‘Fire Adam Gase’ banner flies over New York City
Jets fans are literally taking flight in their movement to get Adam Gase fired.
A large group, which identified itself as die-hard Jets fans on its blog, created a GoFundMe page entitled “Fire Adam Gase” with plans to send “loud public messages to ownership that we are fed up.”
The fundraising, which as of Friday afternoon sat at $2,640 from 159 fans, went toward a plane that flew over New York City’s West Side on Friday afternoon with a banner that reads “Fire Adam Gase!” attached to the back.
“While Adam Gase’s name was on the back of the plane, this movement is actually about holding ownership accountable for their actions over the past decade,” the movement’s blog reads. “In reality, that plane should have read “SELL THE TEAM!” but we know that they (the Johnson family) have absolutely no intention of doing that.”
The passionate group included their social media handle in order to give their movement more traction. Sports Illustrated reported the group is planning more protests in the coming weeks.
The protest comes less than a week after the 1-7 Jets’ most embarrassing loss of the season to the previously-winless Dolphins and ahead of their MetLife Stadium matchup with the Giants.
The scene is eerily familiar to 2014 when an angry fan bought a banner that read “Fire [then-general manager] John Idzik” to fly over the Jets training center.
The Jets started that season 1-8 and Idzik absorbed most of the heat for the team’s struggles. He was fired after that season, his second with the franchise.
In this blog’s “Where do we go from here?” section, the group clarifies that it doesn’t enjoy “going to these extreme lengths to send a message to ownership.” It cited its continued fandom amid the organization’s fifty-year Super Bowl drought as proof of loyalty.
“That said, fans feel disrespected by ownership,” the blog reads. “The benefit of the doubt is gone. We have been lied to and let down by this ownership group too many times over the past decade to expect Christopher Johnson to fire Adam Gase and be accountable.
“We feel that if Gase is given another year with Sam Darnold, he will ruin the one possible franchise quarterback that we have had here since Joe Namath. Gase was specifically brought here to elevate Darnold, and we are watching him regress week by week.”
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