Throughout the offseason, the Jets made several upgrades to their roster during free agency and the draft. And when players report for training camp at the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center (AHJTC) on July 28, they'll begin their summer work in an improved space that is undergoing a dramatic facelift.
The second phase of the AHJTC transformation, highlighted by a new weight room and Player Performance Center, is well underway. As soon as the team wrapped up mandatory minicamp on June 18, equipment was transferred into the team's temporary training space which offers a footprint 70% larger than the former weight room. The new space offers more equipment and is equipped with better technologies.
"Woody Johnson has always been unequivocal about his commitment to providing players everything they need to succeed on and off the field and this is yet another example of that," said Erik Korem, the team's director of player performance. "He and Darren Mougey and Aaron Glenn have maintained that the long-term vision must not get in the way of any short-term goal. Our players will benefit from these initial changes immediately this summer."
With the new temporary structure set up at the AHJTC, demolition on the old weight room was completed this week.
The Player Performance Center will be a fully integrated ecosystem to support every aspect of player performance, health and recovery. The two-story facility, that dramatically increases both capacity and functionality pace, will be expanded by 250%. Last summer, the Jets unveiled a locker room overhaul that introduced 92 customized lockers, a redesigned wet area, an expanded sauna and a new barbershop.
The Jets' offseason has been marked by intentionality on and off the field. They acquired QB Geno Smith and S Minkah Fitzpatrick in trades and signed LB Demario Davis and DL David Onyemata in free agency. In the draft, they added four highly-touted players – edge David Bailey (Rd. 1, No. 2 overall), TE Kenyon Sadiq (Rd. 1, No. 16 overall), WR Omar Cooper Jr. (Rd 1, No. 30 overall) and CB D'Angelo Ponds (Rd 2, No. 50) – in the first two rounds.
"I'm extremely happy with the amount of youth that we have, I think we were the second-youngest team in the league last year, and then bringing in a number of veterans that's been there, done that," said Glenn said this spring. "But, not just that, but also been really good players in this league and understand what it takes to win and how to win. It was very intentional of trying to create that, but not just that in itself, but bringing in good players that's going to help elevate this franchise to where it needs to be."
Glenn, who will take over defensive play-calling duties, leads a revamped coaching staff that includes OC Frank Reich. With Glenn and Mougey emphasizing the need to build through the draft and keep their own players, the Jets re-signed RB Breece Hall and RG Joe Tippmann this spring.
"Obviously, that starts up front," Reich said. "Listen, it's certainly going to be no secret or surprise to say that we're going to want to run the football, and so we'll continue to emphasize that. And these guys ran the ball pretty well last year, so we'll build on that. But you also have to find ways to be dynamic in the passing game and be excellent in situational football, and the way to do that is to create problems that the defenses can't solve. You do that schematically, you do that personnel-wise, so those are the things that we're focused on as a coaching staff and that we'll work with the players on."
The theme of the Jets' offseason has been an organization and a team under construction. Glenn has maintained that he likes where his team is at, but he knows there is a long way to go. The hammers and hard hats are out day and night at 1JD as a transformation continues.
"We're going to work our (expletive) off," Glenn said. " There's some things that I want to make sure that I emphasize as far as competitive stamina and I think we've talked about before. There's some things about being intentional on how we practice and the situations that we want to practice. I will continue to do that, but I don't want practices to get to a point where it's redundant. To where it's just okay, the players get into this zone to where okay, man, we're going to do this. No, I'm always going to shock the system somehow. Those are some things that we'll do as we get to training camp."
