It isn’t only the desperate search for that elusive franchise quarterback that has been so maddening and futile for the franchise that gave us the Buttfumble.
The Jets have had a terribly difficult time getting franchise head coach right.
Long-suffering Jets fans have spent the better part of five decades since Weeb Ewbank coached Joe Namath in Super Bowl III praying for their Joe Torre. Their Tom Coughlin. Their Bill Belichick. (Note to self: Don’t go there. Much too cruel.)
(Breaking news: Self just changed his mind — why does HC of the NYJ have to be such a giant sinkhole)?
If it isn’t Ewbank hiring his son-in-law, Charley Winner, who wasn’t (9-14), it is Leon Hess making like Usain Bolt racing down Rich Kotite, his dese-and-dose guy from Brooklyn and saying: “I’m 80 years old. I want results now.” He got results, all right: 4-28.
(Note to self: Show some mercy and don’t bother mentioning the rookie head coach Hess unceremoniously fired following a 6-10 season in 1994 to make way for Kotite was Pete Carroll, who won Super Bowl XLVIII with the Seahawks. Besides, Kotite was the first Jets coach in 20 years with head coaching experience.)
Keyshawn Johnson was the first overall pick of the 1996 draft. Kotite, who had gone 3-13 in 1995, left an early indelible and alarming impression on the prized rookie.
“When I saw him standing on the other [practice] field by himself on a cellphone smoking a cigar while everyone [was] in the middle of practice, while everybody else was running practice,” Johnson said Tuesday by phone. “That’s when I realized, ‘Oh s–t, this is trouble.’ We were probably 0-4 at this time or something. And I’m sitting there saying to myself, ‘Yeah, this is gonna be a long haul here, buddy.’ ”
The ’96 Jets started 0-8 before beating the Cardinals in Arizona.
“And Richie Kotite has the nerve enough to say in a meeting, ‘We’re still alive. If we run the table, we can make the playoffs at 8-8,’ ” Johnson recalled. “And I was like, ‘What has my life come to? What is this? Oh God.’ ”
Heaven — Bill Parcells — could wait.
“I would say it was major hell,” Johnson said, “because I was used to winning, and I was coming from a college football program [USC] that came off two January 1st bowls, the Cotton Bowl where I was the MVP, the Rose Bowl where I was the MVP where we dominated Northwestern and we were a top-10 team all year long. So we were a winning football power tradition, and that’s all I knew … high school, Little League … I only knew winning, I didn’t know anything about losing.”
Now that the firing squad has begun to set its sights on Todd Bowles, it would make you wonder if there is something in the water in Florham Park, except there seemed to be something in the water at Hofstra, too.
At least Bowles hasn’t lined players up by size for the national anthem, or written a victory fight song for them to the tune of “The Caissons Go Rolling Along,” as Lou Holtz did during his ill-fated, 3-10 tenure in 1976 — belt it out, Broadway Joe: “Win the game, fight like men, we’re together win or lose, New York Jets go rolling along.”
None of them had staying power (or a heavyweight franchise quarterback). The personable Herm Edwards was known more for his “You play to win the game” rant than anything else. Eric Mangini tried to be Belichick and alienated the owner. Rex Ryan was The Next Big Thing — until he wasn’t, literally and figuratively, thank you, lap-band surgery. He lasted six years because the owner couldn’t get enough of him on the back pages of the tabloids. Bowles is 3-9 and suffering a severe sophomore jinx.
“We gotta blow up the roster, and take a look at all personnel decision-makers,” Johnson said.
Keyshawn is not exactly a fan of quarterback Christian Hackenberg, general manager Mike Maccagnan’s second-round 2016 pick.
“If Hackenberg was the answer, he would have taken snaps by now,” he said.
The question: Is Bowles the answer?
“Todd Bowles shouldn’t be fired,” Johnson said. “It’s not Todd Bowles’ fault. Todd Bowles is a keeper. He knows what he’s doing. Why would you get rid of a guy in his second year that actually showed promise with a team that was overvalued on talent last year?”
Because it’s the Jets, where anything and everything is possible.