On Both Sides of the Ball, Jets Have Have Struck Early Gold in the Red Zone

For the Jets, the red zone recently had been less about being red-hot and more about finding themselves in the red.

On offense, the Jets’ highest NFL red zone ranking since 2016 has been 15th, and a few seasons, such as 2020 and last season, their touchdown drive percentage inside the opponents’ 20 came in 32nd.

The Green & White’s red zone defense has fared better over those previous eight seasons, although their No. 4 ranking in the NFL in 2022 in preventing red zone touchdowns had been their best finish.

This season, though, like many metrics in the early going, the Jets are riding high out of the starting gate.

“If there’s a turnover and they get the ball on our 3-yard line, we want to defend it with our heart and everything in our body,” said DL Solomon Thomas of the Jets’ red zone defense, tied for fourth in allowing opponents three touchdowns in 10 drives inside the 20, a crisp 30% rate. “In practice, against our offense, against the scout team, it’s that point of emphasis.”

“For sure, that’s our main thing — finish,” WR Mike Williams said of the red zone offense, tied for third with a gaudy 75% on six TDs in eight drives. “It’s all 11 people doing their job. One person not doing his job is going to affect the play. So it’s everybody being on the same page and doing what we’re supposed to do, carrying out our assignments and capitalizing on it.”

Of course, weekly statistics and rankings change, well, weekly, and red zone stats can be particularly unstable. But what the Jets have done so far in the RZ is a rarity. They and the Saints are the only teams in the top five in both red zone categories.

If those 75 and 30 percent rates were to hold for an entire season, the Jets would set franchise records in both, and their achievements would hearken back to not that long ago to arguably the best red zone operation in franchise history, the 2015 Jets, who did so many great things in gong 10-6 except for one little thing: They were eliminated from playoff consideration with their Game 16 loss at Buffalo.

Still, the ’15 Jets were the NFL’s czars of the zone. On offense, Ryan Fitzpatrick threw to Brandon Marshall and Eric Decker and handed off to Chris Ivory. Defensively, MLB David Harris was the heart and soul, DE Muhammad Wilkerson led the pass rush, and on the back end, CBs Darrelle Revis — in his last best season with nine takeaways (5 INTs, 4 fumbles) — and Antonio Cromartie were reunited, and Marcus Williams also played a strong supporting role on the corner.

The RZ offense that season finished third in the NFL with a 66% touchdown rate that is the second-best by any Jets outfit. The defense’s 35% TD rate for opponents led the league and remains the best TD-stopping rate in franchise history.

“FitzMagic” put his spin on the red zone offense in a Daily News article from December of that season but also could have been speaking for his D or for the ’24 team.

“That’s an important stat for an offense because everything happens fast down there,” said Fitzpatrick, who holds the Jets mark with 23 red zone TD passes that season. “That, to me, means we’ve got a decent understanding of what we’re trying to get done. It also means that we’ve had some guys really step up. We’ve got great red zone receivers. We’re able to run the ball down there. I take a lot of pride in that.”

The thought process hasn’t changed much over the past nine seasons. LB Quincy Williams said this week the defensive disparities playing between the 20s as opposed to inside its 20 are unmistakable.

“Yeah, it’s a huge difference,” Williams said. “It’s just like two-minute is different than open-field during the game. It’s just a different mindset you’ve got to have. There’s very little room for error down there, so you kind of heighten your senses.”

WR Allen Lazard, who has scored two of those six red zone TDs, the first from Tyrod Taylor and the second on his T-shirt-unraveling 10-yard reception from Aaron Rodgers, gives A-Rod his due for making all the offensive situations run smoother, from third-down to two-minute to red-zone. And Lazard said the importance of converting those final yards into seven points comes down to two words: “Just winning.”

But Rodgers and Thomas both warn about the Green & White getting too enamored of their progress over the first three weeks, whatever the situation.

“I go back to this quote a lot from Mike McCarthy,” Rodgers said of his former Packers coach. “Our biggest struggle is going to be handling success.”

“It’s early in the season. We still have a lot of work to do,” Thomas said. “We still need to progress. We’ve got to keep climbing.”