State of NY football: Why have Jets and Giants struggled for so long?

Robert Saleh has worked in struggling franchises before, and he’s been a part of difficult rebuilding projects. So he knew what to expect when he was hired by the Jets. He knew it wouldn’t be easy. And he knew the fans would be impatient.

He understood what was happening with football in New York.

“I started joking around with somebody that one year in New York is like dog years,” he said recently. “It is euphoria or disaster. There is no in between.”

That may be true, but there’s still one big problem with that statement: The euphoria has been missing around here for a long, long time.

It has been a decade of disaster for the Giants and the Jets in what might be the most painful stretch of football this city, this region, has ever endured. The Jets have missed the playoffs for 11 straight seasons. The Giants, barring a miracle, will have one disastrous playoff game in the last 10 years.

And that only scratches the surface on how bad it’s been. In the 10 years since the Giants won Super Bowl XLVI in a season when the Jets were coming off a trip to the AFC championship and finished 8-8 (missing the playoffs by just one game), the teams have combined for 16 losing seasons -- 14 with double-digit losses. The Jets (3-11) have had at least 10 losses five times in the last six years. The Giants (4-10) have lost at least 10 in five straight seasons and seven of the last eight.

Their combined record since the start of the 2012 season: 115-201. That’s a winning percentage of .363.

“It’s disheartening,” said one former NFL general manager. “And why would you think it’s going to change when it hasn’t changed? Seriously. Past performance predicts future achievement. Why would you think it’s going to change? They’re going to catch lightning in a bottle?”

Maybe that’s what it will take to shake New York football out of its current, seemingly unending cycle of doom. Over the last month, SNY spoke to more than a dozen current and former NFL executives and scouts to try to get an answer to the question “What’s gone wrong with New York football?” and to see what they thought could be done about it. Many of them requested, and were granted, anonymity so they could speak freely about the teams that some of them knew very well.

Their answers, which will come over the next several days in a series of stories, painted a dark picture about the two franchises’ recent past, and not a whole lot of hope about their immediate futures. And most of the focus was on two areas: A decade of bad personnel decisions – poor drafting and misspent free agent money -- and bad decisions by ownership.

“It’s interesting,” said Joe Banner, who was president of the Philadelphia Eagles from 1995-2012 and is the co-founder of The 33^rd Team, an NFL insider website. “I’m not sure their root problems are that different. They just happen to be in the same city.”

The bad drafting by both teams has been obvious. In the last 10 drafts, despite having a combined 11 Top 10 picks between them, they’ve produced just two all-pro players – former Giants safety Landon Collins and former Jets safety Jamal Adams (defensive tackle Damon Harrison, an undrafted free agent signed by the Jets in 2012, was also an all-pro with the Giants in 2016). They’ve also drafted a combined six Pro-Bowlers – three each.

“Dumb drafting,” said one current NFL scout. “It’s like both teams overthink it, no matter who the GM is. It’s not the first rounders. Sometimes that’s just bad luck. It’s the next day picks where they overvalue guys, take players that no one was going to take in the second or third rounds. Sometimes it seems like both teams think they’re smarter than everybody else.

“Clearly they’re not.”

The list of failed Day 2 (Rounds 2 and 3) draft picks is long for both teams over the past decade. The Jets’ list includes receiver Stephen Hill (second, 2012), quarterback Christian Hackenberg (second, 2016), receiver ArDarius Stewart (third, 2017), and linebacker Jachai Polite (third, 2019). The Giants’ Day 2 track record is better, but their list still includes defensive end Damontre Moore (third, 2013), defensive tackle Jay Bromley (third, 2014), defensive end Owa Odighizuwa (third, 2015) and quarterback Davis Webb (third, 2017).

And those are just the busts. There’s a long list of others who became marginal players, or had careers derailed by injuries. And when teams miss on so many early picks, they end up overspending in free agency to compensate for their problems.

“They end up chasing,” said one current NFL executive. “(The Giants) miss on Ereck Flowers (in the first round of the 2015 draft), they have to get a new left tackle and they end up spending $70 million on Nate Solder (who signed a four-year, $62 million deal with the Giants in 2018). The Jets fail at so many drafts they have holes everywhere and wind up throwing $70 million at Trumaine Johnson (a cornerback, who signed a five-year, $72.5 million deal with the Jets in 2018).

“Those are players who never would’ve gotten that kind of money. But desperate teams feel like they’ve got no choice.”

Those were far from the only bad deals over the past 10 years. The Giants, in GM Dave Gettleman’s effort to rebuild the offensive line, signed guard Patrick Omameh to a three-year, $15 million deal in 2018, and he didn’t make it through the season. He gave receiver Golden Tate a four-year, $37.5 million contract in 2019 to replace Odell Beckham, Jr. Even Beckham’s five-year, $95 million contract extension in 2018 was a bust, since the Giants traded him less than a year (and just 12 games) later.

The Jets, meanwhile, gave a five-year, $70 million deal with $39 million guaranteed to a past-his-prime Darrelle Revis in 2015, in a reunion that became a disaster. Center Spencer Long got a four-year, $28 million contract in 2018 and lasted only 13 games. And while there’s no doubt linebacker C.J. Mosley is a good player and valuable presence in a young locker room, has he really been worth the five-year, $85 million contract with $51 million guaranteed that he signed in 2019?

And on and on it goes for both teams.

“If you miss on enough draft picks, you miss on enough free agent acquisitions, that all adds up to an underperforming record to where you’re kind of on that merry-go-round,” said ESPN analyst Louis Riddick, a former director of pro personnel with Washington and the Philadelphia Eagles. “It gets to the point where you’re like ‘Well, I’ve got to make a change because this isn’t working.’ That’s just the way it goes.”

What’s most maddening about that, though, is the bad drafts and poor free agent choices aren’t the work of just one man. For the Giants, Gettleman’s poor personnel record since he was hired at the end of the 2017 season mirrors what was going on at the end of Jerry Reese’s tenure as GM. The Jets have cycled through four GMs in the past 10 seasons – Mike Tannenbaum, John Idzik, Mike Maccagnan, and now Joe Douglas.

The fact that the problems of the two franchises remain largely the same is why every single one of the sources SNY spoke to pointed at least some of the blame at the two teams’ owners.

“There’s a different problem in Florham Park than there is in the Meadowlands,” said one former NFL executive. “But the owners are both still the problem.”

The criticisms were definitely different, but they all boiled down to the same thing: Who do they trust? And the answers were familiar. Jets owner Woody Johnson, and his brother/CEO Christopher for a few years while Woody was serving as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, were largely blamed for not knowing whom to trust and listening to too many people when they make their big decisions. 

Meanwhile, Giants co-owner John Mara took hits for his “all in the family” approach and his seeming unwillingness to look outside the organization for help.

The results have been the same, many of the critics agreed: “Whether they’re listening to themselves or to others, they’re listening to the wrong people,” said one current NFL executive. And because of that, the wrong people have consistently ended up in key jobs.

“The first job of an owner is to make sure he’s got the right key employees in position,” Banner said. “Going back in time, both teams have struggled to say unambiguously yes to that question. As long as you’re not saying yes to that question then the foundation of everything is uncertain.”

“It’s all about who they listen to,” said another former NFL general manager. “If you listen to the wrong people, no matter who they are, you’re lost.”

For the Johnsons, that has been a lot of different people. The disastrous, two-year tenure of Idzik was the result of a three-week, 10 candidate search led by the headhunting search firm of Korn/Ferry – an example, one current NFL executive said, of “non-football people telling non-football people how to run a football team.” In 2015, the Jets leaned on former Washington GM Charley Casserly as a consultant for their GM search, even though he had been out of the NFL for the decade. He immediately centered on Maccagnan, a former scout he once hired for his staffs in Washington and Houston.

There was also the famous phone call from Hall of Fame quarterback Peyton Manning to Jets CEO Christopher Johnson in 2018 that tipped their head coaching search toward Adam Gase. And a year later, when Johnson fired Maccagnan, he named Gase the interim GM and he had a hand in choosing his old friend, Douglas, to be the next GM.

There have even been examples of the Jets listening too much to the media, such as when they appeared to be on the verge of hiring Doug Marrone in 2015, before appearing to abruptly change directions in the face of some manufactured media outrage.

The result has been a franchise adrift, with no consistency, no identity.

“It’s like they’re just waiting for the next person to whisper something into their ear,” said a current NFL executive.

“I don’t think they understand anything about how to build a culture,” said a former NFL executive. “I think they have a corporate mentality. They don’t really have an identity from the owner. It’s always been a corporate mindset.”

Not everyone agrees with that. In fact, several people close to the Jets or who have worked in the organization pushed back strongly on that idea. While they conceded that sometimes the Johnson family has trusted the wrong people, they pointed out that those “football people” have always had plenty of support along with the freedom to run the organization and build the culture as they see fit.

“They were tremendous owners,” said Tannenbaum, who worked for the Jets for 16 years, including seven (2006-12) as the GM, and is now one of the co-founders of The 33^rd Team. “I always walked around (the facility) and said ‘Look, if we don’t win, it’s on us. We have every single resource we possibly could ever imagine to be successful. No expense is spared.’

“If the team is not successful, the last people to blame are ownership.”

Of course, when Tannenbaum was there, the Jets had stability. He only employed two coaches in his seven seasons as the GM – Eric Mangini and Rex Ryan. He had already been the assistant GM for five years before he took over and he was given the time and latitude to build something in the early years of Johnson’s ownership. Johnson bought the team in 2000 and the Jets made the playoffs six times in his first 11 seasons, culminating with back-to-back trips to the AFC Championship game.

But since then, change has been more of the norm, which is why they’ve struggled to define their identity and plan since the boisterous Ryan left town after the 2014 season.

“The identity has got to come from the owner,” said a former NFL GM. “Because if it doesn’t, it changes. You’re like the farmer who goes out to the field and keeps digging up the roots to see if they’re laying. You don’t have a foundation because the owner refuses to give you one. If he walks in and says ‘Here’s what I want to be as a football team,’ he doesn’t have to tell you ‘We have to have this kind of offensive lineman.’ He’s just got to say ‘Here’s who we are.’”

The Giants seem clear on who ownership wants them to be. They like tough, disciplined teams that are anchored by strong defenses. They prefer old school, no-nonsense coaches at the helm. That’s the way it’s always been for this franchise, and it’s even been mostly true in the modern era dating all the way back to the 1980s and Bill Parcells.

To many, though, that’s the problem – an unchanged philosophy that hasn’t adapted to modern times, made worse in recent years because the franchise never looks outside for help. They’ve had an unbroken chain of just four general managers since George Young was forced upon the Giants in 1979, all of them coming from within the organization. Ernie Accorsi was Young’s assistant GM. Reese was Accorsi’s director of player personnel. And Gettleman spent 13 years as the Giants director of pro personnel from 1999-2011 before returning seven years later to take over as GM.

Sometimes that works – like during the Tom Coughlin Era that brought two Super Bowls to the franchise. But for the last decade, it’s seemed to many like a failed experiment to try and recreate their past.

“I think the biggest issue is they have won and been successful, and it’s hard to change and be adaptive and mobile when you’ve done that,” said Mike Lombardi, a longtime NFL executive and former GM of the Cleveland Browns. “Because you remember when you’ve won and you don’t want to change what you did when you won. So they are kind of stuck in time.

“And so what happens is, they just bring in people that support what they already want to know. That’s really what they do and that’s what they become. The hardest thing to do in any sport is evaluate your own team correctly. When you’re not doing that correctly, you’re prone to make mistakes.”

That’s what many around the league believe the Giants are about to do. The general feeling around the NFL community is that Gettleman will be nudged into retirement at the end of the season, and many think Mara wants to give Giants assistant GM Kevin Abrams the top job rather then bring in an “outsider.” 

While that’s not a certainty, multiple current and former Giants employees acknowledged that Mara is generally resistant to hiring a GM from outside because of how much that could really upend the entire organization, including getting rid of employees who have been there for many, many years.

And yes, that does include family members. Chris Mara, John’s brother, remains the team’s senior VP of player personnel. Tim McDonnell, John’s nephew, is the co-director of player personnel.

In fairness, the Giants have shaken up their front office and scouting department a lot over the past four years, including some more changes since head coach Joe Judge was hired two years ago. Several current employees said they’ve changed far more behind the scenes than is generally known. So it’s not as if Mara is completely resistant to changes.

But there is a lot of wonder about just how much change he’s willing to endure.

“You have got to let somebody else make the decision, or have a different group collaborating or a different process,” said one current NFL executive. “Just bring in another voice, another approach.”

“I think they should hire an outside consultant to come in and tell them what’s wrong with them,” said a former GM. “And I think this is going to be really hard, because there’s a lot of people named Mara and Rooney that work in there and they’re going to have to change all of that. They don’t want to do that. It’s a family business.”

Whether they are willing to do that or not remains to be seen, but there’s no doubt their next decision about the GM and the front office will be crucial and will set the tone for the next five years – either a rebirth or more of the same. 

The Jets, at least, are seemingly already past that point and, by all accounts, are committed to giving Douglas and Saleh the time they need to rebuild the organization. The early signs aren’t good. There have been times this season when the team hasn’t even been competitive. But they have loaded up on young, promising talent and are overloaded with high draft picks and salary cap space for next year.

The Giants, meanwhile, will have two high draft picks thanks to Gettleman’s shrewd trade down in the first round with the Chicago Bears last April. But they are only projected to have about $3.5 million in salary cap space next season. They loaded up on free agents and high draft picks over the last four years with the intention of arriving as a contender this season.

Instead, they got off to a 1-5 start and have now lost four of their last five as they deal with a roster crumbling due to injuries, and they’re running one of the NFL’s worst offenses that has averaged a mind-boggling 11.8 points over the last five games.

“The margin for error in the NFL is slim to none,” Riddick said. “You can go from worst to first in a hurry. Or you can go from first to worst in a hurry, just by missing on a few draft picks, key free agent acquisitions, or hiring a coach or coordinator or position coaches who aren’t as good as you thought. That’s a lot of s--t that you have to get right, otherwise you could have a long stretch where you’re like ‘Damn, what’s wrong?’”

Which is exactly where New York football sits at the moment, looking back at a decade of misery and wondering what’s gone wrong. The Jets’ 11-year postseason drought is twice as long as that of any other NFL team. The Giants at least had a playoff game in that span, though their success flamed out in spectacular fashion in a Wild Card game loss in Green Bay in 2016.

The last playoff win for either team was Super Bowl XLVI, when the Giants beat the Patriots on Feb. 5, 2012. That postseason, the Giants opened the playoffs with a 24-2 win over the Falcons in what was the last playoff game they played at home. In fact, that’s the only playoff game ever at MetLife Stadium, which opened 12 years ago. The Jets’ last home playoff game was a 41-0 win over the Indianapolis Colts way back in January 2003.

It’s a drought that was described by current and former executives as “disappointing,” “ridiculous,” and “borderline impossible.” One called it “a tragedy” in the football sense. They all felt for a fan base that has grown tired of waiting, wanting to believe that next year will be better, when the reality is that it usually isn’t.

“Those teams have been mismanaged so much and the roster’s gotten so bad, you’ve got to tear it down and build it up and it’s not going to be done overnight,” said a longtime NFL executive. “The problem is people get impatient because they suck year after year.”

Or, to put it another way, as Riddick did:

“Enough of that selling hope s--t. Enough. Either we’re getting it done or we’re not.”