Jets fans, we’re offering you amnesty. Come jump on another bandwagon.
Certain videos on social media really ought to come with a this will wreck your day" trigger warning. Like, for instance, the video of a poor young Jets fan captured in the moments after yet another loss this year.
T's & P's to little bro, hope he's doing ok today
- Bussin' With The Boys (@BussinWTB) October 21, 2025
: @dandremacpic.twitter.com/yEP3v5YcCV
I hate this team," the kid says, while wearing an empty expression and a Quinnen Williams jersey he probably got one hopeful Christmas morning. I was born into this, and I, I'm not gonna ever ... I'm always a Jets fan, but, like ... I hate this team."
Behold what the Jets have done to this lad. They've hollowed out his soul like a jack-o-lantern. He's but a youth, and he's already cursed with knowledge that the rest of us spend our lives trying to avoid. He didn't have a choice to become a Jets fan. He never had a chance. He, and so, so many like him, deserve so much better.
Look, there are few elements of sports fandom more annoying than the greater New York Metropolitan region's infatuation with itself, a dated relic of the pre-TV days when virtually every sports team and media outlet was based in the Big Apple. That's why every New York title - back when New York was winning titles - was celebrated with a moon-landing-level spectacle, and why we get woe-is-us Championship Drought" social media posts every time the Yankees, Knicks, Mets, Giants or Rangers flame out in the playoffs short of a championship. Sorry, Gotham ... we really don't care how long it's been since you last won anything.
With one exception. The Jets are so pathetic, so unbelievably lost and directionless, that hating on them seems an act of active cruelty. No team in the NFL has a longer playoff drought than the Jets, who haven't made the postseason since the 2010 season. (For context: in that postseason, the Jets beat Peyton Manning's Colts and Tom Brady's Patriots - yes, really - before losing to Ben Roethlisberger's Steelers in the AFC championship. Yeah, it was a long time ago.)
As fans, we've all had seasons where our teams corkscrewed into the ground. But few of us have suffered through an 0-7 start to the season. Even fewer have had to watch their owner publicly ripping their quarterback - not inaccurately, but still - as the team flounders. Yes, the Jets have lost five of their games this season by one possession, three by a combined total of just six points, but the only number that matters is the 0 in the win column. At this rate, the Jets will get that x-eliminated from postseason" marker next to their name in the standings before Halloween.
I feel zero sympathy for team ownership; they assembled this dog's breakfast of a roster. And I don't feel particularly bad for the coaches and players, either; they're getting well compensated despite their ongoing string of failure. But I do feel terrible for the fans of the Jets, the poor downtrodden souls like that lad above who didn't ask for this, and can do nothing whatsoever to change the downhill direction of this misbegotten franchise.
There's a classic old therapy line about how you can't control how people act, but you can control how you react. So with that in mind, I'm proposing two opportunities for Jets fans to process this weekly trauma, two offers to help them get through these dark days:
A hand, not just a middle finger. You know how even an opposing team's fans will applaud in support when a player leaves the field after a grievous injury? It's an expression of grace and respect for a fallen opponent, and virtually every NFL fanbase steps up in these solemn moments. (Well, everywhere except Philly. You monsters.)
I propose a similar method of support for broken Jets fans. Show them respect as they limp through yet another season of misery and pain. Give em a pat on the back or a fist-bump when you see them out in the wild. (Their faces will be as green as their old Namath jerseys.) Until the Jets are no longer the most pathetic team in the league - that is, until they've passed at least one team in the win column - show their fans the love they're not getting from their own team.
Of course, there is another option for those fans ...
A one-time-only, zero-guilt bandwagon jump. We all knew the kid in school - or the guy at work - who roots for some hotel-buffet combination of the New York Yankees, Los Angeles Lakers, Duke basketball, Indiana Fever and Kansas City Chiefs, regardless of where they grew up. Scornful graduates of Michigan and Alabama (are there any other kind?) call these bandwagon-jumpers Wal-Mart Wolverines" or Dirt Road Alumni," and in most cases, all the disgust is deserved. You don't get to just pick a better team when you have a perfectly fine one at home.
But if the home team isn't perfectly fine," if the home team stinks like garbage juice in August, if the home team is the New York Jets ... well, for this team only, and this season only, we're lifting the societal scorn on bandwagon-jumping. Want to give up on Gang Green and join the Mahomes/Kelce/Taylor Swift Chiefs cult? Come on in, brother and sister, it's a big ol' tent. Tired of losing the AFC East over and over and want to switch your loyalties to the Buffalo Bills? There's a table with your name and Woody Johnson's face on it, friend, dive right in. Want to join so many of your New York brethren and emigrate to Miami? We would advise against pinning any hopes whatsoever on the Dolphins, but at least you'll be suffering in sunshine.
So, my friends who are fans of the other 31, largely competent NFL franchises, open your hearts to Jets fans. Let them know there's hope. Let them know it's possible for your team to actually win a football game. Let them know football goes on into January, and even February. Let them know football can be fun. They're sure not going to find out any of this by rooting for the Jets.