Ian Hartitz reviews the team needs for the New York Jets going into the 2025 NFL season.

The return of Aaron Rodgers was supposed to be the necessary ingredient to take the Jets from mediocre to great. And for a fleeting moment (three weeks) it seemed like the 2-1 Jets were on their way to doing just that … before losing nine of their next 10 games.

Throw in the decision to fire Robert Saleh in the beginning of October, the trade for A-aron's old pal Davante Adams, and a hilarious article from The Athletic outlining owner Woody Johnson's willingness to trust Madden ratings when making massive decisions—and it's safe to say the 2024 Jets were a complete sh*t show.

Ultimately, the Jets have now gone an NFL-high nine consecutive seasons without a single finish at or above .500. Not great, and the team has a LOT to figure out personnel-wise over the next few months in order to gain any level of trust in new head coach Aaron Glenn's ability to turn this sinking ship around.

Today we'll recap some of the good and bad of 2024 before getting into potential offseason injuries to monitor as well as team needs ahead of the 2025 offseason.

As always: It's a great day to be great.

NEW YORK JETS 2024 RECAP

  • Record: 5-12 (9.5 preseason win total)
  • Points per game: 19.9 (24th)
  • EPA per dropback: +0.053 (18th)
  • EPA per rush: -0.108 (20th)
  • Points per game allowed: 23.8 (20th)
  • Leading passer: Aaron Rodgers (3,897 pass yards, 28 TD, 11 INT)
  • Leading rusher: Breece Hall (209 carries, 876 yards, 5 TD)
  • Leading receiver: Garrett Wilson (101 receptions, 1,104 yards, 7 TD)

Biggest surprise: RB Isaiah Davis

This was a tough one, because Garrett Wilson and Breece Hall's respective campaigns were solid enough, but obviously came after really high preseason expectations. A similar sentiment is true for Davante Adams, who wound up going on a bit of a heater down the stretch—albeit he didn't exactly supply the sort of game-changing production the team was hoping for.

So let's give Davis some love! The 2024 fifth-round pick worked as the No. 3 RB behind Breece Hall and Braelon Allen for the first three months of the season before managing to make the most out of his touches down the stretch. Small-sample size, small-sample size, small-sample size … BUT Davis' advanced efficiency measures ranked among the league's best RBs on the ground.

Davis among 91 RBs with 30+ carries in 2024:

  • Yards per carry: 5.8 (4th)
  • Yards after contact per carry: 4.2 (2nd)
  • Missed tackles forced per carry: 20% (35th)
  • Explosive run rate: 26.7% (1st)

That latter stat is especially wild—eight of Davis' 30 rushes went for 10-plus yards! Kudos to the rookie for supplying some rare fireworks down the stretch of a lost season.

Biggest disappointment: QB Aaron Rodgers

I don't think anyone was expecting the MVP version of Rodgers to magically appear in 2024, but man, it's tough to find an advanced stat that paints him as anything other than a mediocre-to-bad QB. From EPA per dropback (+0.057, 19th), to success rate (44.3%, 24th), and completion percentage over expected (-2.6%, 30th): Life wasn't easy when throwing the football despite having what sure looked like one of the league's better WR duos on paper.

Now, the offensive line didn't help matters (more on them shortly), and Rodgers certainly has lost plenty of mobility at this point in his career, but it was almost astonishing how bad things were even from good situations. The below chart denotes every QBs' EPA per dropback and explosive-pass play rate on straight dropbacks from clean pockets—and Rodgers is down there in the bottom-left quadrant around some not-so-great company.

These should have been the sort of plays that brought out the best in Rodgers, but alas.

Key injuries

The Jets are tentatively not believed to be dealing with any significant injuries to fantasy-relevant players ahead of the offseason. Hell, yeah!

What Are The Biggest Needs of the Jets Ahead Of 2025?

Team Need No. 1: Quarterback

Rodgers' aforementioned disappointment makes his future in New York very iffy, likely leaving the Jets (again) in search of a long-term answer under center.

And really: Have they ever NOT been in dire need of some serious help at QB? Just look at their team ranks in passer rating over the years. Note that passer rating might not be the best one-size-fits-all metric in evaluating a QB (what is?), but the stat does do a good job of generally quantifying the success of an overall passing game.

Jets passer rating:

  • 2020-2024: 78.0 (32nd)
  • 2010-2019: 76.3 (31st)
  • 2000-2009: 78.6 (21st)
  • 1990-1999: 74.5 (24th)

Last year's passing game was objectively a below-average unit (18th in passer rating) … and it produced the team's fourth-best single-season mark ever, and their highest since 2002.

Veterans like Sam Darnold (lol), Russell Wilson, Kirk Cousins, and Derek Carr are probably the best options available on the free agent and trade markets. Perhaps the Jets go down that route, otherwise they'll be looking to draft their first overly successful QB of the 21st century.

Team Need No. 2: Offensive line

Elderly mercenary tackles Tyron Smith and Morgan Moses are both hitting free agency, leaving the Jets with the league's 10th-fewest 2025 dollars currently devoted to the offensive line. Hopefully the 2024 NFL Draft's 11th overall pick Olu Fashanu is ready to pick up the slack, but he did end the season on injured reserve while dealing with plantar fasciitis in his foot.

While the group deserves credit for allowing just a 28% pressure rate (5th lowest in the NFL), they continued to not exactly make life easy on the RBs.

Jets rank in RB yards before contact per carry:

  • 2024: 1.08 (26th)
  • 2023: 1.07 (23rd)
  • 2022: 1.09 (30th)

The team should have some cornerstones on the roster in the form of Fashanu, C Joe Tippman (43rd overall pick of the 2023 draft), and RG Alijah Vera-Tucker (14th overall pick of 2021 draft); just realize the results haven't been there—and it's accordingly made life tougher for everyone involved.

Note that pass catcher could also quickly be in play here if the Jets decide to move on from Davante Adams and if there's any truth to the rumors that Garrett Wilson perhaps wants out of town. Tyler Conklin also doesn't exactly represent a massive plus at TE (with all due respect to Conklin)—I'd be VERY OK if the Jets wanted to try to kill two birds with one stone by drafting a quality inline TE like Tyler Warren or Colston Loveland in Round 1.

Team Need No. 3: Secondary

The Jets have eight of their top 10 corners and safeties presently set to hit free agency. No. 1 CB Sauce Gardner is all good, as is backup nickel back Michael Carter, but yeah: Starting safety Chuck Clark could join longtime No. 2 CB Reed and starting slot corner Isaiah Oliver as potential free agents.

The other big problem here is the reality that, you know, this secondary wasn't very good at slowing down opposing passing attacks last year in the first place. Gardner and Reed were the only corners that PFF graded higher than 98th, while none of the team's primary safeties cracked the top 40.

And guess what: The Jets actually had the league's fourth-best pressure rate! The pass rush is more or less doing their job; now is time to pony up a bit more cheddar for cornerback and safety rooms currently getting paid the fifth-fewest 2025 dollars in the league.