a good back-and-forth as long as, at the end of it, we can either agree to disagree and revisit it later and come to some sort of middle ground.”