Tag: Jay Ajayi

Winning games has never been Adam Gase’s forte, but few NFL head coaches are better at alienating talented players and tearing rosters apart.

The Jets sent shockwaves through the NFL on Tuesday night, cutting star running back Le’Veon Bell after not being able to find a trade offer to their liking. Bell’s departure was inevitable, but the thought was that he would either be dealt before the trade deadline or cut in the offseason. Instead, New York decided to eliminate the elephant in the room right away.

Such drama is nothing new at One Jets Drive. A player making headlines for either being unhappy or wanting out of the Big Apple is a yearly occurrence at this point. Make no mistake about it, though. It’s not Bell’s fault things ended this way. This one falls squarely on the shoulders of New York’s head coach — as most things tend to these days.

Bell’s time with the Jets did not have to end in a nasty, public divorce. He idolized Curtis Martin growing up and he wanted to be in New York despite years of the team losing. This isn’t a player who wanted more money or was making unrealistic demands that we’re talking about here. Bell wanted to be with the organization, and he wanted to get enough touches so that he could make a difference. The feeling was never mutual on Gase’s end.

Gase did not want to shell out money for a running back as the Jets did with Bell, but Mike Maccagnan made the move anyway. Instead of setting his pride aside and making Bell a focal point of his offense, Gase treated the All-Pro like a rotational player. He did little to feature Bell, who was stuck sharing carries with over the hill Bilal Powell at one point last season. Throughout his 17 games with the Jets, Bell was limited both on the ground and catching passes out of the backfield. Why? Because Gase didn’t play to his strengths.

Gase did the same exact thing with some of his best players in Miami. He thought Jay Ajayi wasn’t playing hard enough, so he shipped him off to Philadelphia. He played favorites and relegated the blossoming Kenyan Drake in favor of veteran Frank Gore, who is now likely to take carries away from rookie La’Mical Perine in New York. He couldn’t stand Jarvis Landry anymore, so he sent him to the Browns. Why did Gase have an issue with Landry? Because he asked for a bigger route tree.

Seriously.

“When I’d go to talk to [Gase] about it, he’d curse me out,” Landry said after being traded, per Bleacher Report. “‘Why are you telling me how to do my job?’ It got to the point where the environment was just awful.”

When the Dolphins fired Gase, some of his former players, Landry included, openly celebrated on social media. Gase didn’t exactly live up to his status as an offensive mastermind in Miami, but it wasn’t the Xs and Os that cost him his first head coaching job. It was his inability to manage personalities in the locker room, and that’s been a theme again with the Jets. Jamal Adams, though he made plenty of his own mistakes before exiting New York, was also critical of the culture Gase created. He and Bell are far from the only examples of Gase clashing with players since arriving in New York.

Frankly, it should have been Gase, not Bell, who was shown the door. Bell was never the problem at One Jets Drive. Now that he’s free of Gase, odds are he’ll find a new home and thrive as Robby Anderson has with the Panthers, Ryan Tannehill has with the Titans and DeVante Parker has under new leadership in Miami, among others.

If there is anyone to blame for Bell’s tenure with the Jets ending in such tumultuous fashion, blame Gase. He never had a chance to return to being the player he once was with Gase running the show.