JUST GO AHEAD AND PICK THE NEW YORK JETS, HARD KNOCKS

BY ADAM GREENE

It is once again time to award the NFL’s annual booby prize, and appearance on HBO’s Hard Knocks. And if you don’t know what that phrase means, “booby prize” congratulations. Your back probably doesn’t hurt and your hangovers don’t last for three straight days just yet.

For the rest of us raised on Looney Toons and 50s/60s television repeats, “booby prize” is the award given to someone who completely blows a competition, usually something a last place finisher is given as a joke. Back in those days, a “boob” meant an idiot, which is also where the term “booby trap” came from. Anyway, don’t get too curious and start Googling stuff about that at work. Wait until you’re home. The internet is a dangerous place for certain words and, frankly, I’ve probably already altered the SEO of this article exponentially.

Anyway, for those of you who got here on purpose instead of a Google mishap, no NFL franchise worth a damn ever wants to be on Hard Knocks. Which is why the NFL basically has to force teams to do it with the following ruleset that hasn’t changed since the 2014 season.

1. The team cannot have a first-year head coach.

2. The team can’t have gone to the playoffs in the previous two seasons.

3. The team can’t have appeared on Hard Knocks over the past 10 years.

4. As far as I know, a team can still “volunteer” to be on Hard Knocks, but, again, no team on the planet wants that.

Of course, all those rules were tossed out the window in 2020 because of COVID-19. NFL Films featured both their local clubs, the Los Angeles Rams and Chargers, just for proximity and safety. Neither would have qualified under any of the above listed rules.

Now, I have no clue what the rules are for the “in season” version of Hard Knocks and there doesn’t seem to be any. It might be all volunteer, which makes the fact that any owner (and trust me, it’s the owners, not the players or the coaches) would want to do it a real mystery. Literally, both of the “in-season” versions of Hard Knocks ended up with the team featured, who made the playoffs the year before, not making it that season. Furthermore, it also got the coaches featured on those “in-season” franchises fired. Frank Reich, appeared on the first “in-season” Hard Knocks in 2021 was canned by the Indianapolis Colts nine games into last season. Kliff Kingsbury, of the 2022 Arizona Cardinals, never even got a chance to come back and was handed his walking papers as the final whistle sounded in Week 18.

I will be legitimately shocked if any team volunteers for that action this year and, if it holds up as a Wild Card team before, that would be an entirely new set of potential teams. Frankly, I’d love to get a look at the Seattle Seahawks or New York Giants, two franchises that fit that bill and have never been featured on either version of the show.

But we’re talking about the preseason Hard Knocks, the regular, compulsory version, if you will, and it is just as deadly to head coaches as the “in-season” broadcast has been. 

Since 2014, every single head coach outside of the Rams’ Sean McVay (the aforementioned COVID-19 season) in 2020, Mike McCarthy of the Dallas Cowboys in 2021 and Dan Campbell of the Detroit Lions last season, have been fired, most of them at the end of that same year.

We’re talking the 2014 Atlanta Falcons and Mike Smith, the 2016 Rams and Jeff Fisher, the 2017 Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Dirk Koetter, the 2018 Cleveland Browns and Hue Jackson and the “other” LA team in 2020, the Chargers and Anthony Lynn.

Bill O’Brien was probably as shocked as anyone that he made it another five seasons as the head coach of the Houston Texans after the team was featured in 2015. Jon Gruden made it a season and a half past his inaugural appearance on Hard Knocks as head coach of the then Oakland Raiders.

That’s right. In 19 seasons counting the two “in-season” versions of the show, the only head coaches featured that remain employed are McVay, McCarthy and Campbell. And, frankly, McCarthy’s days seem numbered every time he makes a public appearance with Jerry Jones.

So, with all that being said, here are the four teams that fit the criteria to be featured on Hard Knocks even though there’s just no way NFL Films doesn’t want to pick the New York Jets. The only way that isn’t happening is if someone at the league office literally forces them not to.

It wouldn’t be the first time NFL Films has either willingly, or been pushed, to drop the ball so emphatically. That 2014 Falcons team could have been, and should have been, the Pittsburgh Steelers. That’s right. Ben Roethlisberger and Mike Tomlin would have been on Hard Knocks. That is all but inconceivable, so it’s hard to believe some real shenanigans didn’t keep that from happening. The Steelers would have come up again in 2020, but the pandemic apocalypse happened.

The same backroom tomfoolery occurred again with the Sean Payton and Drew Brees with the New Orleans Saints, who could have been on the show in 2016 (the first Rams season) and 2017 (the Buccaneers) after not only two consecutive losing seasons, but three in a row. You could maybe make the argument that the Rams, having just moved to LA, were a better fit in 2016, but there is no excuse that makes any sense as to why you’d feature the Buccaneers over the Saints in 2017.

If the New England Patriots don’t make the playoffs this season, and they won’t, they’ll be eligible in 2024 and there is NO WAY there could ever be a better Hard Knocks selection than that. Seeing Bill Belichick forced to deal with the ultimate stupid distraction, along with his inept sons on the coaching staff as he proves, definitively, that he can’t win anything without Tom Brady would be, to use the grossest word possible to describe it, delicious.

But Roger Goodell and the NFL, they’re dirty and they can’t be trusted.

1. NEW YORK JETS

Last season: 7-10

Odds to win Super bowl: +1400

Odds to win AFC: +800

Odds to win AFC East: +230

Which is why the Jets, while being the best and most obvious choice to be selected for a Hard Knocks preseason feature might, somehow, get “skipped” over.

There’s no question that head coach Robert Saleh has no interest at all in appearing on the program. When asked about it by ESPN, Saleh said, “I’ll leave that one alone.

Special teams coach Justin Hardee, Sr. was a little more emphatic on his Twitter, writing, “Man, ya’ll can give Hard Knocks to another team. Man, we tryna focus and win. That’s a distraction.” To which, I can only say, yes. We know. That’s why it’s so much fun to watch. This is what we want.

The reasons to pick the Jets are obvious. First, they just traded for Aaron Rodgers, the biggest move of the offseason, bringing in the four-time NFL MVP and Super Bowl Champion to a franchise that, obviously, was a quarterback away from competing a year ago. There are plenty of young stars like Breece Hall, Garrett Wilson, Quinnen Williams and Sauce Gardner. They play in the biggest market on the planet and are the talk of the league right now and will be all preseason. It’s a layup of a Hard Knocks pick, just like the Cowboys were in 2021.

But the Steelers and Saints were layups too, and they didn’t happen. Next year’s New England Patriots season should be a slam dunk as well, but does anyone believe that Bill Belichick can’t somehow put the kabosh on that?

And, here’s the thing, the NFL might not WANT to focus too hard on Aaron Rodgers and the Jets because Rodgers has proven himself to be a conspiracy theorist and nutcase. No player in recent NFL history has done more damage to his off the field persona by just sharing his thoughts and opinions while still playing than Rodgers. The less stink eye pointed at Rodgers for the Jets and the league the better. The NFL already broke their own COVID-19 rules back in 2021 with the nutbar after he was busted lying about being vaccinated. Rodgers should have been suspended for multiple games, for each weekly infraction in breaking the league’s COVID-19 protocols all season long up until he busted for not being vaxxed after catching Covid at his own stupid Halloween party.

Are they really looking forward to an NFL Films camera being pointed at Rodgers’ face as he talks about 9/11 and reptilian aliens living inside our hollow moon? I can see why the Jets, Saleh and Goodell might want to think hard on that.

Me, I want to watch every second of it. I want to see Rodgers fire dimes in practice to Wilson and Allen Lazard while his voiceover blames Bigfoot for the assassination of JFK. This could literally (and probably) be the only shot Hard Knocks ever has of featuring Rodgers. You blew it with Roethlisberger. You blew it with Brees. NFL, don’t take this from me.

2. CHICAGO BEARS

Last season: 3-14

Odds to win Super Bowl: +6600

Odds to win NFC: +2500

Odds to win NFC North: +350

We’ve established, even before making this list, that the Jets should be the team selected. But, there’s no reason not to look over the other three contenders and at least figure out why watching them cut whichever UDFA NFL Films has decided to focus on because he has the cutest kid or the worst sob story, might be entertaining.

What would make the Bears interesting? Justin Fields, who took the league by storm, at least statistically, last year and broke out in spite of the team winning just three games. They’ve leaned into Fields, as an organization, traded for extra picks to help him out and brought in a true No. 1 receiver in their trade for that top pick with the Carolina Panthers, in DJ Moore.

They too have some good, young stars even outside those guys like Darnell Wright, their first round pick this season, Darnell Mooney, Chase Claypool, DeMarcus Walker and Tremaine Edmonds. In any other offseason, a regular offseason, you’d be more than happy to see the Bears show up as your Hard Knocks franchise.

Not this offseason. Not this time. This Bears team is still in shambles. As good as Fields looked last season, and the kid threw for 2,242 yards and 17 touchdowns and rushed for 1,143 yards and eight touchdowns, all while beings sacked 55 times (the most surrendered by any offensive line in the league), this team is not making a jump in 2023. They’ll maybe top out at five wins in the NFC North, but this is not a potential playoff team. They’re practically taking the field with an XFL roster and NFL Films is already far too enamored with bottom of the squad guys to give them access to a full team of those kinds of players. If they all have cute toddlers, the show will be all but unwatchable. 

3. NEW ORLEANS SAINTS

Last season: 7-10

Odds to win Super Bowl: +5000

Odds to win NFC: +1400

Odds to win NFC South: +115

The case for the Saints is relatively easy, again if you want to just smack all of civilization right across the face and not pick the Jets. Like New York, they too have made a major quarterback acquisition this offseason, signing Derek Carr as a free agent after he was released by the Raiders. Carr has already been on Hard Knocks before, as has Jameis Winston. There’s plenty of young star power there too, with Chris Olave and Alvin Kamara, plus some potential drama with Michael Thomas coming back from multiple injured seasons.

You also have fun veterans like Marshon Lattimore along with Cameron Jordan and Tyrann Mathieu, who know how to make good television and always deliver solid, on camera moments.

New Orleans also has the benefit of being a legitimate playoff contender since they play in the worst division in the NFL, the NFC South. Two of the teams in that division will be starting either a rookie or second year guy and other is starting Baker Mayfield. Which, honestly, will put a pretty bright spotlight on head coach Dennis Allen and all but guarantee he’ll be fired at the end of the season if they don’t make the playoffs. Of the three other teams on this list, Allen easily has the best chance of being loaded up in the nearest trebuchet after Week 18 and getting flung over the nearest castle wall.

4. WASHINGTON COMMANDERS

Last season: 8-8-1

Odds to win Super Bowl: +8000

Odds to win NFC: +2500

Odds to win NFC East: +1100

While I’ve placed the Commanders last on my potential Hard Knocks list, make no mistake, they are 100 percent in the mix if the league capitulates to the Johnson Family as well as Saleh and skip over the Jets this season. Why? Because, by the time the NFL Films’ cameras start rolling, Daniel Snyder will no longer own the team.

If Snyder was still there, with all the issues he’s caused in the league over the last decade, if not his entire tenure as Washington’s owner, there’s no way in hell they’d let the Hard Knocks cameras anywhere near a Commanders’ facility.

Thanks to Josh Harris and his group of investors, that includes one Earvin “Magic” Johnson, Washington will have new, and much less controversial ownership. Harris, Johnson and the crew have reportedly ponied up $6 billion for the franchise and, considering they’ll probably (and hopefully for their fanbase’s draft position next season) finish in last place in the NFC East, no one would be too perturbed by the presence of the Hard Knocks cameras.

Ron Rivera should be in no danger of getting fired, regardless of the record the team posts (and it will be bad) with its Subway Sandwich Artist-worthy quarterback room. Washington wants to lose, get the top overall pick and draft Caleb Williams out of USC unless some Joe Burrow type QB comes out of nowhere this upcoming college football campaign. Either way, the Commanders want the top pick and couldn’t care less about the “distraction” brought on by the NFL Films crew.

But, as a viewer, the Commanders would be boring as hell because they suck. There’s only so much they can feature Magic Johnson on the program. Terry McLaurin and Jahan Dotson might be future NFL stars, but you can’t base a show on them. Chase Young could still be a superstar if he can get and stay healthy, but the team appears ready to move on from him and didn’t pick up his fifth-year option. He could be traded at any time and certainly by the trade deadline.

The fact that Rivera got this team to an 8-8-1 record last season, with everything going on with Snyder outside the team (and the facilities falling apart), and the weaknesses on this roster was a “Coach of the Year” level performance. But, unless Hard Knocks wants to show a team doing their best to tank without looking as if they’re doing it on purpose, the Washington Commanders would be a pretty boring show.

So it’s the Jets, Hard Knocks. Let’s stop screwing around and make it happen.

Follow Adam Greene on Twitter @TheFirstMan.

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