• Just sniffing around the New York Jets’ process, I don’t think the organization is going in with a preconceived notion on where it’ll land, or who it’ll land on, in its search for a new general manager and coach.
Ostensibly, the search kicked off with the Jets bringing in , a group founded by their former general manager Mike Tannenbaum to assist with the process. Former Minnesota Vikings GM Rick Spielman, who was a lead consultant in the Washington Commanders search last year, will work with Tannenbaum to lead the effort.
This is the first time the Jets have fired their coach and GM in the same year since 2015. And just like that time, the Jets are going the consultant route (they had former Washington GM Charley Casserly and former Green Bay Packers GM/former Jets exec Ron Wolf), rather than hiring a search firm.
The upshot? First, Spielman and Tannenbaum led NFL front offices relatively recently, so they have the know-how of and connections to other front offices. Second, , through its media arm and the research it does for teams, lives and breathes pro football 365 days of the year, which guides everything the group does. This is their first NFL search, but they’ve done college searches in the recent past, and they’ve done a ton of projects for and with NFL and college teams.
Then, there’s Tannenbaum’s presence. He worked for the Jets for 16 years, and was their GM for seven, giving him great perspective on the dynamics of the job, and market, and a good idea of who’d be a fit and who wouldn’t—which I believe will be a factor for the Jets.
The effort is already underway, with Tannenbaum, Spielman and the Jets launching research and vetting—and they’ve done it with a blank canvas. Will the GM report to the coach? Could a coach pick the GM? Will the two be paired and both report to the owner? All those things are on the table, and the thought is that it could stay that way even when interviews begin in January, with decisions potentially made based on the best candidates, and what it might take to land a top-shelf coach or GM.
For now, though, the Jets have six weeks. So the focus is on coming up with detailed, thorough lists for both the coach and GM openings, so everyone can hit the ground running in January. And maybe, just maybe, get it right after a decade of ineptitude for the franchise.
