The New York Jets experienced what may have been the worst nightmare-turned-reality that any team has been forced to deal with in a long time at the start of the 2023 NFL season, when Aaron Rodgers ruptured his Achilles in the first game of the year.
A season that began with so much promise was over in an instant, and it derailed what would become a two-year run of underwhelming quarterback play that was put out of its misery during the 2025 offseason.
This year, new coach Aaron Glenn is banking on Justin Fields to be Gang Green’s answer under center. Fields’ two-year, $40 million contract certainly suggests the team is confident that his dual-threat ability will result in, at best, more wins, and, at worst, more exciting offensive production.
READ: Justin Fields makes bold prediction for 2025 season
But not all things go according to plan, and in a recent breakdown of every NFL team’s nightmare scenario in 2025, Fields failing to be that guy is what will keep Jets fans up at night.
“Justin Fields doesn’t take a leap,” Bleacher Report’s Brad Gagnon wrote, “while Maye does, and the Jets again become the clear-cut bottom-feeders in the division.”
A glass-half-full approach to the Jets’ 2025 season would suggest Fields can become the second-best quarterback in the AFC East. The Miami Dolphins are always on shaky ground with Tua Tagovailoa, and Maye, while flashing promising upside as a rookie, is far from a finished product. That leaves Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills as the obvious top dog, with Fields having a clear path to QB2 in the division.
A glass-half-empty mindset would suggest that Fields will be who he was with the Chicago Bears and Pittsburgh Steelers: a run-first guy who processes defenses too slowly to be a consistent threat as a passer.
Perhaps a change of scenery and a coaching staff that believes in him is all Fields needs to live up to his first-round pedigree. It shouldn’t take long to find out, and, hopefully, it will be Fields who’s giving defenses nightmares.
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