Mike Tannenbaum knows a thing or two about the Jets’ decision-makers.
The former Jets general manager gave his thoughts to The Post on Season 1 of the Aaron Glenn-Darren Mougey regime, after his company — The 33rd Team — helped hire the coach and GM last offseason.
The Jets went 3-14 and traded away key players, though Tannenbaum said the brain trust needs more time before giving them a grade for their performance.
“I would give [Aaron Glenn and Darren Mougey] the same grade. I’d give them a grade of incomplete,” Tannennbaum told The Post.
“What I give the Jets a ton of credit for is that they’re trying to reset this franchise for the long term.”
This comes after a season in which the Jets traded away their top two defenders — defensive lineman Quinnen Williams and cornerback Sauce Gardner — following an 0-7 start.
The team also benched Justin Fields due to his disappointing play after signing a two-year, $40 million deal in the offseason.
“They made some really big decisions where they could have won four games, five games, or six games if they kept Quinnen Williams and Sauce Gardner,” Tannenbaum said. “We’ll never know. I think they put themselves in a position with cap space and draft choices that is really good. The result wasn’t where they wanted to be this year. In six short weeks, as we come up on free agency, this roster is going to look very different.”
Tannenbaum, who was instrumental in the hiring of Glenn and Mougey, added that the process was lengthy, and he received glowing reviews of Glenn specifically when running through the candidates.
“I knew Aaron Glenn for a long time, and you talk to people he either played for or coached for,” said Tannenbaum, who was the Jets GM from 2006-’12 when the team last made the playoffs.
“He had recommendations from Bill Parcells, Bill Belichick, Sean Payton and Dan Campbell. Look, this year didn’t go great, obviously. What I can tell you about Aaron Glenn is that no one will be harder on himself than him. He takes this very seriously.”
With Glenn remaining, despite some fans calling for his ouster after one difficult season, the head coaching carousel continues to swing without the Jets involved in a star-studded list of available candidates, including John Harbaugh.
“Anyone who is getting John Harbaugh is getting a really good coach,” Tannenbaum said. “He does a lot of emphasis on fundamentals, and he’s a great leader, and he puts a process in place, and he hires really good people.”
Harbaugh has been closely linked to the Giants job and is being pursued by almost every team with a coaching vacancy this offseason, with nine teams looking for new coaches.
“Uh – I think he’s a grown man. And as we know, New York is not for everyone,” Tannenbaum said when asked if Harbaugh would be a fit in the Big Apple.
“John is a fully-formed adult. I think he will go anywhere with his eyes wide open.”
As for potential coordinators for a scenario in which Harbaugh landed with the Giants, he views it as a necessity to be an offensive mind with a run-pass option or a zone-read background with Jaxson Dart set to be the team’s quarterback of the future.
Kliff Kingsbury immediately came to mind.
“I like Kliff a lot. Kliff was with us with the Jets,” Tannenbaum said. “He was on IR for a year. Great guy. Did a great job with Jayden Daniels two years ago. Knows a lot about the run game with the quarterback. Got Jayden Daniels to the final four in year one, which is incredible. That makes a lot of sense to me.”
Tannenbaum added that he predicts a team – potentially the Las Vegas Raiders – will hire a big-time college coach.
“My prediction is we will see something that we’re not thinking of yet,” Tannenbaum said. “Maybe there’s a coach in college that springs. An obvious spot to do that would be Vegas. If you’re trying to attract a college coach, the fact that you can say you can have your pick of whoever you want with the first pick and you try to reset things. I wouldn’t be surprised if we’re sitting here in a couple of weeks and a college coach jumps to the NFL.”
