First-year GM Terry Bradway started his tenure with the Jets in 2001 looking to add size to the wide receiver corps through free agency.
Meanwhile, 6-foot-3, 200-pound Matthew Hatchette was seeking to make a fresh start of his own after four seasons in the shadows of Minnesota's Cris Carter, Randy Moss, and Jake Reed and signed with New York.
"At the time, I thought it was the best fit for my body type, from the plays I like to make on the outside with them having Wayne Chrebet as a slot guy," Hatchette said. "This is back in the day when you didn't go three wide a lot. If you went with three wide receivers 50 percent of the time, you were considered a passing team.
"So I just thought that me being the only big receiver pretty much on that roster, I would be used as an outside guy like I was kind of in Minnesota. I thought I was going to compliment Wayne Chrebet and Laveranues Coles and Santana Moss a little bit more, so I just thought was a great fit for me."
After catching 43 passes for 640 yards and four touchdowns with the Vikings, Hatchette found that his size and speed combo didn't mesh in first-year Jets head coach Herm Edwards' West Coast Offense. Playing in 11 games, he recorded just two receptions for 44 yards.
"Yeah, I thought we had went over this in the free agency discussion. Systems are funny. After all of these years, I have tons of examples of this receiver and or this running back and or quarterback, they're in the right system to help them fulfill their skill set. You know, not everybody finds the right system for their skill set, and so I'm not the only one," Hatchette said.
"There's tons that do, and there's tons that don't. I'm not bitter about it at all. It's just, at the time, you don't know enough about ball and I didn't know enough about the business to understand what was going on. So it was, of course, disappointing. I didn't have the year I wanted in New York. But at the same time, I lived and I learned from it and took the positive and moved on from there."
A major part of the positive experience Hatchette had while with the Green & White was the team's camaraderie.
"I thought there was a lot of people in that locker room rooting for each other, which is a big deal in pro sports because you don't get that. From Curtis Martin to Vinny Testaverde and Chad Pennington, an old veteran quarterback and a first-round quarterback, sometimes that doesn't gel," Hatchette said. "And on defense, Aaron Glenn and Ray Mickens and Mo Lewis, all those guys, those were a lot of good veterans that didn't have an ego and played well together.
"That's very hard to find in professional sports, and I still talk to those guys till today. Me and Ray Mick, we talk almost weekly. I think that's the best thing I learned and took from being with the Jets, a team camaraderie. Whether you win and or lose, it's a real thing in professional sports."
After playing at Mercyhurst University in Pennsylvania and Langston University in Oklahoma, Hatchette was selected by Minnesota in the seventh round of the 1997 Draft. Given that he went on to spend eight seasons in the NFL with the Vikings, Jets, Raiders, and Jaguars, what makes him most proud of his career?
"There's tons of guys that went to the big schools, the Ohio States and Florida States. And first-round picks, I outlasted a lot of those guys, and it's from perseverance, it's from endurance, and I think that was my superpower, if you will," Hatchette said. "And then that whole offseason, my only focus was to go to the Pro Bowl. That was my mindset.
"I was working out three workouts a day, and I was like, 'I got to get to the Pro Bowl', and I'm barely a free agent. I'm last guy on the totem pole. But I had to set my sights on something bigger than was what reality was.
"If I went in there acting like I was a 12th guy on the depth chart, I would have got cut the next day. But four years in Minnesota, I got to learn under Cris Carter and Jake Reed and Randy Moss and I never for one time said, 'I'm going to take a back seat and just watch these guys play.' I want to go play with them. And does my numbers and my career accolades compete with those guys, of course not. But again, I was right there alongside of them and I use everything I learned to this day."
Following his playing days, Hatchette made his home in Southern California, where he has coached football at several Los Angeles-area high schools and a junior college since 2011.
"You know what's funny? When I was playing, 'I'll never be a high school coach.' But if I look at the receiver position, which I've studied for hours upon hours, and if I look at the quarterback position, which I've studied for hours upon hours, I realize I have a lot more information than the regular person has," Hatchette said.
"You go put 100 kids in front of me, you can have them do five drills, you can have them play checkers for five minutes, or you can have them go race for 15 minutes, and I'll have a good idea on who has the makeup to be a professional athlete. There's just certain characteristics that people in successful businesses and/or sports and/or life have, and usually that DNA does not change after the ages of 13 and 14."
Last year, Hatchette decided it was time to put his DNA on a program, and he became a first-time head coach at Huntington Beach High School.
"I was just, 'Okay, let me see if somebody would have me be a head coach.' And it didn't matter where," Hatchette said. "I just started putting in some applications and started making a couple calls, and this job came open. I was just like, 'It doesn't matter who gives me the opportunity. I'm all in. That's the only way I know.' So once I got here, I was like. "This is my dream job.'"
After having been an offensive coordinator, defensive coordinator, wide receivers coach, and quarterback coach, Hatchette guided Huntington Beach to an 8-2 record last season. What has he found to be the biggest difference in being a head coach from being an assistant?
"I'd say the day-to-day of everything," Hatchette said. "You're worried about uniform combinations. You have to talk to parents about getting their son, Johnny, pictures for his senior year. All of those things that have nothing to do with football, but you still have to give them attention because it has to do with the kids' growth, if you will, and the family support of the program.
"Now boosters, those types of conversations are probably the biggest things. Which again, those aren't X's and O's. You get to do X's and O's on Friday nights. But besides that, all that other stuff is very important to the program that you have to be on top of."
Hatchette is rightfully proud that he has endured in the profession and of his dedication to coaching, which he has seen as a way to positively impact young lives.
"It's not the moment of the Friday night winning 31-27. Even though that's great and that's what gets my blood going," Hatchette said. "It's more about the phone call at 23-years-old, 'Hey, Coach, I remember you told me this when I was 17, and now I'm getting married. I use this in the conversations I have with my wife.' Or 'I'm going for a promotion at this company at 26, and I'm using those same mindset tools that you instilled into me when I was a senior in high school.'
"That's when it really pays off. That's when you know you're making a difference and you're changing kids' DNA. You're changing families' lineages from the conversations and the mentorship you gave them while you were coaching them.
"And that's the same with myself and (my coach with the Vikings) Denny Green. There's a lot of things that I do in my life, especially my coaching style, that I learned from Denny Green. And unfortunately, Denny, rest in peace, is not here anymore, but he's a big reason why I'm coaching today. I just believe that what he instilled in me, I need to pay that forward in this lifetime, as well."
