Look round the Jets’ locker room and you see a void in leadership as large as the one you see in the standings, where you see just four wins in 14 games. The two issues are inextricably linked, and until one is fixed, the other won’t be.
A team with good, productive leaders at key positions is, more often than not, a winning team.
Look at the key positions on the Jets and what you find is an alarming dearth of leaders, too many players walking to the beat of their own drum, which is something that’s been a problem on this team dating back to the end of the Rex Ryan era.
At quarterback, the Jets stumbled upon Ryan Fitzpatrick as a leader last year when Geno Smith took that TKO punch in training camp, and Fitzpatrick delivered the best season of his career.
A year later, with Fitzpatrick unproductive and benched, he has as much chance of being on the team next year as Joe Namath does of returning to uniform. So the Jets have no idea who their quarterback will be in 2017 and beyond, which is the worst place to be.
The Jets’ running back position, dating back to the Curtis Martin years, has been as transient as a seasonal tourist town.
The offensive line, which lost veteran left tackle D’Brickashaw Ferguson to retirement before this season and essentially everyone else to injury during it, is an unsettled mess.
On defense, the two veterans on the line, Muhammad Wilkerson and Sheldon Richardson, have gone from terrific, overachieving players to underproductive on the field and combative with the media off it.
Richardson’s latest transgression — the Snapchat gaffe — is symptomatic of the leadership void that exists on the team. So, too, is the fact both Wilkerson and Richardson were benched earlier this season for habitual lateness for meetings.
Leaders? Hardly.
Cornerback Darrelle Revis, who will go down as one of the top five players ever to wear a Jets uniform, has had such a down season on the field, it has been difficult for him to be taken seriously as a leader.
The best leader the Jets have is also one of their quietest players — linebacker David Harris, who is the classic lead-by-example guy. But he can do only so much and, in his 10th season, its uncertain how much longer he will be around.
The Jets desperately need the new, talented blood to take over their locker room — and that starts with defensive tackle Leonard Williams and linebacker Darron Lee, who has had his share of growing pains in his rookie year but sounds hungry to be a leader.
Williams and Lee, when interviewed by The Post on Wednesday, expressed a strong desire to lead the Jets out of their current abyss, as they ready to play at New England on Saturday as an embarrassing 16-point underdog.
“I’m definitely coming out of my shell a little more into that role,’’ Williams said.
“I was that guy in college, and I always view myself in that [leadership] role,’’ Lee said. “But in order to be a leader you’ve got to follow. I still am following. I’m not sitting here saying I’ve arrived and am a leader of this team. I’m just looking to build on that these next couple years and definitely get a culture going here, get us going in the right direction.’’
Williams and Lee, who are close friends off the field, are beginning to understand it is their responsibility as top young players on the team to assume leadership roles.
Williams, who was a captain at USC, and Lee also know leadership cannot come without making plays on the field. Williams, voted in as a Pro Bowl alternate, has been more consistent with that than Lee this year.
“Darron and I are good friends and talk all the time. We hang out at my house all the time and talk football,’’ Williams said. “I definitely think he’s one of the guys that’s going to step up and lead this organization in the right direction.’’
Williams, who came to the Jets last year as a 21-year-old college junior, said he has been conscious of not wanting to “overstep boundaries or cross that line’’ with the older, more established players on the team.
“I didn’t want to walk in and, just because I was a first-round pick, try to be a leader,’’ Williams said. “As it comes to me, eventually I’ll take more of a leadership role.’’
For this Jets team so devoid of leadership, “eventually’’ cannot come soon enough.