An open letter to New York Jets Head Coach Robert Saleh: Go down swinging against the Kansas City Chiefs

Hi Rob,

I’d ask how’s it going but I follow the New York Jets year-round and I’m pretty certain your answer would be, at best, “not great.”

Honestly, I can’t blame you for likely feeling that way after how the last year has gone. You took a defense from nothing to top 5 and managed to have two Rookie of the Year candidates on offense last season... and you still finished under .500. That burns, but you and the team seemingly picked yourselves up and dusted yourselves off this offseason. You even went ahead and traded for future Hall of Fame quarterback Aaron Rodgers only a year removed from an MVP. That’s some stuff there. You can dream on that. No doubt about it.

Then that dream died after all of four snaps. Talk about something that only happens to the New York Jets, amirite? I can tell you from the fan side of the equation, watching that burned, so I can’t even imagine what you felt down in the trenches.

From there, you went back to your old quarterback who you had tried to replace in Zach Wilson, who continues to look like a quarterback that you don’t trust at all. I mean his average depth of target might as well be 0 at this point. All this to say, I know things stink right now. I’m really sorry about that.

And that isn’t even to mention that reigning MVP quarterback Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs are coming to town... and that they’re bringing arguably the biggest celebrity on the planet to cheer for them to draw extra eyes for a game that you’re heavily favored to lose.

But the arrival of the Chiefs is why I’m writing you this letter. I get things stink. I get that you might not trust Zach Wilson. But I also get that the team is now 1-2 and that “1” came in a game that seemed like several miracles had to happen for the Jets to get the win. I feel like we’re friends now, so I’m going to be blunt, 1-3 is really hard to overcome if a playoff berth is going to stay on the table.

I hate to say this, but we’re (I’m saying “we” here Rob because we’re in the same boat of being sad if we’re thinking about the Jets in relation to the NFL draft before October yet again this year) probably going to lose on Sunday. The Chiefs are really good and, thus far, our team has been really bad.

So if that’s likely to happen (and the odds say it is), all I ask is the following: can we at least go down swinging on national television? Can we at least go down like a team that wants to give the impression it thinks it can score with the big boys?

Break out the trick plays.

Break out the RPOs.

Let Zach run for yards until his heart is content.

Break out the old BYU playbook and move that pocket before Zach heaves it up for 50 yards.

Give running back Breece Hall carries.

Let wide receiver Garrett Wilson go make plays that only a few guys on earth can make.

I don’t even care if it fails and a blowout ensues. Just give the Chiefs offense the respect it deserves by trying to score enough times to beat them instead of hoping they make enough mistakes to keep the game close for the box score... because we all have seen Mahomes play enough to know that if it’s close he’ll find a way. And it’s going to be really hard for it not to be close if our gameplan involves scoring the typical 10-16 points that we’ve been putting up this season.

Long story short, play like there isn’t a tomorrow, because if we lose this one then it certainly feels like there isn’t as far as this team’s success is concerned. Give fans a reason to keep hoping because right now that hope that was cultivated for the last few calendar months sure feels like a false bill of goods right now.

This fanbase cares... probably a little bit too much if we’re being honest... so, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, go down swinging like any good New Yorker would.