Who were the top preseason performers on the New York Jets?

My favorite example of why preseason performance can be overrated is the story of the 2008 Detroit Lions. The 2008 Lions live on in infamy as one of the four NFL teams to ever go winless across an entire regular season. While that fact is rather well known, a lesser remembered tidbit of that season was the 2008 Lions were also undefeated in the preseason. If that doesn’t show preseason performance may not be predictive of a strong regular season then I don’t know what does , but I would still contend having a better preseason performance is better than having a worse one.

With that in mind, I wanted to highlight the best players on the New York Jets’ offense and defense during the preseason according to Pro Football Focus grades. Specifically, I am going to highlight anyone with a grade over 75.0, as I personally consider that to be a “great” performance.

On offense (overall grades in parentheses):

• Quarterback Aaron Rodgers (81.4)
• Offensive tackle Mekhi Becton (80.0)
• Wide receiver Garrett Wilson (78.7)
• Quarterback Zach Wilson (78.7)
• Offensive guard Laken Tomlinson (77.6)
• Wide receiver Jason Brownlee (77.3)

On defense:

• Cornerback Brandon Echols (91.9)
• Cornerback Sauce Gardner (91.2)
• Defensive tackle Quinton Jefferson (87.4)
• Edge rusher Bryce Huff (85.9)
• Safety Dane Cruikshank (85.1)
• Defensive tackle Solomon Thomas (80.5)
• Edge rusher Pita Taumopenu (78.3)
• Edge rusher Jermaine Johnson (78.0)
• Cornerback Michael Carter II (77.7)

As you can see, most of these players would up making the Jets roster, likely in part because of their preseason success. Fingers crossed the preseason performance of these players carries into the regular season and benefits the Jets when the games count.