The Jets vs Titans season opener went 23-10 to New York, and the football part was simpler than the storyline: Breece Hall ran for 102 yards and a touchdown, Geno Smith threw for 215 in his return to the Jets, and Tennessee never got the game to a place where it had to be decided late. Robert Saleh's first game as Titans head coach came against the franchise that fired him. It did not go the way anybody scripts it in their head.
That is the whole thing in one sentence, and yet it is not the whole thing at all.
How did the Jets beat the Titans in the season opener?
On the ground, mostly. Hall's 102 yards is the number that tells you what kind of afternoon it was for Tennessee's front: the Jets got to lean on the run, which meant Smith got to throw on his own terms rather than on the down-and-distance's terms. Two hundred fifteen passing yards is not a highlight reel. In a 13-point win where the back cracks the century mark, it is not supposed to be.
Ten points for the Titans is the other tell. You can lose an opener a hundred ways. Scoring ten of them is the way that follows a team into the film room on Monday.
Robert Saleh's Titans debut against his former team
The NFL does not usually hand you this. A coach gets fired, lands somewhere new, and typically waits a year or two for the schedule to arrange the reunion. Saleh got it in Week 1, on the first Sunday of his tenure, against the building that let him go.
checked the almanac: the jets fired saleh five games into the 2024 season and he never got them to a winning record in his time there. now he's the guy on the other sideline, and the first data point of his second act is a 13-point loss to the people who handed him his coat.
That is not a verdict on Saleh as a head coach. It is one game, in September, against a roster he knows uncomfortably well, which cuts both ways: he knows their tendencies, they know his. What it does do is set the tone for a Tennessee season that needed the opposite of this. A new voice usually gets a honeymoon. This one starts with a road loss and a lot of questions about the offensive line.
New York Jets injury news: Omar Cooper Jr. and Minkah Fitzpatrick
The win came with a bill. Rookie wide receiver Omar Cooper Jr. and veteran safety Minkah Fitzpatrick both went down during the game, and the specifics have not come through yet beyond that. I am not going to speculate on severity when the team has not said it.
What I can say is which one changes the shape of things. A rookie receiver is a developmental piece you can slow-walk. A veteran safety with Fitzpatrick's history is the guy who organizes everything behind the front seven, and a secondary that loses its communicator gets loud in the worst way. Watch the practice report before you draw any conclusions.
Around the league on Sunday
The Jets were not the only team who made Week 1 look easy:
| Game | Final | Headline number |
|---|---|---|
| Jets vs Titans | 23-10 NYJ | Hall 102 rush yards, 1 TD |
| Ravens vs Colts | 41-23 BAL | Jackson 324 pass yards, Henry 3 rush TDs |
| Steelers vs Falcons | 20-13 PIT | Watt 35-yard pick-six |
Derrick Henry's three scores moved him into third on the NFL's career rushing touchdown list, passing Marcus Allen. Thirty-two years old and still carving his name into the concrete. That is the kind of thing you want to stop and look at for a second before the news cycle eats it.
What I'm watching next
Two things. First, the Jets' injury report and what it says about Fitzpatrick, because the ceiling on that defense runs through him. Second, whether Tennessee's problems Sunday were scheme-new or roster-real, because a new head coach can fix one of those a lot faster than the other. Saleh gets his answer in the film. We get ours in about a week.