Robert Saleh said he was blindsided to learn that he was fired as the Jets’ head coach on Tuesday and a report indicates he was considering making a big change to the coaching staff before he got his pink slip.
Jonathan Jones of CBS Sports reports that Saleh was considering firing offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett in the wake of the team’s loss to the Vikings in Week Five. Passing game coordinator Todd Downing would likely have been the choice to replace Hackett.
Firing Hackett likely would have ruffled some feathers with quarterback Aaron Rodgers as their past relationship from Green Bay was seen as the reason why Hackett got the job with the Jets in the first place. Jets owner Woody Johnson said on Tuesday that he did not speak to Rodgers about firing Saleh before choosing to part ways with the head coach, but Johnson might have taken Rodgers’s feelings for Hackett into account if there were issues with the relationships on the coaching staff.
However that fell into place, the result is that defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich is now the interim head coach and the Rodgers/Hackett tandem remains at the helm of an offense that has scored the same amount of points through five games as the Jets managed without Rodgers last season.
