Aaron Glenn walked into his first Jets head coaching job carrying Bill Belichick’s playbook for handling reporters. The approach worked for Belichick because Belichick won six Super Bowls. Glenn’s resume includes losing 30-10 to Buffalo while his quarterback completed three passes.
That difference matters.
After Glenn’s squad was hampered by sloppy play and costly penalties in Week 2’s blowout loss to the Bills, the first-year head coach defaulted to his go-to response when pressed about specific performances.
During his postgame press conference, Glenn responded to three straight questions by saying, “I’ve got to watch the tape.”
Aaron Glenn is going to watch the tape pic.twitter.com/DAgyJoC9En
— Brian Costello (@BrianCoz) September 14, 2025
It’s the same deflection Glenn has used consistently since arriving in New York.
When reporters asked about Aaron Rodgers’ release, Glenn was in no mood to answer the question, instead claiming that Rodgers has “been gone” and that he would only talk about players currently in the Jets locker room. When pressed further about game planning for Rodgers before their Week 1 matchup, “Just like I said, I’m not finna sit here & answer questions on what I saw back then,” replied Glenn. “It’s not relevant to right now.”
And while Glenn might view it as strategic silence, it comes across as reflexive stonewalling that accomplishes the opposite of what Glenn intends.
“I hate to be the giving advice guy, but that press conference when you’re constantly are defensive and saying, ‘Tape. Tape. Tape.’ I understand. You had a bad loss,” Connor Rogers said during SNY’s postgame coverage. “There are times when you have to watch the tape. The one thing I’ll say that’s not good about that is when you always use that answer for every question, those reporters are now going to go to your players and ask them more questions and more details.”
The unintended consequence is exactly what Glenn is trying to avoid.
“So, he doesn’t realize this right now…he’s trying to protect his players and he’s doing the opposite,” Rogers continued. “Now they’re vulnerable to, ‘The coach said he had to watch the tape, but I talked to so and so after and he said this…’ And, listen, it’s not creating friction inside the locker room, but it can create perception of things like that.”
The newly tabbed co-host of Chris Simms Unbuttoned isn’t wrong about the mechanics. When a head coach repeatedly punts on substantive questions, reporters don’t pack up and go home. They find other sources. Usually, that means players who may not have the context or media training to navigate loaded questions about teammates’ performances or coaching decisions.
Glenn’s defensive posture reflects his background as a coordinator, where deflecting was an option because Dan Campbell handled the big-picture questions in Detroit. He could be defensive and snippy, but he also had a head coach to delegate to. There’s no Dan Campbell walking through that door. The buck stops at Glenn.
The irony is that Glenn’s approach stems from a desire to protect his players, particularly after cutting kick returner Xavier Gipson following his fumble in the Week 1 loss to Pittsburgh. “You will not be on this field with this team,” he said. “If you’re going to cause us to lose games.”
Glenn clearly values accountability and discipline, but his media strategy undermines both.
Consider what happened after the Bills’ loss. Instead of addressing his quarterback’s historically bad performance directly — Justin Fields was brutal with career lows in completions (3) and passing yards (27) — Glenn deferred to the tape. That forces reporters to seek quotes elsewhere, potentially putting players in positions where they have to answer for teammates or coaches.
Glenn’s former teammate, Anthony Becht, described the coach as someone who “is going to make sure they weed out anything that shouldn’t be around to keep it very tight inside, so that only the players and coaches uniformly come together for the single purpose of turning that organization around.” That’s admirable in theory. In practice, shutting down legitimate questions about performance creates information vacuums that get filled by less reliable sources.
The New York media environment demands a different approach than what worked in Detroit or New Orleans. Glenn knows this. He spent eight seasons with the Jets as a player and understands the market’s intensity. But knowing and adapting are different things.
Glenn’s early tenure shows promise in other areas. He moved decisively on Aaron Rodgers, made hard personnel decisions like releasing Gipson, and did little to hide his frustration with Micheal Clemons after the defensive lineman blatantly ignored his warning from a week prior by committing another costly penalty. These are signs of a coach who won’t accept mediocrity.
But accountability means more than cutting players and yelling at them on the sideline. Glenn’s Belichick routine falls flat because Belichick earned the right to be dismissive. When the guy with six rings says he needs to watch tape, reporters shrug and move on. When a rookie head coach coming off a 30-10 beatdown says it three times in a row, it just sounds like a cop out.
Nobody’s asking Glenn to become texting buddies with Joe Benigno or play footsies with the Post. But there’s room between complete transparency and complete silence. Glenn can acknowledge what everyone saw without throwing players under the bus. He can explain decisions without revealing game plans. He can be frustrated without stonewalling reporters.
“You don’t have to love it. You don’t have to be in a good mood,” Rogers later added. “Nobody’s in a good mood after a loss like that, but you’re actually hurting your players’ protection when you have press conferences like that.”
Glenn inherited a franchise desperate for competent leadership after years of dysfunction. His emphasis on discipline and accountability represents exactly what the Jets need. But protecting players requires more than shutting down questions. It requires giving reporters enough substance that they don’t need to go fishing elsewhere.
The tape will show Glenn plenty of things to fix after two weeks. How he handles the questions about what he found might be the most important adjustment of all.
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.