The Jets have yet to win an NFL game in 2026, but in the view of many observers they were one of the big winners in last week's draft -- in which they made eight quality selections -- in Pittsburgh. The true impact of the players picked, from edge David Bailey at No. 2 to safety VJ Payne at No. 228 will play out over the coming seasons.

Last year, with little time to settle in and adapt to an existing system, GM Darren Mougey, who was hired after HC Aaron Glenn, was able to hit the ground running and land seven players -- all of whom made the 53-man roster out of training camp and all contributed to varying degrees.

Over the last year however, Mougey, who began his NFL career as scouting intern with Denver in 2012 in his late 20s, has overseen the installation of new systems and processes that last Saturday, at the conclusion of the draft, he said improved and enhanced the organization's draft-related IT system.

Over the last two years the Jets have drafted 15 players who, if they're on the 53-man roster on opening day in September will comprise nearly 30 percent of the roster.

On Saturday, Mougey acknowledged he "hit the ground running" after he was hired. With more time under his belt, Mougey said he came to the realization that the evaluation process across the operation needed to be tweaked.

"It's definitely a more comfortable feeling going in knowing you have a whole year with your processes," Mougey said. "We changed the entire grading scale from our last draft, so we're on a different scale, we're on a different system. I felt much more comfortable visualizing the board this year and kind of knowing how it was going to fall and feel really good about where we're at as a whole staff."

*'Trader' Mouge Does His Thing *In only his second season with the Green & White, Mougey has earned notice and compliments around the NFL for many of his shrewd player moves, particularly the way he's manipulated the Jets' board over two drafts with six trades, but especially this year.

It started early in Pittsburgh when the Jets sent the No. 33 and No. 179 picks to San Francisco to jump back into the first round and nab Indiana WR Omar Cooper Jr. at No. 30.

"I think it's something that I've talked about before is, when you have targets, you identify guys you like, you love, you go get them," Glenn said Thursday night after the Jets on Day 1 added Bailey, elite TE Kenyon Sadiq and Cooper. "And that's exactly what we did. Man to get three first-round picks and the caliber [of] guys that we got, the personality, the mentality, the football character, all those things are huge, bringing those guys on our team."

Mougey then traded a pair of fourth-round picks (Nos. 128 and 140) to Cincinnati to move up 18 spots to take Clemson QB Cade Klubnik at No. 110. And he wasn't done, sending two picks to the Seahawks – No. 199 (Round 6) and No. 242 (Round 7) -- moving up 11 slots to take Miami's massive G Anez Cooper (6-4, 335) at No. 188. If you are scoring at home, Mougey has acquired 18 draft picks and traded 20 picks (13 of those which have been sixth- or seventh-rounders.)

Overhauling the System
Though Mougey didn't get into the details of exactly how the Jets changed things, he praised his staff for energetically embracing his philosophy.

"So last year, you get here, it's hard to make an overhaul of a system's scale and stuff, so you kind of just dive in and say, 'OK, let's figure it out as we go,' and we adapted and adjusted to the current group and you kind of figure it out," Mougey said. "Then once you get through the [2025] draft you say, 'OK, in the offseason, we're going to get together collectively as a group,' and we actually created our own scale."

Part of that new process came into play as Mougey and his staff began to evaluate college players ahead of last season. That's when the Jets began to track a player like Klubnik, who Mougey said the Jets "had good grades on going into this year" and who had had success at every level, but mostly fell out of the wider draft conversation among QBs because he struggled with an injury all season.

"I had all of my scouts pitch different ideas," Mougey said. "I mean it was several weeks of a process and we had a lot of discussions, because we've all had different experiences and different scales, but we created our own with our own color schemes, our own number schemes, [and] had a lot of discussion about it. I would say [we] enhanced the systems, laid out the process for the whole year for everyone. In doing so, I think a lot of guys feel really good about it and I think the result was pretty good and we feel good about it.

"And, last but not least, our IT and football developers, Chris Miller and Iwao [Fusillo] have done a fantastic job kind of transitioning our IT system into something that I'm more familiar with, which has really helped me through this draft process this year, it's been very seamless and awesome."