The Definitive Ranking of All 42 New York Jets Quarterbacks Since 1990
In trading for Aaron Rodgers, the Jets hope they’ve finally found the player who will end their decades of quarterback misery. But before Rodgers takes his first snap, let’s rank all of the (mostly bad) QBs of the past 33 years.
I wish I had goldfish brain so that I could truly get excited for the prospect of Aaron Rodgers, New York Jets quarterback. I know that I should be thrilled: The 2022 Jets had an elite defense and an exciting young offensive core and missed the playoffs only because they had the worst quarterback room in the NFL. Now, they have the guy who won two of the last three MVP awards. They solved for X, and everything seems to be going great. Have you seen Hard Knocks? It makes you want to run through a wall! Did you read about how Rodgers is being a good teammate for the first time in forever? He even took a pay cut!
But in my lifetime as a Jets fan, competent quarterback play has always been the missing piece of the puzzle, and every attempt to find it has failed. They have traded for quarterbacks and failed. They have tried to tank and draft multiple times, and each first-round pick has failed. They have signed veterans and attempted to develop youngsters and failed. This is not even the first time they’ve traded for a disgruntled late-career Packer with multiple MVPs and a Super Bowl ring. (The first one failed.) Lucy pulled the football away from Charlie Brown every time; Jets quarterbacks throw it to members of the Patriots secondary every time.
Since I was born in 1990, the Jets have ranked 30th out of 32 teams in touchdown rate, interception rate, yards per attempt, and completion percentage. Most Jets passing records are still held by Joe Namath, who set many of them before his AFL team merged with the NFL. He remains the only Jets quarterback with a 4,000-yard passing season, a remarkable stat considering that seasons consisted of 14 games when Namath set that record in 1967 and have 17 games now. Only seven Jets quarterbacks have ever had winning records as starters, and only one of those (Vinny Testaverde) has a record more than four games over .500.
The Ringer’s Fantasy Football Rankings
From sleepers to busts, we’ve projected every player in your upcoming draft.
Two years ago, I ranked every Bears quarterback since their 1985 Super Bowl win. As another franchise whose few successes came because of the strength of elite defenses and that has otherwise been defined by horrendous quarterback play, the Jets were the next logical choice. Indeed, in the Super Bowl era, the Jets and Bears are 31st and 32nd, respectively, in passer rating.
Now that I have compiled this list about the Jets, I’d like to apologize for the emotional trauma I must have caused Chicago fans two years ago. Researching Bears quarterbacks was an enjoyable endeavor for me as I learned all the tidbits and stories behind bad quarterback after bad quarterback. Writing the Jets version has felt like crawling in a dark labyrinth of repressed football memories. I thought exploring the bad times would make me more enthusiastic about the Jets’ potentially bright future. Instead, I can’t see Rodgers without imagining the ghost of Brooks Bollinger behind him.
I have decided to keep roughly the same, albeit far from scientific, formula from my Bears quarterback ranking, with one major tweak:
- We ranked 42 players, and they were awarded from 0 to 42 points on a sliding scale based on how many passing touchdowns they scored for the Jets. This is a way to reflect how well these quarterbacks performed specifically for the Jets. For example, Chad Pennington passed for the second-most touchdowns of any Jets quarterback since 1990, so he received 41 points. If a QB on this list had no touchdown passes for the Jets, he got 0 points.
- Quarterbacks received from 0 to 42 points for their ranking on Pro Football Reference’s career approximate value list. This is a way to gauge how successful a player’s career was overall. If a player had a career AV of 0, he received no points in that category.
- Quarterbacks received one point for every win as a Jets starter. I know the problems with wins as a quarterback stat, but look: The quarterbacks who played in wins made me happy, and the ones who played in losses made me sad. So points for wins.
- Players are given one bonus point per achievement if at any time in their career before or after joining the Jets they won the Super Bowl as a starter, earned a Pro Bowl selection or first-team All-Pro honor, or led the league in a major statistical category. In the Bears ranking I gave five points for each of these feats, but the Bears had fewer players with notable career honors. In this case, Brett Favre would have gotten 125 points from these categories alone, enough to make him the no. 1 Jet even though he played just one awkward season in New York. Did I make this tweak specifically to keep Favre out of the top spot? Yes, absolutely. Why? Because screw Favre, that’s why.
- Five bonus points are awarded for any quarterback who hit any of those milestones with the Jets or set a Jets single-season or franchise record. Unfortunately, most of these franchise records are still held by Namath.
- I have also awarded 1 bonus point to the lone player on this list who won a championship in the Canadian Football League.
- I used 1985 as a starting date for the Bears because that’s when they won a Super Bowl. Unfortunately, the Jets haven’t won a Super Bowl since my dad was in elementary school. I decided to use 1990, the year of my birth, so that readers could get a full understanding of how much mental damage I have suffered. Players who began their Jets careers before 1990 had their full Jets career totals included.
- While I am not including non-quarterbacks who threw passes for the Jets on trick plays, the Jets have had three players who alternated between quarterback and other positions over the course of their careers. I’ve included all three on this list.
- In cases of ties, quarterbacks are ranked by how much I hate them.
42. Kliff Kingsbury
Total points: 0
Jets touchdowns: 0
Career AV: 0
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
Better known as a record-setting college quarterback and a deeply frustrating head coach, Kingsbury threw only two NFL passes, both in a blowout Jets loss in 2005. The Jets later considered hiring Kingsbury, a supposed offensive mastermind, for their head-coaching job in the 2019 offseason before he took the Cardinals job; I’d say “bullet dodged,” but they hired Adam Gase instead.
41. Chris Streveler
Total points: 1
Jets touchdowns: 0
Career AV: 0
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 1 (won the CFL championship)
The only thing Jets-ier than earnestly believing your fourth-string quarterback is better than the guy you recently drafted second overall is being proved right. With the Jets on the cusp of a playoff berth down the stretch of the 2022 season, Zach Wilson turned in a Week 16 Thursday Night Football stinker against the Jaguars. With backup Mike White and third-stringer Joe Flacco injured, the Jets benched Wilson for Streveler, a former CFL champ. He significantly outperformed Wilson, with the Jets gaining more yards on Streveler’s three drives (144) than they did in Wilson’s three quarters (93). But the Jets still lost 19-3; Streveler was recently cut without making another appearance for the team.
40. Luke Falk
Total points: 6
Jets touchdowns: 0
Career AV: 1 (T-38th, 6 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
Because of my stupid semi-objective formula, Falk isn’t last on the list, but I think he’s the worst Jets quarterback I’ve ever watched. Falk was forced into action one week into the 2019 season after Sam Darnold got mono and backup Trevor Siemian injured his ankle. It’s not just that Falk threw no touchdowns: The offense didn’t really have any scoring drives in his three games, two of which he started. The Jets scored two defensive touchdowns, kicked a field goal on the drive in which Siemian got injured, and scored on an end-around one play after an opposing muffed punt in the red zone. He had a remarkable 18 percent sack rate, the highest of any quarterback with at least 50 pass attempts in a season since 2000. After Darnold recovered from mono, the Jets cut Falk, who was never signed to an NFL team again.
39. Troy Taylor
Total points: 16
Jets touchdowns: 2 (T-28th, 16 points)
Career AV: 0
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
Taylor was a fourth-round pick for the Jets in 1990 and got into a handful of games over the course of two years, mainly in mop-up duty. Now the head coach at Stanford, he has a chance to outperform Kingsbury as both a Jet and a coach.
38. Tim Tebow
Total points: 16
Jets touchdowns: 0
Career AV: 12 (T-27th, 16 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
No sports team has ever made a more First Take–ass decision than the Jets’ trade for Tebow in 2012. Anybody with critical-thinking skills could see that the Broncos’ 2011 playoff run was a spectacular string of close, luck-heavy victories rather than a display of elite quarterbacking. Everybody except for the Jets, who traded for Tebow without any legitimate plans for the headline-grabbing Heisman winner. They were stuck with a backup quarterback who could not provide backup for the starter while they simultaneously caused a massive media frenzy as their brief Rex Ryan–era window of relevance closed.
The Jets seem to have caught the Tebow bug when they lost to him in 2011 at the peak of #TebowMania. He showed little passing prowess in that game against the Jets, going 9-for-20 for 104 yards, but Denver’s defense scored a touchdown on a Sanchez pick-six, and Tebow ran for a game-winning score in the game’s final minute. The Broncos and Jets both wound up finishing the season 8-8, so that win helped Denver sneak into the playoffs as AFC West champs, while the Jets sat at home. Denver revamped its offense the next spring with an actual quarterback, adding Peyton Manning; the Jets opted for gimmickry and got worse.
The Jets mainly used Tebow on special teams and trick plays, and when they benched Sanchez late in the season, they turned to third-stringer McElroy over Tebow. Special teams coordinator Mike Westhoff, who worked closely with Tebow on the punt team, called the decision to trade for him “a mess,” acknowledging that the Jets never really practiced the Wildcat-style packages they said they would implement after he came to the team. Tebow threw only eight passes for the Jets, and he hasn’t played in an NFL game since—but hey, at least the Jets Tebow experience was less embarrassing than the Jaguars Tebow experience.
37. Patrick Ramsey
Total points: 17
Jets touchdowns: 0
Career AV: 15 (26th, 17 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
Ramsey is the only player on this list whose Jets tenure I had completely forgotten. The former first-round pick was supposed to compete with a rehabbing Pennington for the starting job in 2006 but threw only one pass in New York, an incompletion.
36. Matt Simms
Total points: 19
Jets touchdowns: 1 (T-31st, 13 points)
Career AV: 1 (T-38th, 6 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
The lesser of the two Simms Sons, Matt had more interceptions than touchdowns in a forgettable college career at Louisville and Tennessee, but for some reason the Jets signed him anyway. Simms backed up Geno Smith and got a handful of snaps in blowouts. He somehow stayed in the NFL until 2019—honestly, news to me—but only the Jets were desperate enough to give him snaps in regular-season games.
35. Greg McElroy
Total points: 19
Jets touchdowns: 1 (T-31st, 13 points)
Career AV: 1 (T-38th, 6 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
There’s a reason McElroy is now an ESPN college football commentator and not an ESPN NFL commentator—his college career at Alabama was a bit more glamorous than his two-season stint with the Jets. But he did have a moment of glory as part of a riveting Jets quarterback triangle with fellow college superstars Mark Sanchez and Tim Tebow. (Tebow is also an ESPN college football commentator, for the same reason as McElroy.) After three Sanchez interceptions in a December game against the Cardinals, Rex Ryan benched the starter and went to the third-stringer McElroy, who came off the bench and threw the only touchdown in a 7-6 win over the Cardinals—a decade later, it’s still the most recent game won by a team scoring exactly seven points. Ryan kept shuffling his quarterback deck, returning Sanchez to the starter spot, then later re-benching him for McElroy, who lost his only start before suffering a season-ending concussion.
34. Trevor Siemian
Total points: 20
Jets touchdowns: 0
Career AV: 18 (23rd, 20 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
Remember the much-memed Darnold mono graphic? That was meant to explain to ESPN’s Monday Night Football audience why they were getting Siemian at quarterback instead of the advertised 2019 matchup between Darnold and Baker Mayfield, two of the top three picks from the prior year’s draft. But they wouldn’t get much of Siemian, either—he suffered a season-ending ankle injury on an illegal hit by Myles Garrett just three drives into the game, ending his Jets career. (A real bummer for me, perhaps the world’s only Northwestern-Jets combo fan.)
33. Bryce Petty
Total points: 30
Jets touchdowns: 4 (T-22nd, 21 points)
Career AV: 4 (35th, 8 points)
Jets wins: 1 (1 point)
Bonus points: 0
In the spirit of being Petty, I’ll turn his blurb into a discussion of the actual worst Jets draft pick ever: Christian Hackenberg. Hackenberg was the Jets’ second-round pick in 2016, and if you’re a second-round pick, you should be able to win a backup job. But he couldn’t beat out Petty, a Day 3 pick who was forced to start seven execrable games over two seasons. Petty threw more than twice as many interceptions (10) as touchdowns (four) while going 1-6 with four 20-point losses. Petty is one of the worst Jets quarterbacks ever to play in a game, let alone start one, but ranked above several better players because Hackenberg couldn’t even get a single snap, failing to qualify for this grotesque parade of poor passers.
32. Josh Johnson
Total points: 31
Jets touchdowns: 3 (T-24th, 19 points)
Career AV: 8 (T-31st, 12 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
The Jets have a long tradition of journeyman quarterbacks who suited up for handfuls of NFL teams but played their best ball in New York—Ryan Fitzpatrick, Josh McCown, and the king of NFL journeymen, Johnson. Johnson has famously “played for” more teams than any other NFL player, although most of the time he’s been only a practice squad or training camp signee with no actual regular-season experience. Johnson came to New York in 2021, having already played for 13 NFL teams (including a preseason stint with the Jets in 2015) as well as for teams in the UFL, AAF, and XFL. He replaced an injured Mike White (who was playing in place of an injured Zach Wilson) against the Colts in Week 9 and threw for 317 yards and three touchdowns (both career highs) after coming off the bench. Despite Johnson’s heroics, the Jets still lost, and they sent him back to the bench instead of finally giving us all the full Johnson starting QB experience we deserve.
31. Brad Smith
Total points: 34
Jets touchdowns: 1 (T-30th, 13 points)
Career AV: 20 (22nd, 21 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
One of my most firmly held albeit incorrect beliefs is that the Jets should’ve gone, “YOLO” and given Smith a chance to be QB1. Do we really think he would’ve been worse than Clemens? After he had a record-setting career running the option at Mizzou, the Jets used a fourth-round pick on Smith in 2006, purportedly to play him as a wide receiver. They surprised the rookie by letting him play quarterback in a preseason game—literally, he wasn’t expecting it—and Smith led the team to a comeback win over the Eagles. It was the last chance he got to run the offense. He occasionally got to play Wildcat-style QB, but the Jets’ insistence on making Smith a jack-of-all-trades limited his production. He threw for only 51 yards in five seasons with the Jets and never had more than 400 scrimmage yards in a season.
30. Jeff Blake
Total points: 35
Jets touchdowns: 0
Career AV: 81 (9th, 34 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 1 (one Pro Bowl)
There’s an alarming amount of crossover between this Jets list and the Cincinnati Bengals; much of that is due to Bruce Coslet, who was hired as the Jets’ coach in 1990 after a successful stint as the Bengals’ offensive coordinator, was fired in 1994, and then went back to Ohio to become the Bengals’ offensive coordinator again. With the Jets, Blake was stuck on the bench behind Nagle and played in only three games. But Coslet took a liking to him, seeing Blake as a project, and he was eventually proved right—just not in New York. Coslet brought Blake to Cincinnati, where he made the 1995 Pro Bowl in his first full season as a starter. However, he eventually lost his job when Boomer Esiason returned to play for the Bengals late in the 1997 season.
29. Jack Trudeau
Total points: 36
Jets touchdowns: 1 (T-30th, 13 points)
Career AV: 25 (21st, 22 points)
Jets wins: 1 (1 point)
Bonus points: 0
Trudeau is a solid example of why I shouldn’t be using quarterback wins as a stat here: The longtime Colts backup came to the Jets in 1994 and technically went 1-1 as a starter, but the one win was actually a game in which Boomer Esiason entered in the second quarter and led a comeback victory.
28. Browning Nagle
Total points: 37
Jets touchdowns: 7 (T-18th, 25 points)
Career AV: 5 (T-34th, 9 points)
Jets wins: 3 (3 points)
Bonus points: 0
The Jets nearly got Favre at the beginning of his career instead of at the end. Then–Jets executive Ron Wolf reportedly had Favre as the top player on his draft board, and as the future Hall of Fame quarterback kept falling and falling, it looked like the Jets might be able to snag him with the 34th pick. Instead, the Falcons picked him 33rd. The Jets panicked and picked Nagle, Wolf took a job with the Packers and traded for Favre the next year, and the rest is history. Back in New York, Nagle rode the bench as a rookie while Ken O’Brien led the Jets to the 1991 playoffs. The next season, the Jets felt pressured to play their young prospect and inexplicably benched O’Brien for Nagle, a decision that head coach Bruce Coslet would later call “the biggest mistake of my coaching career.” The Jets went 3-10 with Nagle as a starter as he threw seven touchdowns and 17 interceptions. At one point, Coslet decided he couldn’t trust Nagle to run the two-minute offense and concocted a cockamamie strategy in which Nagle started but O’Brien played at the ends of halves, a doomed platoon that shattered Nagle’s confidence. Nagle never got significant playing time again after the 1992 season; Favre won three MVPs and a Super Bowl.
27. Brooks Bollinger
Total points: 37
Jets touchdowns: 7 (T-18th, 25 points)
Career AV: 6 (33rd, 10 points)
Jets wins: 2 (2 points)
Bonus points: 0
Bollinger was a third-stringer forced into action after injuries were suffered by Pennington and Jay Fiedler in 2004 and 2005. The Jets briefly fished a 41-year-old Vinny Testaverde out of semi-retirement but quickly realized that Bollinger was a better option, even if he did sometimes throw four interceptions in a single game.
26. Mike White
Total points: 37
Jets touchdowns: 8 (17th, 26 points)
Career AV: 5 (T-34th, 9 points)
Jets wins: 2 (2 points)
Bonus points: 0
Mike White magic lasted for one beautiful afternoon in 2021. Wilson suffered an injury midway through his struggle-filled rookie season, giving White the chance to start against the eventual AFC champion Bengals. It should’ve been a disaster: White was a fifth-round pick who had been languishing on the Jets roster for two years without ever playing in a game. He’s not even one of the top two Google results for “Mike White.” (Personally, I’d put him behind the White Lotus guy and ahead of the Georgia basketball coach.) Yet White somehow outdueled Joe Burrow, going 37-for-45 for 405 yards and three touchdowns (and two interceptions, but shut up) and throwing touchdown passes on back-to-back drives to rally the Jets back from an 11-point fourth-quarter deficit and win. From nowhere, the third-most famous Mike White had thrown for the 10th-most yards in Jets history. That game created enough belief that the Jets kept turning to White when Wilson flailed throughout the 2021 and 2022 seasons, but he won just one more game as a starter, threw four more touchdowns, and had eight interceptions.
25. Glenn Foley
Total points: 40
Jets touchdowns: 10 (16th, 27 points)
Career AV: 8 (T-31st, 12 points)
Jets wins: 1 (1 point)
Bonus points: 0
Foley had a decent career for a seventh-round pick. He surprised the Patriots in a 1996 game when he came off the bench and completed 14 consecutive passes to lead a comeback victory—after the game, the Pats defense claimed they hadn’t even noticed Foley had replaced Neil O’Donnell—and he was named the Jets’ Week 1 starter in 1998. But he’d quickly lose his starting job to Testaverde. His Jets career ended with a 1-7 record as a starter, and he had more interceptions than touchdowns.
24. Quincy Carter
Total points: 40
Jets touchdowns: 3 (T-24th, 19 points)
Career AV: 17 (T-24th, 19 points)
Jets wins: 2 (2 points)
Bonus points: 0
Carter was another player in a long line of quarterbacks who started when Pennington was out with various injuries, and he helped the Jets win two games in a tight race to the AFC postseason in 2004. But Carter, whose career was derailed by arrests and suspensions for issues with alcohol and drugs, abruptly left the team after its playoff win against the Chargers to check himself into a rehab facility. The Jets didn’t re-sign him in 2005, and he never played in an NFL game again. He even struggled to catch on in the CFL because of a “serious marijuana problem” (In Canada! I thought you guys were chill!) and wound up playing in various indoor leagues.
23. Kellen Clemens
Total points: 41
Jets touchdowns: 5 (T-20th, 23 points)
Career AV: 10 (29th, 14 points)
Jets wins: 4 (4 points)
Bonus points: 0
The trajectory of the Jets would be a lot different if Clemens had been, you know, good. After he was drafted in the second round in 2006, the Jets hoped Clemens could be a long-term successor to Pennington, whom they finally benched for good after a 1-7 start to the 2007 season. But Clemens quickly established that he wasn’t the solution, throwing five touchdowns and 10 interceptions in eight starts. That meant the Jets’ hunt for a competent quarterback continued, and they traded for Favre in 2008 and drafted Sanchez in 2009, with Clemens serving as backup to both. The trajectory of the Jets would also be different if Clemens had been worse: If they’d won one fewer game in 2007, they would’ve been able to draft Matt Ryan instead of Vernon Gholston.
22. Tony Eason
Total points: 41
Jets touchdowns: 1 (T-30th, 13 points)
Career AV: 39 (15th, 28 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
Eason barely qualifies for this ranking as a backup for the 1990 Jets. If he’d posted his Patriots stats (a 28-21 record, 60 touchdown passes, and a trip to the Super Bowl) with the Jets, he’d be one of our franchise greats, yet most Patriots fans have probably long forgotten about him.
21. Jay Fiedler
Total points: 43
Jets touchdowns: 1 (T-30th, 13 points)
Career AV: 43 (13th, 30 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 0
The Jets must have the all-time lead in backup quarterbacks who immediately got injured. (The 49ers are contending for the title.) Fiedler was Pennington’s backup in 2005, but he suffered a season-ending shoulder injury during the same game in which Pennington suffered a season-ending shoulder injury. I swear shoulder injuries aren’t contagious for the other 31 teams in the league.
20. Rick Mirer
Total points: 51
Jets touchdowns: 5 (T-20th, 23 points)
Career AV: 36 (17th, 26 points)
Jets wins: 2 (2 points)
Bonus points: 0
Mirer is one of a handful of players bad enough to rank as a mid- or bottom-tier quarterback on both the Jets and Bears versions of this post, and it’s tough to tell which team regretted employing the no. 2 draft pick more. His Bears stint was egregiously bad—Chicago gave up a first-round pick for Mirer, who never threw a touchdown for the team and quickly became third string. The Jets gave up only a sixth-round pick to trade for Mirer, but they almost certainly would’ve made the postseason in the 1999 season if they had turned to third-stringer Ray Lucas instead of Mirer from the start. In fact, they would’ve made the playoffs if they had let punter Tom Tupa keep playing quarterback in the season opener instead of letting Mirer, who threw two fourth-quarter interceptions, play. (More on this later. Much more on this later.) Instead, the Jets missed the postseason by one game, Bill Parcells retired, and Bill Belichick left the Jets for the Patriots—and, yes, I’m saying the Patriots dynasty is Mirer’s fault.
19. Frank Reich
Total points: 51
Jets touchdowns: 15 (T-12th, 31 points)
Career AV: 17 (T-24th, 19 points)
Jets wins: 1 (1 point)
Bonus points: 0
The current Panthers head coach spent most of his 13-year playing career as a backup, mostly in Buffalo, where he started just eight regular-season games in nine seasons. A rare exception was his lone year with the Jets in 1996, when he started seven. Unfortunately, it was the worst year in Jets history, as the team went 1-15. In Reich’s defense, he was responsible for the only win. All that losing nearly solved the Jets’ quarterback problems, as they had the no. 1 pick in the 1997 draft, but a month before the draft, Peyton Manning decided to return to Tennessee for his senior season. (The Jets traded out of no. 1, and the Rams took future Hall of Fame tackle Orlando Pace at that spot.)
18. Bubby Brister
Total points: 51
Jets touchdowns: 4 (T-22nd, 21 points)
Career AV: 42 (14th, 29 points)
Jets wins: 1 (1 point)
Bonus points: 0
The Jets had a Boomer-Bubby tandem in 1995, which has to be the only quarterback duo in NFL history entirely made up of players who used nicknames instead of first names. (This may or may not be true, but there’s no way to look it up.) Regardless of whether the Jets were led by someone with a nickname more associated with a person born in the 1950s or a Jewish grandmother, they were terrible, finishing 3-13.
17. Ray Lucas
Total points: 51
Jets touchdowns: 14 (T-14th, 29 points)
Career AV: 12 (T-27th, 16 points)
Jets wins: 6 (6 points)
Bonus points: 0
There are 40 quarterbacks on this list, and somewhere between 35 and 39 of them make me sad or frustrated or viscerally angry—and then there is Lucas, who probably has the highest approval rating among Jets fans of any quarterback included here. (There’s a reason he’s been a Jets analyst for SNY while virtually any other quarterback on this list would cause fans to turn their TVs off in fury.) Lucas grew up in Harrison, New Jersey, and set the all-time passing touchdown record at Rutgers (since broken), which makes him a rare homegrown Jet. When he got a chance to start in 1999, he won six of nine starts while throwing 14 touchdowns and six interceptions, taking a Jets team that started 1-6 to the brink of the playoffs. (I’m particularly fond of the night Lucas threw two 50-yard fourth-quarter touchdowns on Monday Night Football to beat the Dolphins.) Lucas didn’t replicate the success for the rest of his career, but he has literally the highest winning percentage of all Jets quarterbacks with more than three starts. Put him in the Ring of Honor.
16. Zach Wilson
Total points: 52
Jets touchdowns: 15 (T-12th, 31 points)Career AV: 9 (30th, 13 points)
Jets wins: 8 (8 points)
Bonus points: 0
Of all the Jets’ quarterback busts—and there are so, so many—Wilson has to be the biggest. With the second pick in a soon-to-be-legendary 2021 draft class, the Jets selected Wilson, who was considered a fringe prospect until he tore up BYU’s COVID-pandemic-altered 2020 schedule. Sure, Justin Fields was clearly an elite prospect from the time he was still in high school, but the Jets passed on him because Wilson made a cool throw at his pro day. (They also passed on Ja’Marr Chase and Micah Parsons, and so on and so on.)
Jets busts like Sanchez and Darnold failed to live up to their high draft positions—but Wilson has been one of the worst quarterbacks in the NFL in each of his two seasons. There haven’t even been moments of top-tier play for us to cling to; it’s hard to identify a single good game he’s had as the Jets quarterback. In addition to his poor play, Wilson has rubbed teammates the wrong way. He was widely criticized for a press conference answer in which he didn’t take responsibility for a 77-yard passing performance in a 10-3 loss to the Patriots last season, and his teammates celebrated like this when Mike White led them to a win after Wilson was benched. The plus side is that Wilson has been so bad, the Jets were able to give up on him in less than two years.
15. Tom Tupa
Total points: 53
Jets touchdowns: 2 (T-27th, 16 points)
Career AV: 38 (67th, 27 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 10 (first-team All-Pro, one Pro Bowl as a Jet)
Is Tupa really the 16th-best quarterback on this list? I don’t care. I’d put him at no. 1 if I thought I could get away with it. I would rather talk about Tupa’s one game as a Jets quarterback than anything else on the planet. Gather round, and allow me to tell you the tale of Tupa—just like I plan on doing for my kids every night at bedtime.
Tupa was the Jets’ punter from 1999 to 2001. At Ohio State, Tupa was one of the last legitimate two-way players—a starting quarterback and an All-American punter. NFL evaluators, though, thought he’d be more valuable as a quarterback, and that’s where the Cardinals had him play after drafting him. He couldn’t quite cut it as a passer, though, and by 1994, he’d shifted to punting full-time. When he came to New York in 1999, it was to punt. After all, the Jets had Testaverde and a veteran backup in Mirer. Tupa’s throwing days were long gone.
OR SO EVERYBODY THOUGHT.
For some reason, Bill Parcells decided to try to save a roster spot by listing Tupa as the backup quarterback on game days and listing Mirer as the emergency third-string quarterback—meaning, according to the NFL’s rules at the time, if Mirer entered the game before the fourth quarter, the starter and backup would be ineligible to reenter. That unusual choice became relevant right away. In the season opener, Testaverde’s Achilles tendon popped on a second-quarter handoff. The Tuna’s Tupa two-step had backfired. The Jets would have to play a punter at quarterback for two quarters or give up on special teams for the rest of the game.
It should’ve been a disaster: Tupa hadn’t thrown a pass outside of occasional trick plays in years, hadn’t been practicing with the offense, and was wearing punting cleats. But Tupa’s very first pass was a 25-yard touchdown to Keyshawn Johnson. He later connected on 50- and 65-yard passes to Johnson, who recorded a career-high 194 receiving yards that day. The Jets roared back to take a punter-powered 28-27 lead heading into the fourth quarter.
But then the Jets brought in Mirer … who went 4-for-11 with two interceptions. Tupa was named first-team All-Pro as a punter that season but never played quarterback again. The Jets missed the postseason by one game—they should’ve stuck with Tupa and never looked back.
14. Mark Brunell
Total points: 60
Jets touchdowns: 2 (T-27th, 16 points)
Career AV: 120 (5th, 38 points)
Jets wins: 0
Bonus points: 6 (three Pro Bowls; led league in yardage, yards per attempt, and interception rate)
Brunell came to the Jets at the end of his career to back up Sanchez and serve as a mentor. Unfortunately, 25-year-old Sanchez was closer in age—and, apparently, maturity—to Brunell’s school-aged sons than to the 41-year-old former Jaguar. ESPN reported that Sanchez frequently went to the Brunell house, spending hours playing video games, dodgeball, and backyard football with his teammate’s children.
13. Michael Vick
Total points: 62
Jets touchdowns: 3 (T-24th, 19 points)
Career AV: 112 (6th, 37 points)
Jets wins: 1 (1 point)
Bonus points: 5 (four Pro Bowls, one Comeback Player of the Year award)
Jets quarterback dysfunction peaked when they went to San Diego to play the Chargers in 2014. Starter Geno Smith missed a team meeting because he went to the movies, blaming the mistake on his inability to comprehend time zones when pressed by the media. (It’s unclear whether he got the movie showtime correct.) Smith played terribly and was benched at halftime for Vick—but Vick was 34 and a full-time backup for the second time in his career (the other being shortly after he was released from prison and joined the Eagles). Vick admitted that he hadn’t fully prepared to play, saying that he “took the scout team for granted,” leaving the team without a competent starter or backup in a 31-0 blowout loss. After a 1-7 start to the season, the Jets benched Smith for Vick, who still had a few ounces left in the tank—and if you don’t believe me, watch his performance against the Steelers, his lone win as a Jet. He could still make guys miss. But this wasn’t Madden NFL 2004 Vick. Being a backup didn’t sit well with him, and he posted career lows in most passing categories before playing his final game in 2015.
12. Josh McCown
Total points: 69
Jets touchdowns: 19 (11th, 32 points)
Career AV: 47 (12th, 31 points)
Jets wins: 5 (5 points)
Bonus points: 1 (led league in interception rate)
In 2015 and 2016, the Jets’ quarterback was Ryan Fitzpatrick, who was in his mid-30s, who had spent most of his career as a journeyman backup, who rarely earned starting gigs, and whose teams had never qualified for the playoffs. After Fitzpatrick’s awful 2016 season, the Jets turned to McCown, who was like Fitzpatrick but a downgrade in every possible way: older, less starting experience, less charisma, no beard, no Ivy League pedigree, and the same amount of nonexistent playoff experience. The 38-year-old McCown had the best season of his career, setting career highs in basically every category, but the Jets still went 5-11 in 2017 and were in position to move up to draft Darnold the next year.
11. Joe Flacco
Total points: 70
Jets touchdowns: 14 (T-14th, 29 points)
Career AV: 122 (4th, 39 points)
Jets wins: 1 (1 point)
Bonus points: 1 (won Super Bowl)
Flacco’s Super Bowl win with the Ravens is not his greatest accomplishment. No, his pièce de résistance was his lone win in three seasons with the Jets: a random, improbable Week 2 victory over the Browns that will glimmer long after the diamonds in any championship ring fade. To be clear, Flacco was capital-C Cooked for his entire Jets tenure. Not medium well, not well done—just a lump of charcoal. Flacco came to the Jets after failing his Broncos physical due to a neck injury, and even though the Jets tried to get rid of him in 2021, they wound up needing to reacquire him from the Eagles after Wilson was injured. In his late 30s, he no longer had the arm strength that made the irresponsible passes of his younger days viable, and he wore the unfamiliar no. 19—cool on Keyshawn, gross on any quarterback post-1950. Flacco lost his first six starts as a Jet, but trailing 30-17 with two minutes left against the Browns, Flacco dug deep and summoned the last bit of magic in his arm, hurling two desperation touchdowns bookending an onside kick recovery to steal a 31-30 win from the jaws of a 99.9 percent loss probability. Even with the four-touchdown, 307-yard performance against Cleveland, Flacco was one of the worst quarterbacks in 2022, averaging a pitiful 5.5 yards per attempt, and he’s currently a free agent. It makes that one miracle moment even more improbable.
10. Sam Darnold
Total points: 73
Jets touchdowns: 45 (6th, 37 points)
Career AV: 27 (20th, 23 points)
Jets wins: 13 (13 points)
Bonus points: 0
Like Haley Joel Osment in The Sixth Sense, Darnold on the Jets will be best remembered for a quote about seeing the dead. The embarrassments were plenty during Darnold’s New York tenure, like the pick-six on his first career pass or the way a Monday Night Football graphic turned his bout with mono into a meme. But rock bottom was a four-interception performance in a 33-0 loss to the Patriots, during which he famously yelled, “I’m seeing ghosts!” while mic’d up. The Jets began wondering why NFL Films had allowed such embarrassing audio to make the Monday Night Football broadcast instead of wondering why their young passer was producing such embarrassing quarterback play.
But the most embarrassing thing to me is the way the Jets wasted Darnold’s talent. His arm was absolutely worthy of the no. 3 pick, but the Jets gave him two inept coaches. When he was a rookie, his offensive coordinator and quarterback coach was Jeremy Bates, who hadn’t worked in the NFL since 2012 when he took the Jets job in 2017, was openly criticized by Jets players during his tenure, and hasn’t found an NFL job since. Then, the Jets put Darnold in the hands of the clueless Adam Gase, and he regressed massively. Darnold seemed to turn a corner with the Panthers last year, and I’m half convinced he’ll win the Super Bowl with the 49ers this year.
9. Geno Smith
Total points: 74
Jets touchdowns: 28 (8th, 35 points)
Career AV: 33 (19th, 24 points)
Jets wins: 12
Bonus points: 3 (one Pro Bowl, one Comeback Player of the Year award, led league in completion percentage)
While many Jets quarterback hypotheticals are star-crossed laments about players the team almost drafted, I spend a lot of time thinking about the (literal) self-inflicted damage from when the Jets gave up on a future Pro Bowl quarterback because they victim-blamed him for getting punched in the face by a cuttable depth chart rando.
Smith looked bad as a rookie in 2013, but he showed improvement in his second season and was the projected starter heading into the 2015 season. Then came the Punch: Backup defensive end IK Enemkpali hit Smith shortly after the start of training camp, breaking Smith’s jaw. It’s true that Smith owed Enemkpali $600, and it’s true that Smith probably should’ve paid up considering he was a quarterback with a multimillion-dollar contract who was dealing with a guy fighting for a roster spot. But the Punch quickly became a referendum on Smith’s leadership—how could anybody trust a quarterback who was punched by a teammate? The Jets never gave Smith a chance to start again—nor did anybody else until last year, when he won Comeback Player of the Year after throwing 30 touchdowns for the Seahawks.
8. Neil O’Donnell
Total points: 75
Jets touchdowns: 21 (10th, 33 points)
Career AV: 73 (10th, 33 points)
Jets wins: 8 (8 points)
Bonus points: 1 (one Pro Bowl)
The Jets seemed to have pulled a free agency coup in 1996 when they signed O’Donnell, who had led the Steelers to four playoff appearances in five years, including a trip to the 1995 Super Bowl. The Jets outbid the Steelers with a $25 million contract—that’s $25 million over five years (the NFL was a much different world back then)—and seemed set at quarterback. Unfortunately, O’Donnell’s success was heavily linked to “being on the Steelers” and did not translate to “being on the Jets.” He went 0-6 before a season-ending injury in 1996, and although he vastly improved in 1997, Bill Parcells briefly benched him for Glenn Foley. The Jets cut him after that to avoid paying his $6 million salary and moved on with Testaverde.
7. Ryan Fitzpatrick
Total points: 91
Jets touchdowns: 43 (7th, 36 points)
Career AV: 101 (7th, 36 points)
Jets wins: 13
Bonus points: 6 (led Jets in single-season passing touchdowns, led league in yards per attempt)
Fitzpatrick has played for nine teams in his career, and most of his seasons were forgettable: He was a backup with the Rams and Bengals, was a subpar starter with the Bills, got locked in ugly quarterback battles with the Titans and Texans, and so on and so forth. And then he came to the Jets and set the franchise’s decades-old single-season passing touchdown record, nearly leading the team on a stunning late-season surge to the postseason. (Nearly.)
Fitzpatrick was thrust into the Jets’ starting role after the Punch broke Geno Smith’s jaw, but even after Smith was cleared to play, the Jets stuck with Fitzpatrick, who by then had established a dynamic connection with Brandon Marshall. (No wide receiver should have to play for the Jets and Bears. That’s cruelty.) Marshall had the best statistical receiving season in franchise history in 2015, setting franchise records for receptions and yardage and tying the team record for touchdowns. Fitz really turned it on in December: The Jets went on a five-game winning streak, and Fitzpatrick threw for 13 touchdowns and one interception in that span. And then Fitzpatrick threw three picks in a devastating season-ending loss to the Bills, who were coached by Rex Ryan—just a year after the Jets kicked Ryan to the curb. Fitzpatrick would drop off massively in 2016, so that strange 2015 season was the closest Fitzpatrick ever came to the playoffs—and the closest the legendary journeyman ever came to having a home.
6. Mark Sanchez
Total points: 97
Jets touchdowns: 68 (4th, 39 points)
Career AV: 35 (18th, 25 points)
Jets wins: 33 (33 points)
Bonus points: 0
Sanchez is far from the worst quarterback the Jets have ever had, but it feels like he has become the face of the Jets’ decades of quarterback ineptitude. Specifically, a face that slammed into the ass of a teammate so hard that Sanchez fumbled the ball and the Patriots returned it for a touchdown on Thanksgiving 2012. Sanchez peaked with a three-touchdown performance in a playoff win over Brady and the Patriots in Foxborough, Massachusetts, in the 2010 postseason. (You probably remember Bart Scott’s “CAN’T WAIT” postgame interview from that day.) But the thing about peaks is that everything that comes next is downhill. The next week, Sanchez played the Jets into a 24-0 hole in the AFC title game against the Steelers, and before long, it was Butt Fumble time.
Sometimes, I look back on Sanchez’s tenure as a Jets quarterback fondly, considering that the back-to-back runs to the AFC championship game in his first two seasons constitute the most successful Jets era of my lifetime. But reflecting on Sanchez’s role on those teams, it’s clear why it’s so easy to be disappointed with him: What if the Jets had, you know, a good quarterback to go along with those god-level defenses instead of a struggling youngster? What if the Jets had invested in a solid veteran instead of wasting a rare championship window on a high draft pick who never panned out? The Jets’ other quarterback disappointments had the luxury of sucking on bad teams; even if Sanchez had been better, we remember him because his struggles came on teams that had higher hopes.
5. Boomer Esiason
Total points: 107
Jets touchdowns: 49 (5th, 38 points)
Career AV: 137 (3rd, 40 points)
Jets wins: 15 (15 points)
Bonus points: 14 (first-team All-Pro; four Pro Bowls, including one as a Jet; MVP; led league in passer rating and touchdown rate; led league twice in yards per attempt)
I decided to become a Jets fan when I was 4 years old and my dad took me to a game at the Meadowlands. We weren’t really a football family—my dad isn’t even a Jets fan, so I’d guess he got the tickets as a gift—but the Jets won after a guy named Boomer came off the bench and led the team to a 16-6 win over the Colts, which was the absolute coolest thing I had ever seen in my life. (I mean, come on. A guy named BOOMER!) I didn’t understand the context behind the Jets’ brief decision to bench Esiason for Jack Trudeau, which was why Esiason needed to come off the bench in the first place—I just remember everybody was excited about Boomer. I didn’t know that Esiason was a former league MVP, or that he was well past his prime by the time he spent three years with the Jets, or that the Jets were a pretty mediocre team headed toward a 6-10 campaign in 1994. I didn’t even really know the rules of football, to be honest. I just knew that Boomer had made everybody scream and cheer, and it ruled. So I guess Boomer Esiason is the reason I’m a Jets fan.
I’ll never forgive him.
4. Brett Favre
Total points: 115
Jets touchdowns: 22 (9th, 34 points)
Career AV: 259 (1st, 42 points)
Jets wins: 9 (9 points)
Bonus points: 30 (three-time All-Pro; 11 Pro Bowls; three-time MVP; won Super Bowl; led league in touchdowns [four times], yardage [two], completion percentage [one], touchdown rate [four], and interception rate [one]—none with the Jets)
Before Favre defrauded the people of Mississippi, he was just a good ol’ gunslinger who sent unsolicited pictures of his penis to a team employee. In hindsight, the Jets’ decision to bring in the past-his-prime Packers legend was both a PR nightmare and a football disappointment—but for a while in 2008, it really looked like the Jets’ bet on Brett might pay off.
The Jets got Favre for cheap after his first 38-ish threats to retire—they gave up just a conditional fourth-round pick to get a future Hall of Famer. For three months, it seemed like a steal. In Week 4, Favre threw six touchdowns in a 56-35 win over the Cardinals, tied for the most passing touchdowns in a game by a Jets quarterback since Namath in 1972. The Jets went 4-1 in November, including back-to-back wins over the Patriots and the undefeated Titans. That left them on top of the AFC East standings, and with Tom Brady out for the season, it looked like the Jets would actually do something big.
And then Favre fell apart. The ancient quarterback tore his biceps in the win over the Titans, but the Jets kept the injury secret, leading to a fine from the NFL after the season. Favre’s play immediately dropped off. In the Jets’ final five games, Favre threw two touchdowns and nine interceptions. They still had a chance at winning the AFC East heading into Week 17, but Favre threw three interceptions (including a pick-six) in a 24-17 loss to the Dolphins, who clinched the division. To add insult to biceps injury, the Dolphins’ quarterback that day was Chad Pennington, whom the Jets had unceremoniously dumped when it became clear they could get Favre. (Between this and Fitzpatrick at Buffalo in 2015, the Jets missed out on earning two potential playoff appearances in Week 17 games due to three-pick performances against disgruntled, recently dumped ex-Jets.) After the 2008 season, Favre “retired” again, but signed with the Vikings in the offseason.
So yeah, all things told, one of the better seasons by a Jets QB.
3. Chad Pennington
Total points: 127
Jets touchdowns: 82 (2nd, 41 points)
Career AV: 62 (11th, 32 points)
Jets wins: 32 (32 points)
Bonus points: 22 (two Comeback Player of the Year awards, one with the Jets; led league in passer rating, completion percentage, and touchdown percentage with the Jets; led league in completion percentage with the Dolphins)
Pennington should be no. 1 on this list, but his body wouldn’t cooperate. His near-constant injury issues not only threw wrenches into the Jets’ hopes year after year but also kept him from ever reaching his full potential, as he came back slightly worse from every surgery and never again reached the heights of his first season as the Jets’ starter.
After serving as a supporting cast member in Randy Moss’s Marshall highlight reels, Pennington was a first-round pick in 2000, but the Jets rode with Testaverde through the 2002 season. When Pennington finally played, he was a revelation: He led the NFL in passer rating, touchdown rate, and yards per attempt, then threw three touchdowns in a 41-0 thumping of the Colts in the first round of the playoffs. It felt like the Jets had their guy.
Then Pennington broke his hand before the 2003 season … and tore his rotator cuff during the 2004 season … and the rotator cuff didn’t fully heal before Pennington returned, leading to another surgery during the 2005 season. Pennington won Comeback Player of the Year in 2006—his only 16-game season during eight years with the Jets—but quickly dropped off in 2007. By the end of his Jets career, his never-stellar arm strength was virtually gone, presumably because of all the shoulder injuries and surgeries. In 2008 Pennington went to the Dolphins, where he won Comeback Player of the Year again—only Pennington has had enough injuries to get the award twice—and kept the Jets out of the playoffs by beating his former team in Week 17 while clinching the AFC East title for Miami.
2. Vinny Testaverde
Total points: 128
Jets touchdowns: 77 (3rd, 40 points)
Career AV: 141 (2nd, 41 points)
Jets wins: 35
Bonus points: 12 (two Pro Bowls, one as a Jet; led league in yards per completion; led league in pass attempts with the Jets)
I wasn’t sure whether Testaverde would be the best Jets quarterback, but I know in my heart that he is the most Jets QB. He’s an Italian guy from Long Island whose name means “Green Head” in Italian. He was born to be the Jets’ QB, and I honestly prefer not to acknowledge that he played for other teams.
This list is full of quarterbacks who made Pro Bowls with other teams but went 7-9 with the Jets. Testaverde is almost the opposite, the rare quarterback whose time with the Jets was the pinnacle of his career. Testaverde holds the NFL’s career record for losses by a quarterback, and when A Tribe Called Quest rapped, “Your styles are incomplete same as Vinny Testaverde” in 1993, they were just being honest: Before coming to the Jets, Vinny had more seasons in which he led the league in interceptions (two) than he had winning seasons (one). But his Paisan Powers immediately activated upon arriving in New Jersey. He came to the Jets in 1998 and began the season as Glenn Foley’s backup. Testaverde won the QB1 job by Week 3, went 12-1 as a starter, and got the Jets to the AFC championship game.
Unfortunately, Testaverde was already 34 by the time he got to the Jets. They were in the Super Bowl conversation in 1999, but hope vanished after he tore his Achilles in Week 1. The Jets drafted Pennington in 2000 and gave him the starting job in 2002 as Testaverde started to quickly decline. If only the most Jets QB had come to New York earlier.
1. Ken O’Brien
Total points: 147
Jets touchdowns: 124 (1st, 42 points)
Career AV: 87 (8th, 35 points)
Jets wins: 50 (50 points)
Bonus points: 20 (two Pro Bowls, led league twice, both with the Jets)
O’Brien is totally deserving of the top spot on this list. In nine mostly injury-free seasons as the Jets’ starting quarterback, O’Brien ranked second in most Jets all-time passing categories behind Namath. He has 42 more Jets touchdowns and 17 more Jets wins than anybody on this list, meaning the gap between first and second is as big as the gap between last place and the top 10. (This piece ranks all Jets QBs that have played for the team since 1990, but we used O’Brien’s full career stats, even though he played most of his games in the 1980s.) He has nearly twice as many passing yards for the Jets as Pennington.
But even a great Jet can feel disappointing—because O’Brien is one of the all-time head-scratching draft picks. In 1983, every team in the AFC East picked a quarterback in the first round. The Bills and Dolphins got future Hall of Famers in Jim Kelly and Dan Marino, respectively, and the QB the Patriots drafted that year, Tony Eason, got them to a Super Bowl. The Jets drafted O’Brien, who was solid but had never won a playoff game—and they took him at no. 24, with Marino still on the board. Pretty much everybody had expected the Jets to take Marino, an All-American at Pitt. Instead they took O’Brien, a little-known prospect out of Division II UC–Davis. Marino reportedly became “visibly ill” when the Jets took some unknown player over him. O’Brien, meanwhile, was asleep on the West Coast, not expecting to be a top draft pick, and to this day he still laughs about the video of confused Jets fans who were infuriated that the team picked a guy from a random D-II school. “The camera panned to people in the audience and they were like, ‘Where? Cal what?’” he recently told ESPN. O’Brien later beat Marino in the 11th-highest-scoring game in NFL history, a 51-45 Jets win in which the quarterbacks combined for 927 passing yards and 10 touchdowns. But the career competition between the guy the Jets drafted and the guy they passed over wasn’t particularly close.
But that’s the way it is with the Jets. O’Brien is objectively the deserving no. 1 Jets QB of my lifetime—and still a source of mockery from outsiders and anguish for Jets fans who wonder what could’ve been.