Zach Wilson’s preseason ended before Friday night’s game with the Eagles began.
The Jets decided to rest Wilson rather than play him against the Eagles’ backups in what ended up a 31-31 tie at MetLife Stadium. Head coach Robert Saleh said Wednesday he was leaning toward playing the rookie quarterback in the game, but he changed his mind.
“When you look at all of the different things that were happening on the offensive line with Mekhi [Becton] being out and shuffling people around, it just wasn’t worth it to bring him out,” Saleh said. “We felt we had a productive training camp with regard to what we saw in games and with practices we had with Philadelphia, we just felt like we had enough accomplished.”
Wilson finished the preseason 15-for-20 for 191 yards and two touchdowns with no interceptions. He had a passer rating of 137.7 and led the Jets on four scoring drives in six possessions with no turnovers and no three-and-outs.
The next time Wilson will take the field will be Sept. 12 when the Jets open the season against the Panthers in Charlotte, N.C.
- The game had a thrilling ending with a 49-yard Hail Mary pass from James Morgan to tight end Kenny Yeboah as time expired to cut the Eagles’ lead to 31-29. Josh Adams then converted the two-point conversion to tie the score at 31-31, which is how the game ended since there is no overtime in the preseason.
- The start of the game was delayed by about 20 minutes after a thunderstorm came through East Rutherford and prevented the teams from warming up on time.
- In addition to Wilson, the Jets rested many of their starters. There were, however, several players who project as starters or major contributors who did start the game: TE Trevon Wesco, RB Ty Johnson, TE Chris Herndon, OT George Fant, OT Morgan Moses, WR Keelan Cole, DE Bryce Huff, DT Folorunso Fatukasi, DT Nathan Shepherd, LB Jamien Sherwood, LB Hamsah Nasirildeen, CB Bless Austin, CB Bryce Hall and CB Michael Carter II.
- Veteran QB Josh Johnson was the surprise starter with Wilson not playing and Mike White held out with a rib injury. Johnson has not gotten much playing time in training camp. He took advantage of the opportunity, completing 7 of 8 passes for 93 yards and one touchdown.
- The Jets’ offensive line had mostly backups, but Fant and Moses both started at tackle. They are competing for the right tackle job, but Fant started at left tackle. That is one of the only true competitions for a starting job on the Jets right now.
- “I think it cleared itself up a little bit,” Saleh said of the right tackle decision. “ I’ll wait to tell you guys until we get a definitive answer from everybody in the discussion.”