This is one in a series of articles that will also appear in the New York Jets 2025 Yearbook, which will be published later this summer.
After interviewing 15 candidates for their general manager position, the Jets hired former Broncos assistant GM Darren Mougey on Jan. 29.
Over 12 seasons in Denver, Mougey, 40, held several titles. He was a scouting intern in 2012, a personnel and scouting assistant (2013), a college and pro personnel scout (2014), an area scout (2015-19), the assistant director of college scouting (2020) and the director of player personnel (2021).
"It is one of the greatest honors and privileges of my life to be named general manager of the New York Jets," Mougey said. "This is a proud franchise with great tradition and incredibly passionate fans located in one of the most iconic cities in the world."
Mougey, a native of Scottsdale, AZ, began his collegiate career at San Diego State in 2005 as a quarterback receiving reps behind current Vikings HC Kevin O'Connell.
"We've had some great conversations, whether it's the draft process or more times than not about combine participants," O'Connell said of Mougey. "And you start to realize this guy knows ball, he knows how to see it, he knows how to scout it. He's got a great scouting background combined with working side by side with some great people in John Elway, Matt Russell and George Paton."
Mougey, stating that his philosophy "will be to draft, develop, keep our own, and be disciplined and strategic in free agency," signed QB Justin Fields as a free agent and retained MLB Jamien Sherwood with a three-year extension. He emphasized youth, bolstered depth and added two secondary starters in S Andre Cisco and CB Brandon Stephens.
"One of the priorities going in was to address the quarterback situation really on both sides of the ball," he said. "Obviously, we feel good about what we did there with Justin and then talking about the quarterback on defense, Jamien, wearing the green dot. It's always nice when you can keep one of your own in free agency."
Following his first draft in which he landed Missouri RT Armand Membou (Round 1, No. 7 overall) and LSU TE Mason Taylor (Round 2, No. 42), a reflective Mougey commented on his first steps with the Jets.
"I'm going to go upstairs, finish this process, and then take a few days to get away from it because I'm quite honestly exhausted from just the past few months," he said. "But it's exciting, and I do look forward to gathering the whole group and having a lot of good discussions, collectively as a group and individually, about how we want to maybe change some processes moving forward. But I've been really pleased with the entire group."
