Breece Hall didn’t name Robert Saleh directly, but the message was hard to miss.
As the Jets try to reset again, Hall pointed to something he believes has been missing around the team: steadiness. Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, he said the difference starts at the top and trickles down to the locker room.
“I feel like there’s a lot more organizational stability, which I feel like helps the players because I feel like the players are only going to be as good as the organization is,” Hall said. “You can’t have good players and not have a stable organization and still have a good team.”
That’s a sharp contrast to the Saleh era, which ended with a 20-36 record and a firing in his fourth season. The Jets brought him in with big expectations, but even Aaron Rodgers and the pairing of Sauce Gardner and Garrett Wilson couldn’t turn it into a winning operation. His constant enthusiasm and the “all gas, no brakes” slogan never really landed, and the whole thing unraveled fast.
Now the Jets are almost two full years removed from Saleh, and the mood around the team has been noticeably more upbeat this summer. Under Aaron Glenn, New York went 3-14 in his first season and still hasn’t been to the playoffs since 2010, but Hall’s comments suggested he sees a different kind of foundation in place.
The national conversation has tried to revive Saleh’s image since the Titans hired him in January, but Hall’s remarks cut against that wave of revisionism. He didn’t blast his former coach outright, yet the implication was clear enough: the Jets’ problems went beyond talent.
Saleh’s track record in New York was ugly despite a roster that included several promising young players. The team never found its footing, and the coach often looked overwhelmed in the New York spotlight without a franchise quarterback to lean on. If anything, Hall’s comments reinforced the idea that talent alone can’t cover for dysfunction.
There is at least some precedent for Saleh being well-liked. His players in San Francisco spoke highly of him during both of his stints there as defensive coordinator.
But as the Jets found out, being a strong coordinator and being the right head coach are not the same job. Josh McDaniels is another reminder of that.
Looking back, there’s a real argument that New York should have moved on after the 2021 season, when the Jets finished 4-13 and Woody Johnson was once again the principal owner after serving during Donald Trump’s first administration. Maybe a different coach, maybe an offensive mind like Mike McDaniel, would have changed the path for Zach Wilson and the whole franchise.
That’s all hindsight now. For Hall, the focus is on what’s next, and Week 1 will give the Jets a direct test when they face Saleh’s Titans.
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