Aaron Glenn has plenty of familiarity with the Bills coaching staff.
He and Bills coach Joe Brady spent two years together on the same Saints staff under Sean Payton. Glenn was the defensive backs coach, and Brady was an offensive assistant at the time.
“Obviously he’s done a really good job, and I’m just talking about this year as the head coach of the team and what they’re doing,” Glenn said Friday. “We started in New Orleans together with Dan Campbell [who was the assistant head coach and tight ends coach at the time]. We had a really good staff there. Then [Brady] actually ended up going to LSU and being a part of that staff when everything blew up with those receivers [Ja’Marr Chase and Justin Jefferson] and quarterbacks [Joe Burrow] they had there. We always stayed in touch, and we talked ball a lot.
“I would take a drive up to Baton Rouge to speak with him about some things that they were doing there, and it was vice versa. He would come back up to New Orleans where we were, and we would talk ball. He’s a damn good coach. Really bright offensive mind, and he’s doing a really good job with those guys.”
Glenn, when he began his NFL coaching career as an assistant defensive backs coach with the Browns, also coached Bills defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard, who had a 10-year NFL career as a defensive back, for one season.
“Very, very smart and intelligent player,” Glenn said. “I would say this, and I don’t think he gets a lot of credit for this, he was way more athletic than people gave him credit for. I can recall one meeting that we had as coach Penn [Mike Pettine] as our head coach, he showed a clip, a couple of clips of Jim actually dunking a basketball. I think the guys got a kick out of that. He was 5-foot-7 or something like that, 5-foot-8 dunking a basketball the way he was doing it. The guys got a kick out of doing it.”
Harrison Phillips was in the same 2018 Bills draft class as Josh Allen. He had a front-row seat for Allen’s development into a superstar.
“I think I really did see a lot of those same traits back then that he still has now,” Phillips said Friday. “He was elite when I first saw him. I wouldn’t even say confidence — I think at the time, he knew how good of a player he was. We didn’t win a lot of games that first year, but he knew what was going on. I don’t know, he seems maybe a little bit more fulfilled. I feel like he’s smiling a lot more. He’s a husband now, he’s a father now. Maybe just feeling a little bit more complete.”
Linebacker Trevin Wallace (groin) is the only Jets player ruled out for Sunday’s game. Edge rusher Joseph Ossai, who has missed the last four games with an ankle injury, is listed as questionable but was a full participant in Friday’s practice.
The Bills are getting back tackle Dion Dawkins and guard Alec Anderson, who both missed their win over the Vikings last week, on Sunday. But they’ll likely be without tackle Spencer Brown (ankle), who is doubtful.
