For two veterans who have participated in 12 losing NFL seasons together, this Jets season has certainly been different.
Neither Tyler Conklin nor Quinnen Williams visualized themselves with a 3-10 record and no playoff games.
And it’s hard to blame them either.
They started with a healthy Aaron Rodgers, who has played just four snaps this year after tearing his Achilles tendon in the 2023 season opener.
Of course, they believed this would be different for the future Hall of Famer.
The Jets also brought in eight-time Pro Bowl tackle Tyron Smith and star edge rusher Haason Reddick.
They ended the Jack Wilson era.
They re-signed a reliable kicker in Greg Zuerlein.
Robert Saleh was entering his fourth year with the Jets and was expected to not only have a winning season but also help put together another of the league’s best defensive groups.
It seemed like there were elements to turn things around, but the season unfolded in disastrous fashion.
The Jets have lost their last four games, most recently a 32-26 overtime loss to the Dolphins in Week 14. The loss officially puts them out of playoff contention for 14 consecutive seasons.
“If you can’t win a football game every week, you can’t make the playoffs. I think the most important thing is the most important thing. “It’s like we need to win a football game and we haven’t won enough to do that this year.” Williams spoke to The Post after practice Friday ahead of Sunday’s game against the Jaguars.
“So it’s going to be the same thing that happens every year. Let’s go back to the drawing board and see what we did wrong. I look at what I did wrong and especially what I can do next year to help this organization. “To help us get to where we want to go, which is the playoffs and the Super Bowl.”
Conklin spoke to The Post about whether he imagined the Jets would be ahead in Week 15. “Nobody on this team (coaches, players) expected going into this game. The situation we are in now. But that’s why you have to go out and play football on Sunday and that’s it.”
The seventh-year tight end added that this year is “a little more painful than usual” because of the expectations the Jets have of themselves.
What’s more frustrating for the Jets is that there doesn’t seem to be a single game or moment that can help us understand where the problem arose.
Rather, it’s seemingly more than just one thing that has led them to tie the second-worst record in the NFL with the Panthers, Patriots, Browns, and Titans over time. Just above the lowly Giants and Raiders.
The Jets have also lost five games by three to six points this season. That’s the exact opposite of the Chiefs (12-1), who have proven to be escape artists in late-game situations with seven wins under the same parameters.
“I can’t pinpoint exactly what went wrong,” Conklin said. “It wasn’t the exact moment something changed, and things didn’t seem right. It’s an accumulation of things. This year we had a lot of close games that didn’t go our way. … So not being able to win that game definitely hurt us.”
“There are little things here and there,” Williams added. “Like a lot of times, the defense didn’t come to play. There were many cases where the attack did not work. In many cases, special teams weren’t there to watch the game. To win a football game and advance to the next level, every position and every unit must play. And to achieve that ultimate goal, the organization and each member of the team has to come in and play every week, from top to bottom.”
The final four games could be the last time Conklin struggles in New York as he is set to become a free agent.
Williams is under contract through 2027 after signing a four-year, $96 million contract extension in July 2023, and in his seventh year with the Jets, he will be tasked with helping lead the team to a turnaround.
