- WHERE: MetLife Stadium (East Rutherford, N.J.)
- WHEN: 8:15 p.m. ET | ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN Deportes, NFL+
About a week ago, the biggest storyline heading into Bills versus Jets on Monday Night Football might have been returning to the scene where Aaron Rodgers tore his Achilles against Buffalo, ending his first year with New York four plays into the 2023 season.
Then, Jets owner Woody Johnson walked into Robert Saleh’s office on Tuesday morning and fired the head coach after 56 games and a 20-36 record, leaving Gang Green to regroup before hosting the AFC East-leading Bills under interim coach Jeff Ulbrich.
Buffalo has its own issues to contend with, however.
After starting the season with three consecutive victories, including blowouts of 21 and 37 points, the Bills endured a similarly outsized 35-10 beatdown by the Baltimore Ravens and let a close 23-20 game slip through their fingers against the Houston Texans.
Both teams are longing for more consistency.
Both teams are also, technically speaking, where they want to be. Whoever wins Monday night will hold the division lead a third of the way through the season.
Here are four things to watch for when the Bills visit the Jets on Monday night on ESPN and NFL+:
1) Josh Allen desperately needs to bounce back. Allen had the makings of a Most Valuable Player candidate before hitting a snag against the Ravens in Week 4 and tumbling even farther into disarray in Week 5 against the Texans. After leading the Bills to 30-plus points in each of their first three contests thanks in large part to his nine total touchdowns, Allen guided the offense to only 30 points combined against Baltimore and Houston while contributing a lone passing TD. His 30% completion percentage (on 30 attempts!) in his last game was the lowest of his career, and he’s now gone four contests without a rushing score for the first time since Weeks 9-13 of 2021. There remains a silver lining: Allen is still interception-free this season after setting a career high last year with 18. He’s not been taking as many risks in 2024, but amid his recent struggles has also reaped few rewards. He’ll need to both maintain the patience he's seemingly developed and rediscover his accuracy against a brutal Jets secondary if he’s to return to form.
2) Do Jets see noticeable boost? You’d be surprised at what the infusion of a new voice can do. While it’s obviously not always the case, especially considering teams that fire head coaches during a season are usually mired in losing football, the initial game under an interim head coach tends to result in a second wind of sorts. Jets fans seeking optimism needn’t look any further than their own quarterback’s experience. After Green Bay fired Mike McCarthy following a Week 13 loss in 2018, Aaron Rodgers and the Packers responded the very next Sunday with a 34-20 victory over the Atlanta Falcons, the most points they had scored to that point in the season. It’s not out of the question that Rodgers delivers another offensive barrage for New York under Jeff Ulbrich six years later. But long term? History isn’t as kind. Only one team in the Super Bowl era -- the 2021 Raiders -- has ever made the playoffs after replacing a coach midseason, and even that was a case where Jon Gruden resigned rather than received walking papers. Nonetheless, the Jets remain stacked with talent. If they win Monday, they’ll reside atop the AFC East with plenty of runway to rewrite their narrative.
3) Buffalo’s supporting cast not supportive enough yet. Shining a spotlight solely on Josh Allen would miss some of the Bills’ other concerns on offense. Instead of replacing Stefon Diggs this offseason with a new star, Buffalo opted to spread responsibility more evenly across its playmakers. Khalil Shakir has shown the best connection with Allen of the bunch. The third-year pro leads the team in receptions (18), receiving yards (230) and shares the lead for receiving touchdowns (two). However, he's questionable to play after missing two practices this week and the previous game with an ankle injury. Rookie Keon Coleman can provide big plays but not consistency at this stage of his young career. Both of his games with a TD catch featured only that reception, and he was blanked entirely in Week 2. Curtis Samuel has been nonexistent with 48 total receiving yards. Tight end Dalton Kincaid (15 catches for 166 yards and a TD) is underperforming expectations, and while running back James Cook has been stellar with 432 scrimmage yards, he's also questionable to play and dealing with a toe injury that could potentially require bigger roles from Ray Davis and Ty Johnson in attacking New York’s 14th-ranked rushing defense. If the RBs can’t find ground, someone will have to step up against the Jets’ pass D, the second-stingiest in the league.
4) Gang Green’s offensive reboot. Jeff Ulbrich’s first major move as interim head coach involved taking play-calling duties from offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett and transferring them to passing game coordinator Todd Downing. Things have majorly failed to click on that side of the ball, arguably costing Robert Saleh his job despite him being a defensive-minded head coach for a team that ranked fifth in points allowed and second in yards surrendered through five games. Ulbrich was calling plays for the D, so cohesion will remain there. Downing, however, will be tasked with shaking things up for a bottom-eight unit in both scoring and total offense. He didn’t post stellar overall results as the Raiders OC in 2017 or Titans OC from 2021-22, but Tennessee notably had the fifth-most rushing yards on an NFL-leading 551 attempts during his first season in charge. Perhaps he can loosen resistance for Aaron Rodgers in the passing game by unlocking Breece Hall, who has 27 rushing yards combined over the past two contests and is currently averaging 3.0 yards per carry -- 1.8 below his career average entering 2024. Buffalo is vulnerable there, allowing 144 yards per game on the ground.
