Adam Gase was once called an offensive mastermind, but the Jets can't score
Adam Gase’s tenure as the coach of the New York Jets gets worse by the week. His squad on Sunday was crushed by the Miami Dolphins, 24-0, the first shutout of this NFL season, dropping the Jets to 0-6 and leaving them as the league’s only winless team. It was the Jets’ eighth loss by double digits since Gase took over last year and the team’s fifth defeat by 20 or more points in his 22-game tenure.
Gase’s record as an NFL head coach is 30-40, with 31 of those losses by at least 10 points, the most of any coach since 2016. That means a stunning 44 percent of his games have resulted in losses of 10 points or more; the average rate of double-digit losses among active head coaches is just 19 percent.
The only other time the Jets started a season 0-6 was in 1996 under Rich Kotite. That team finished 1-15 and was outscored by 10 points per game more than an average team after adjusting for strength of schedule. Gase’s Jets are being outscored by 17 points per game more than an average team, which would be a franchise worst.
And there is no reason to think New York’s performance will improve with Gase at the helm. Yes, he was once described as an “offensive mastermind” and was the first offensive-minded head coach hired by the Jets since Kotite in 1995. But in the four full seasons Gase has been a head coach, his offenses ranked 21st, 28th, 28th and 32nd in points scored per drive.
The Jets this season are scoring a league-low one point per drive. They rank 31st in yards per play, 32nd in yards per attempt, 31st in yards per drive, 32nd in first downs per pass attempt, 32nd in passer rating, 32nd in third-down conversions, 32nd in red-zone offense and 28th in three-and-out rate. They also punt the ball a league-high 52 percent of the time.
If you want to blame someone for Gase’s elevation to an NFL head coach, you might point a whimsical finger at Peyton Manning. Gase was the wide receivers coach for the Denver Broncos when they signed Manning in 2012, and in Gase’s first season as offensive coordinator in 2013, the future Hall of Fame quarterback set a single-season record with 55 passing touchdowns, helping Denver reach the Super Bowl. That solidified the notion that Gase had a gift with quarterbacks.
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“He’ll be an excellent coach without a doubt,” Manning said when Gase was hired by the Dolphins. “He is ready for this for sure.” Manning also recommended Gase to Jets CEO Christopher Johnson the day before he was hired.
It didn’t appear as if Denver’s success was solely because of Manning. Denver boasted the most efficient offense of 2013 after adjusting for strength of schedule, per Football Outsiders. Pro Football Focus had the Broncos as the most talented offensive team that year, too. Running back Knowshon Moreno rushed for 1,038 yards and 10 touchdowns behind an offensive line that allowed Denver’s rushers to be stopped at or behind the line of scrimmage just 16 percent of the time (the league average was 19 percent). Denver’s offensive front also allowed 141 pressures during the regular season, the third fewest in the NFL.
However, every quarterback Gase has tutored since Manning has performed terribly. During Gase’s time with Denver, Manning produced a 108.7 passer rating. The other starting quarterbacks under his charge, including Brock Osweiler, Jay Cutler, Jimmy Clausen, Joe Flacco, Luke Falk, Matt Moore, Ryan Tannehill, Sam Darnold and Trevor Siemian, have collectively managed a passer rating of 85.0.
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Tannehill, notably, has significantly improved after moving on from his partnership with Gase in Miami, boosting his completion rate, yards per pass, touchdown-to-interception ratio and passer rating.
Ryan Tannehill | Completion rate | Yards per pass | TD-to-INT ratio | Passer rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
With Adam Gase | 66 percent | |||
After Adam Gase | 70 percent |
Darnold, meanwhile, hasn’t developed into the franchise quarterback the Jets imagined. The third overall pick of 2018 has been one of the least valuable passers since he entered the NFL, per ESPN’s Total Quarterback Rating, and ranks last or next to last in completion rate (59 percent), yards per attempt (5.7), touchdown passes (three) and passer rating (70.7). He’s also a distant fifth this season to the other quarterbacks in his draft class — Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Kyle Allen and Baker Mayfield — according to those who chart the games at Pro Football Focus.
You could argue the talent Gase has to work with in New York is lackluster, but several skill position players have blossomed after leaving Gase-led teams. Running back Kenyan Drake went from averaging 28.4 rushing yards per game with Gase in Miami to 80.1 yards with Arizona. Wideout DeVante Parker averaged 44 yards with Gase as his head coach; he has averaged 71.2 yards over the past two seasons without Gase. Parker’s touchdown rate improved from once every 38 targets with Gase calling the plays to once every 15 targets under Miami’s new regime. Robby Anderson has seen his yards per target balloon from 8.1 under Gase last season to 11.1 with the Carolina Panthers this season. Plus, Anderson’s yards per game nearly doubled from one year to the next.
Even if Gase had the talent, it is unclear he could get the most out of it, thanks to an archaic game plan. For example, the Jets run the ball half of the time when they face second and long (eight or more yards) in a close game (within eight points). That’s the second-highest rush rate in such situations this season. That dedication to old-fashioned play-calling comes despite Gase’s reputation as a “great offensive mind” and New York’s lack of talent at the running back position, which thinned out considerably with the release of Le’Veon Bell in Week 6. The results speak for themselves: a league-low 2.3 yards per rushing attempt in those situations.
In third-and-long situations, Gase’s offense is averaging a league-low three yards per play, less than half as efficient as the rest of the NFL (6.7 yards per play). No wonder the Jets are forced to go three-and-out more than a third of the time (35 percent; the league average is 29 percent).
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Gase’s lack of aggressiveness on fourth downs is also hurting the team. In Week 5 against the Arizona Cardinals, Gase twice punted on fourth and one when going for it would have increased their chances of winning.
Jets defensive coordinator Gregg Williams offered a sharp rebuke of the offense after the loss to Arizona, telling a reporter at practice the next day that the 30 points allowed was “not a very good number — and a lot of it’s not all defensively.” Williams has a point. The Jets are only surrendering five points per game more than expected after taking into account the down, distance and field position of each play against them, per data from TruMedia. That is close to the league average. The offense, by comparison, is scoring more than 12 points per game fewer than expected this season, by far the worst mark in the NFL. The Broncos are the second-worst offense compared to expectations, scoring seven points per game fewer than anticipated.
“We haven’t done anything well this year at all,” Gase said, via ESPN.com. “We just hurt ourselves so much. Last year, we trended in the right direction. We improved. … This year, we have to figure out a way to improve really quickly, from top to bottom, coaches, players, it doesn’t matter, everybody. We have to get things better.”
Everyone would agree these Jets have to get better. Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear Gase is the coach to help them do it.
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