In April 2023, we predicted that it would be bad news for Aaron Rodgers and the New York Jets. Well, Rodgers famously got injured just four plays into the 2023 regular season, and we figured that was bad luck, of course. Now, at age 41, Rodgers has played 10 games in the 2024 regular season, and it looks like we were right. This attempt for the Jets to finally win something has fallen apart in disastrous fashion. Ho hum, eh?

Our NFL Thursday entry today takes a close(r) look at this nightmare in New York: the Jets have the longest playoff-less streak of any major North American sports franchise right now (that’s MLB, the NBA, the NFL, and the NHL combined), and that misery will continue as the team is just 3-7 right with a small mathematical chance at making the postseason in January 2025. Oh, and the team fired its coach, too. Doh!

To recap: in 2023, Rodgers joined the Jets who thought they could be competitive after a 7-10 finish in 2022 where the East Coast media bias gave them some hope with both ROTY vote winners (something we mocked in our review of those awards). We pointed out in April 2023 the flaws in this logic, and then when Rodgers got hurt, the team somehow still forged another 7-10 record in the 2023 regular season. Surprise!

So, before this season, the media hype started again with Rodgers coming back, but it’s been a disaster: the head coach even got fired, although maybe he had it coming with a 20-36 record overall at the time. If you give a guy enough “talent” to win, and he cannot do so? A change has to be made. The problem was the “talent” really wasn’t as good as everyone wanted to believe, as we noted in April 2023: circular logic fail.

Part of the issue has been the regression of the defense from a Top 5 unit in 2022 to something considerably less in 2023 (12th) and 2024 (10th). Of course, when the offense stalls, that puts more strain on the defense. The Jets offense has been terrible for a long time now: the last time it ranked inside the Top 20 for points scored was in 2015, when the team went 10-6 despite still missing the postseason, unfortunately. Hmmm.

The team ranked 29th in points scored in 2022 and 2023 without Rodgers, and this year that has only improved to 26th, mostly because Rodgers is old and ineffective as we predicted in April 2023. He had shown considerable decline from his amazing 2020–2021 seasons to 2022, already, and the decline has accelerated after a missed season due to an Achilles tear. He is old; he is tired; he is all but done, sadly.

His 20-year career has been fascinating to watch, as he’s really only played regularly in 13 of those seasons, whether due to sitting on the bench as a youngster or due to injuries suffered that cost him considerable playing time. But he’s still the all-time NFL leader in interception percentage, adjusted yards per attempt, and QB rating. Rodgers has been that good, but despite the Jets’ every attempt to help him, it is all failing.

New York probably would have rattle off seven straight wins to end the season with a shot at the playoffs, and this is a team that’s gone 5-14 after its bye weeks in the last two seasons combined. The Jets host the Indianapolis Colts (4-6) this weekend, have their bye week next, and then close with six games against a myriad of semi-talented opponents. Let’s say they somehow beat the Colts and go into the bye at 4-7.

The team would then host the Seattle Seahawks; play the Miami Dolphins and the Jacksonville Jaguars on the road; host the Los Angels Rams; travel upstate to face the Buffalo Bills; and finish with the Fins in New York. Even in a best-case scenario, the Jets are only going to win five of those games. There’s no way the team wins in Buffalo when the Bills will be pushing for playoff seeding in deep winter. And that’s best case.

This is a team, again, that always finds ways to self destruct. Even the NFL’s own projections put New York at just 6.7 wins, which is not going to get them a postseason invite. Reasonably, we can see the Jets finishing W-W-L-L-L-L-W. That gives them a 6-11 record, in our eyes. And we’re being generous with that last “W” as we see Miami not liking the weather action in the Big Apple for the final game of the season. Who knows?

In the end, the Jets’ experiment with Rodgers has failed. And we would be surprised if he keeps playing. There’s not going to be a magic carpet ride at the end of a Super Bowl victory for him ahead; we know these players have big egos, and they have to somewhat in order to be so successful. However, it’s time for Rodgers to be honest with himself and walk away—while he still can, really. He’s old; he’s tired; he’s done.