Eric Mangini addresses rumor that the Jets are looking at him as its next head coach

The race is on to find the New York Jets' new head coach. It's one of many key spots for the organization to be filled in 2025. Team owner Woody Johnson has cleaned house from the head coach to the general manager, and who knows what else could be changed before the final game of the regular season.

The New York Jets are undoubtedly the biggest letdown of this season. A team with many factors to them that would prove them to be division leaders, now their shot at the postseason seems very much out of reach.

With Aaron Rodgers most likely looking to continue his career elsewhere, the Jets' rebuild will be interesting to observe. There's a chance that ownership may want to look into the past to help build the future.

Eric Mangini had a good run with the organization. It was nothing spectacular, but it did make a lot of headlines. He got the Jets to the playoffs in 2006, became the key player in the launch of the Spygate investigation against the New England Patriots in 2007, and coached Brett Favre in his one season with the team. 

Then he was out the door.

Mangini has become a great contributor to the world of sports from a news desk the last few years, but as the Jets looked to put 2024 behind them, his name has emerged as the new Jets head coach next year.

On today's episode of The Herd with Colin Cowherd, Mangini made an appearance to comment on his name being thrown around, and the former coach didn't necessarily shut down the idea of a return to the organization.

"I obviously am not lobbying for the job, but I feel pretty good about what I did while I was there," Mangini told Cowherd. "We just had three of those guys that I've coached go into the Jets ring of honor and I think we were a smart, disciplined, tough team."

The rumors of Mangini in the mix stem from NFL Insider with The Athletic Diana Russini mentioning him in an article published over the weekend.

It's not uncommon for ownership to choose some familiarity in times like this. However, Mangini has only one winning season out of three with the Jets.

Sometimes, it's good to look back at the past but never stare at it.
This maybe isn't that great of a move if true, but what do the Jets have to lose at this point, honestly. 

Who will be the next head coach of the New York Jets?

In case you missed it -- the Aaron Rodgers experiment hasn't gone to plan in New York. The Jets currently sit with a 3-8 record and fired head coach, Robert Saleh and general manager, Joe Douglas over the past month and a half. After Saleh's dismissal, the club turned to defensive coordinator, Jeff Ulbrich to become the team's newest head coach, albeit on an interim basis.

Despite the change in coaching, the Jets have gone just 1-5 under Ulbrich's tutelage, signifying that they'll likely need to turn elsewhere for their next head coach for the 2025 season.

During an appearance on ESPN New York's 'Bart & Hahn' show, former Jets head coach, Rex Ryan seemingly threw his name into the mix when it comes to who could be Robert Saleh's successor.

"I look at it this way...blow it up? We're gonna blow the opponents up," Ryan said. "There's way too much talent on this team to play the way we've been playing. Period. Period. And how hard can you get a guy to play? That's the thing. Like, nobody's seen a team gonna play the way, as hard as this team's going to play in the future, trust me. If I'm the guy. Trust me.

"And that's gonna be it. That's what gonna separate me from all these other guys you're gonna bring in. Your Grudens, your whoever, whatever. Give me a break. They ain't fu — they ain't New York Jets. I'm all about the Jets. We'll see. And the great thing is — here's the great thing. Yeah, you get a second chance at it and that doesn't happen very often. Well, when it does it's usually special. And so we'll find out if I get that chance or not. If not, then I hope they have one hell of a guy in place 'cause I still wanna be a fan of the Jets. I still wanna be, but you know when I look around I know nobody's better than me. So we'll see. We'll see what happens."

Ryan, 61, manned the sidelines for 'Gang Green' from 2009 through 2014. The Jets went 20-12 and made the playoffs in each of Ryan's first two seasons in New York, reaching the AFC Championship game both seasons, but losing to the Peyton Manning-led Indianapolis Colts and Ben Roethlisberger's Pittsburgh Steelers, respectively. Ryan's Jets failed to make the playoffs again and would go just 26-38 over the next four seasons before being fired following the 2014 season.

He was quickly hired by the Jets AFC East rivals, the Buffalo Bills prior to the 2015 season but would spend just two seasons in western New York, going 15-16 and was fired before the club's final game of the 2016 season.

Ryan has been a staple of ESPN's NFL programming since leaving the league in 2016 and currently is an analyst on the network's pre-game show 'Sunday NFL Countdown' every Sunday morning prior to the day's games.

The Jets are on a bye, this week, before returning to the field for a Week 13 matchup with the Seattle Seahawks (Sunday, December 1, 1:00 pm EDT/10:00 am PDT) on FOX.