No NFL month invites bigger exaggerations than August, and the Jets’ preseason opener was no exception. One game was enough to send the discourse flying in every direction, but there’s a lot more nuance under the surface than the hottest takes would suggest.
Start with Braelon Allen, because that 31-yard touchdown run was impossible to ignore. He read the defense cleanly, made a sharp cutback, and flashed the kind of burst that looks even more startling when it comes from a player listed at 250 pounds.
It was a terrific run. It just wasn’t enough to declare him anything close to finished.
That carry was more than 10 yards longer than Allen’s best play across 131 career regular season touches, and in two NFL seasons his longest play has been 20 yards. The bigger picture is still pretty plain: Allen is at 3.7 yards per carry and 5.5 yards per target for his career, numbers that sit below the standard for the position. If he’s going to establish himself as a real RB2, that has to show up over more than one preseason burst against backups.
There are still other boxes to check, too. Drops and pass protection remain issues, and Isaiah Davis has been the steadier back in both areas.
Allen has five career drops on 21 receptions, a 19.2% drop rate, while Davis has one drop on 30 receptions, or 3.2%. In pass-blocking, the Jets have trusted Davis more, giving him 2.2 pass-blocking snaps per game in his career compared with 1.6 for Allen, even though Allen sits higher on the depth chart.
None of that takes away from what Allen showed after his knee injury. The quickness on that run was real, and for a player his size it stood out. But the leap from promising preseason flash to dependable regular-season production still has to be made.
David Bailey’s debut produced a different kind of overreaction, because the second overall pick managed to fuel both the praise and the panic. The truth is less dramatic. He didn’t overwhelm anyone, but he didn’t look overwhelmed either.
His first tackle in the run game was a mixed rep. A backup tight end drove him three yards off the line, which is not ideal, but Bailey recovered well, shed the block, and got involved in the stop.
He also had a speed rush around the edge where he beat the tackle but drifted too far upfield, opening a potential scramble lane for the quarterback. That’s the kind of play people love to label in camp, but it doesn’t shine quite as brightly once the game is live.
There were positive moments, too. Bailey looped inside on a stunt and used a rip move on the guard to get into the backfield for what nearly became a sack before Will McDonald got there first.
He later flashed a spin move on the outside, only to slip before finishing the rush. On another rep, he won with speed around the edge, with what looked like a possible hold by the tackle going uncalled.
What Bailey showed was pretty straightforward: the traits are absolutely there, and they jump out immediately on film. His first-step explosiveness is obvious.
So are the rough edges. That’s what a talented rookie looks like early on, and it’s why the loudest takes on either end of the spectrum are missing the point.
The most worrying reaction from the night centered on Omar Cooper Jr., but that one needs a cooler head, too. Back in April, the Jets traded back into the first round to take the Indiana receiver, and with the way the depth chart looked then, it wasn’t unreasonable to imagine him climbing all the way to WR2. Right now, though, he looks more like WR4 at best.
The Jets opened in 11 personnel with Garrett Wilson, Adonai Mitchell, and Isaiah Williams as the starting trio. Wilson and Mitchell stayed on the field for every snap with the first unit, while Williams handled the slot role. Cooper Jr. worked with the second-team offense.
That’s not what Jets fans were hoping for, but it’s not time to panic either. Cooper Jr. seems to be moving along at a normal pace for a late-first-round pick from a thin class, and Williams’ rise is better viewed as a credit to Williams than as a knock on Cooper Jr.
Friday night didn’t give any real reason for alarm. Cooper Jr. caught both of his catchable targets for 31 yards and looked smooth doing it. He hasn’t been especially loud in camp, but there also haven’t been reports of him struggling to separate or hang onto the football.
If anything, the encouraging part of the receiver picture is the growth from Mitchell and Williams. Mitchell has been stacking vertical separation and connecting with Geno Smith on plenty of downfield plays.
Williams has done more than just return kicks, translating that playmaking into the offense. Cooper Jr. may not have gotten off to a blazing start, but nothing so far suggests he’s lagging behind expectations in any unusual way.
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