The Jets may have finally found the opening they were waiting for with D’Angelo Ponds.
After Jarvis Brownlee’s costly mistake against the New England Patriots, the door appears to be cracking open for the rookie cornerback the Jets took No. 50 in the 2026 NFL Draft. One of Drake Maye’s three touchdown passes came in the red zone on a snap where Hunter Henry was left wide open for an easy catch, and Aaron Glenn seems to have identified the player responsible for the breakdown.
The fallout was immediate. Brownlee didn’t play a single snap afterward as the Jets’ nickel corner, with Ponds stepping in. That’s a notable turn after weeks of Brownlee holding down the job as the primary nickel defender, and it could signal a bigger shift in how the Jets line up moving forward.
Ponds’ start in the league has been rough. He has played only 17 coverage snaps and has allowed three catches for 48 yards and a touchdown. He’s also been flagged twice, including a penalty that wiped out what would have been his first career interception in Week 4.
The Jets have also been asking him to adjust on the fly. At Indiana, Ponds played on the outside, but in the NFL he has been working inside at slot corner.
At 5-foot-9 and just over 170 pounds, there are understandable questions about how he’ll hold up against bigger bodies. Brandon Stephens and Azareye’h Thomas have been good enough that Ponds isn’t going to be seeing many outside reps.
Even so, the tools are still there. Ponds is a top-tier athlete with strong ball skills, and those traits should play no matter who he’s lined up across from, whether it’s an A.J.
Brown type on the outside or a Pop Douglas type inside. What he needs is a real chance.
Brownlee, for his part, remains a useful player. He tackles well in space, is still one of the better run-support nickel corners in the AFC, and brings the kind of edge and aggression the Jets were looking for when they traded for him last season. But his coverage issues have never fully gone away.
He has trimmed the penalties a bit, but they’re still part of the package. Ponds is going to have his own growing pains as he gets used to the physical side of the league, but with the Jets’ secondary playing well around him, the team may be able to live with one vulnerable spot. Ponds has been slow to get going, and Brownlee had not played poorly enough to lose the job - until this latest miscue changed the equation.
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Aaron Glenn is now carrying the weight of those missed chances, because the margin for patience around the team is getting thinner by the week. Rich Cimini raised the possibility that a loss to the Dolphins could put Glenns status in real jeopardy, which is the sort of conversation that starts to follow a coach when repeated breakdowns keep showing up in the same critical moments. For the Jets, the next game now feels like more than a division test. [Read more 🡒]