Tom Rock: Jets can pick up more than one win on Sunday
Jets linebacker Demario Davis runs onto the field before an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns at MetLife Stadium on Oct. 11, 2026, in East Rutherford, N.J. Credit: AP/Seth Wenig
There have been a lot of times in recent years when the Jets faced a game like Sunday’s and it felt like a lose-lose proposition for them. At least it did for the surprisingly large percentage of their fans who seem to root more for draft positioning than for the current team.
A home game against a winless opponent? Ugh. A loss would be embarrassing enough, but all a Jets victory would do is push them down the call sheet in April, further away from that ever-elusive pick who someday will be the key to finally turning the fate of the organization. Meanwhile, by winning, they'd also be nudging their opponent closer to the top pick.
The Jets themselves are never ambivalent about winning, but plenty of their fans are. This year is different, though. This year, facing the 0-5 Dolphins on Sunday at MetLife Stadium feels like something else, a foreign scenario for the franchise's beleaguered fan base.
It could be a win-win.
Gasp!
It’s because these Jets don’t have only their one assigned first-round pick to monitor for next spring. They have two others — both of which currently are ahead of their own, according to Tankathon — that they essentially can root for by hoping the teams they obtained those picks from continue to flounder.
Whatever external pressures that usually would be on them to fail and thus improve their situation should be dramatically decreased by this phenomenon.
So thanks to the trades that sent Sauce Gardner and Quinnen Williams away right around this time last year, the Jets can keep tabs on the picks they’ll be receiving from the Colts and Cowboys. And in case you haven’t noticed, neither of those teams is doing so hot right now. Both of them head into this weekend at 2-4, the same as the Jets.
If the season were over at this point, the Jets would have three of the top 13 picks in the draft: Dallas’ at six, Indy’s at nine and their own at 13. Assuming the trajectories of all three teams remain relatively unchanged for the rest of the year, that should give them plenty of ammunition to either find a franchise quarterback in the draft or acquire one in a trade and maybe even have plenty left over to address another need or two.
It allows even the Jets fans who are on the fence about how to behave — whether to root for or against their team — to cheer wholeheartedly for them while also pulling for, in the case of this week, the Vikings and Eagles, who are playing against the Colts and Cowboys.
That sentiment and slogan the Jets keep repeating about what they want their record to be each week? It shouldn’t be “1-0.” They should say they want to be “1-2” — a win for them and losses for the others to whom their future is tied.
Considering that there are only two winless teams in the league right now and that the Jets have three games remaining against them — two against division rival Miami and a visit from the Chargers next month — this is a really nice place to be for a team that has only the two victories themselves.
Of course, there is a catch to all this feel-good giddiness. With the Jets, there always is.
In order to enjoy the freedom this scenario presents and gain any satisfaction from it, they have to do one little thing.
Remember, it’s a win-win, not a lose-win. The shame of letting an overmatched team like the Dolphins get their first positive tally of the year on the Jets’ turf would override any positives that mock drafts or strength-of-schedule calculations could possibly provide.
They have to beat the Dolphins.
And that might not be as simple as it sounds.
“I don’t think we’re in a position to be looking at anybody’s record,” linebacker Demario Davis said. “It’s not like we got all W’s and no losses where we can feel really good about our record against a winless team. It’s not like that. We have to be ready to put our best on display every time we step on the field. That’s what we’re going to do.”
They may be trying to do it without Breece Hall. The running back could miss a fourth straight game with a quad injury; head coach Aaron Glenn said on Friday he would be questionable for the contest along with guard Dylan Parham (knee). Wide receiver Adonai Mitchell who hasn’t played since Week 2 with a finer injury is expected to be ready for Sunday.
The Jets are a team that hasn’t won an AFC East game since the 2024 season finale, and they are facing a Dolphins team that has beaten them in 10 of the 12 games they played this decade.
Jets safety Minkah Fitzpatrick, who used to play for the Dolphins, was asked about ending those trends. He laughed.
“We gotta win the game,” he said. “At the end of the day, we have to win the game no matter who it is against.”
In the past, a large population of the fan base might have disagreed with that sentiment and hoped more for the consolation prize than the jackpot.
This year? It finally feels almost entirely OK for the Jets to go out and succeed.
Now they just have to do it.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
