Don’t bet on the Jets giving Adam Gase his pink slip on Friday morning.
That’s according to two reports that say it is unlikely New York will fire its head coach should the team lose to the winless Broncos on Thursday night. Previous reports claimed that Gase, who’s Jets are also 0-3, was coaching for his job this week and last.
However, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport said that’s not the case:
However, heading into tonight’s matchup against the Denver Broncos on the NFL Network, it does not appear Gase’s job hangs in the balance pending the result of the game. According to those informed of the decision-making, the thinking is that firing Gase would not only be counterproductive in general, but also potentially damaging to quarterback Sam Darnold.
The Athletic’s Connor Hughes reported much of the same, though he did leave room for Christopher Johnson to make a change should the Jets get embarrassed on Thursday Night Football. The Broncos will start their third quarterback of the season in Week 4 and have been bitten by the injury bug worse than the Jets. If New York were to lose this one in blowout fashion, it would be hard for Johnson not to make a change.
Anything less than a demoralizing defeat, however, and it sounds like Gase will stay put.
The Jets, of course, have already lost three such games. There’s no reason to think they are not capable of another, even against a shorthanded Broncos team.
When it comes to Gase’s job, however, New York has to weigh the pros and cons of firing him now vs. the end of the season. As Hughes noted, there are not a lot of great internal options when it comes to interim coach or a new offensive play-caller, which could be what’s keeping Gase around more than anything.
Per Rapoport, the Jets believe it wouldn’t be fair to fire Gase now given all of the team’s injured pieces. They also worry that a lame-duck group of coaches would set Darnold back even further back. Of course, he doesn’t seem to be making all that much progress now, but perhaps that will change against Denver.
Either way, it sounds like the quarterback can expect to have the same play-caller next week unless Thursday’s game goes terribly wrong.