Bowles was relieved of his duties Sunday night some four hours after the Jets listless effort in a 38-3 season ending loss to the Patriots in Foxboro. Bowles finished his Jets career with a record of 24-40, including three straight years of 11 or more losses.
The writing has been on the wall for Bowles for almost two months. In November the Jets suffered one of the worst losses in franchise history losing to a 2-7 Buffalo Bills team that, at the time, was the worst scoring team in football. They lost that game by a score of 41-10, with Buffalo resorting to its third string quarterback in Matt Barkley.
Many called for Bowles to be fired in the aftermath of that loss, but CEO Christopher Johnson refused to make the decision that quickly. Instead he let Bowles remain as coach for the final six weeks of the season, where the club went 1-5.
Bowles's tenure will be remembered for fielding teams that looked unprepared, and played indiscipline football. Last week's 16-penalty showing against Green Bay was the latest example. Not to mention there was talk of locker room turmoil constantly during his time as Jets coach.
Just this year there was a clear problem with cornerback Trumaine Johnson, who was benched by Bowles for the final week of the season because he missed meetings and practice. Earlier in the year, safety Jamal Adams hinted that there were some bad seeds in the locker room and that he wanted to sit down with the franchise's braintrust to find out how they plan to fix this mess.
The locker room issues were eerily similar to what happened two years ago when a sideline feud between Brandon Marshall and Sheldon Richardson divided the team, and sent that season spiraling out of control to a 5-11 finish.
Oddly enough Bowles' tenure actually started with a flourish in 2015 when the Jets opened the season 10-5 with wins against the Giants, Cowboys and Patriots to boot. However needing just one win in their final game of the season in Buffalo to make the playoffs, the Jets spit the bit 22-17 with quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick turning into Fitz-tragic before everyone's eyes. It has been downhill ever since.
About the only thing that went well for Bowles was the development of two players: Adams and quarterback Sam Darnold.
Adams became a Pro Bowl safety in 2018. While Adams wields a big tongue, he is a hard hitter and improved dramatically in his sophomore season. He is going to be apart of this re-tooled Jets squad moving forward.
Darnold had a bumpy rookie year. He started the season well, leading the Jets to a 3-3 start, but soon hit a wall by midseason. In Week 9 he suffered an ankle injury in Miami that put him on the self for a month. When he returned December 9 against Buffalo, Darnold was a different player. He led the Jets on a spirited come-from-behind win against the Bills, then put forward terrific efforts against the Texans and Packers in the following two weeks. For the first time in a long time, quarterback isn't an issue for the Jets.But now the long, painful road with Todd Bowles is now over for the Jets. The focus now turns to the future. Mike McCarthy and Jim Caldwell have been rumored to be potential candidates for the job. McCarthy has a Super Bowl title under his belt. Calwell went to one as a head coach, but isn't considered as good a coach as McCarthy is. We'll see what direction the Jets go here.
They could go with the young offensive assistant approach, which has been employed successfully by the Eagles (Doug Pederson), Bears (Mat Nagy) and Rams (Sean McVay) in recent seasons.
The other big news is General Manager Mike Maccagnan will likely remain as GM. This is a controversial decision, considering Maccagnan drafted and signed many of the players who caused problems for Bowles during the past four years. In fact over 90 percent of this roster is his. Outside of Adams and Darnold, Maccagan's drafts have produced below average results. There is pressure on him to figure this out, or he could be on the way out next season.
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