With the Week 7 contest hanging in the balance against the Carolina Panthers, New York Jets head coach Aaron Glenn made a quarterback change.
Coming out of the second half, the Jets benched starting quarterback Justin Fields and inserted veteran Tyrod Taylor into the lineup.
“I understand the nature of the quarterback change. Listen, we needed a spark at that time. I felt it was the right time to do it. Obviously, it was a tough situation for both of those guys, but it was my call. It was my call, and I felt it was the right time to do it,” Coach Glenn explained to the media after the 13-6 loss to the Panthers.
Results of Jets QB Change
The Jets mustered three points in the first half, and Fields struggled mightily. He finished with a 50% completion percentage (6-of-12) for 46 passing yards. The former Ohio State product was sacked three times for negative 21 yards.
Taylor performed better than Fields, but that isn’t necessarily saying much.
The veteran passer accumulated 126 yards through the air, completed 45% of his passes (10-of-22), and threw two backbreaking interceptions.
“I just felt like it was time. Our team needed a spark. I thought we did move the ball fairly well. Obviously, not enough to give ourselves a chance to win. Yeah, those guys made two great plays on interceptions. I guess the tough thing about that is, man, you’d rather have [us] catch it, it’s a DPI [defensive pass interference], or it’s incomplete. That has to be the mindset of us on offense, to where we are not giving up interceptions, but they happen, so you have to give those guys credit; they made some plays,” Coach Glenn added.
The Decision Is up in the Air Moving Forward
This was the first time this season that the Jets made a quarterback change not due to injury. After the game, Coach Glenn was noncommittal on his starting quarterback moving forward.
“When it goes into next week, I’m not ready to sit here and say what’s going on next week with our quarterbacks, but I will say this: that is something that I have to look at,” Coach Glenn admitted.
When asked who would be a part of that decision-making process at quarterback.
Coach Glenn explained, “Well, ultimately I make the call, but there are a lot of conversations I have to have with myself to see what I can do to make sure that we give ourselves a chance to win. Obviously, I’m going to talk with the offensive staff and see what their thoughts are, also. But we will make the right decision, whatever the decision is, I’m going to go with it, and we are going to move forward.”
In Week 8, the Jets will travel to play the Cincinnati Bengals. The Jets have their bye in Week 9.
Coach Glenn Reveals What He Wants to See From His Passing Game
“We gotta improve. We have to improve in this situation because now you see what they’re doing against the run, they’re loading the box against the run, sometimes they’re putting nine people in the box. So in order to loosen guys up, man, you have to be efficient to some degree in the passing game, and that hasn’t shown up in the last two games. That is something that I have to take a look at. I put a lot of the fault on me, as the head coach of this team, I have to make sure that we do whatever we have to do to get our passing game going,” Coach Glenn explained.
In Week 6 against the Denver Broncos, Fields finished with negative 10 net passing yards. That was the worst performance in franchise history for a quarterback.
Glenn Reveals the Difficulty of the Fields Decision
“It’s always a tough situation. It’s always a tough decision, but as the head coach, you have to take a look at the team and see what is best for you to put yourself in the best position to go win the game. That was the only thing going through my mind when I was walking in. I told the offensive staff, I went and told Justin and Tyrod exactly what I was going to do,” Coach Glenn said.
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