The Jets were at a crossroads after the 2022 season. They’d fired offensive coordinator Mike LaFleur and made it obvious, especially behind closed doors, that they felt like they had a good enough roster to get to the playoffs ASAP — they just needed a quarterback. Zach Wilson was not the answer, at least not heading into 2023. So they turned their focus to two veterans: one a pipe dream, the other a more realistic option they felt was good enough to get them over the hump.
At the start of the 2023 offseason, the Jets didn’t actually believe acquiring Aaron Rodgers was realistic. Getting Derek Carr, however, was — especially after the Raiders released him a month before free agency. The Jets visited with Carr in Florham Park and a group that included head coach Robert Saleh took him out to dinner, during which they told Carr they felt he could make it to the Hall of Fame if he came to New York. They had visions of Carr leading the Jets back to the playoffs while also mentoring Wilson behind the scenes.
It never happened. The Jets wound up going down the Rodgers road and Carr landed with the Saints. It didn’t work out for either team or either quarterback. On Saturday, Carr announced his retirement in light of a shoulder injury that would have likely cost him the entire 2025 season. Carr’s retirement, coupled with Rodgers’ ongoing free agency, makes this an appropriate time to look back on that crossroads moment in 2023, and wonder what might have happened had the Jets chosen Carr instead of Rodgers.
Carr, by all accounts, was ready and willing to sign with the Jets had they made him a priority. Carr had a close relationship with then-Jets passing game coordinator Todd Downing from their time together with the Raiders, got along well with Saleh and saw the vision the Jets were pitching. He was coming off a Pro Bowl season in Las Vegas, though statistically it was actually one of the lesser seasons of his career: He completed a career-low 60.8 percent of his passes and threw 14 interceptions, tying a career-high established the year before.
But he would have been a clear upgrade over Wilson and it wouldn’t have cost the Jets any draft picks to sign him. The Jets, though, preferred to wait Rodgers out. Once they had a sense that Rodgers might be willing to seriously consider coming to New York, they made him the priority. Carr felt that; he wasn’t willing to wait while feeling like a fallback plan for the Jets, and the Saints — with Dennis Allen, who coached Carr with the Raiders at one point too, leading the way — were ready to act. They signed him to a four-year, $150 million deal on March 6. Rodgers didn’t announce on “The Pat McAfee Show” that he wanted to be a Jet until March 15.
Rodgers had said he went into his famous darkness retreat 90 percent retired, and came out feeling like he wanted to keep playing. That’s when the Jets flew a contingent of Saleh, general manager Joe Douglas, offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett, president Hymie Elhai, owner Woody Johnson and vice chairman Christopher Johnson to California to woo him. It worked, he became a Jet and the rest is history — a history that won’t be remembered fondly. But what if the Jets had simply prioritized Carr?
If the Jets were a quarterback away in 2022, it was the same in 2023 too. As good as the defense was that year (second in defensive EPA) the offense was the worst in the NFL, derailed by Rodgers’ Achilles injury four plays into the season opener, and hurt by a coaching staff that wasn’t prepared or able to adjust after losing the centerpiece of their new offense. Hackett proved to be a significant downgrade from LaFleur. The offense finished last in offensive EPA, 29th in scoring and 31st in yards.
And yet, somehow, the Jets still mustered seven wins that season, and four of their losses were by less than 10 points. Wilson, who was supposed to take a redshirt year, stepped in and mostly struggled. Jets quarterbacks (including Tim Boyle and Trevor Siemian) combined to throw 11 touchdowns and 15 interceptions while completing 59 percent of their passes.
Meanwhile, the Saints finished 9-8 in 2023 with Carr, admittedly inconsistent, finishing with 3,878 yards, 25 touchdowns and eight interceptions with a 68.4 completion percentage — numbers that would have ranked among the best in Jets franchise history. Would Carr have gotten those numbers with the Jets? Maybe not. Historically, he has struggled while under pressure and the Jets had one of the worst pass-blocking offensive lines in the NFL in 2023. Though the Jets’ offseason also might have gone differently with Carr instead of Rodgers. The Jets appeased Rodgers by signing players like Allen Lazard and Randall Cobb; perhaps they would have instead directed their attention toward upgrading the offensive line and adding some real support at wide receiver for Garrett Wilson.
Would Carr have been worth one or two more wins? It’s hard to argue he wouldn’t have — Jets quarterback play was really poor that year. But the other side of the equation: Carr has not always handled criticism particularly well, and he was mostly shielded from big-market coverage during his years playing in Oakland, Las Vegas and New Orleans. That wouldn’t have been the case with the Jets, where media coverage is relentless and critical when things aren’t going well.
Perhaps the Jets and Carr would have eventually landed in the same place that the Saints and Carr did this offseason, a career cut short by injury and two seasons of disappointment. But if the Jets had signed Carr instead of Rodgers, there at least would have been less drama, and they might have pushed for a playoff spot in 2023, which would have given Douglas and Saleh more breathing room in 2024. We might not be sitting here with Aaron Glenn leading the way for an organization that badly needed a reset. Glenn might even have ended up back in New Orleans, where he coached under Sean Payton for five years. The Saints wanted Glenn this offseason, but he never gave them the time of day — he wanted to be a Jet again.
And so the Carr-Jets marriage that never was will remain that way. Carr is retired, Rodgers is gone and Justin Fields is getting his shot to fix the quarterback woes that have plagued the Jets for many, many years.
(Photo: Gus Stark / Getty Images)
