National Football League

Will Jets be Super Bowl contenders with 'new and improved' Aaron Rodgers?

Updated May. 24, 2023 8:18 p.m. ET

New York Jets coach Robert Saleh is feeling good about his team as OTAs begin.

In fact, Saleh likes his team so much that he already views them as Super Bowl contenders following a seven-win season. He told reporters Tuesday that he thinks the Jets are "one of the maybe six or eight teams that have an actual chance" to win the Super Bowl.

Of course, the Jets made one of the biggest splashes of any team this offseason, trading for four-time MVP Aaron Rodgers. The quarterback is viewed by many as the missing piece to a team that had the fourth-best total defense and have the reigning Offensive Rookie of the Year in wide receiver Garrett Wilson, among other intriguing players on that side of the ball.

FOX Sports' Colin Cowherd shared an early version of his Super Bowl bubble on Wednesday, listing five teams he believes have a shot at winning the Lombardi Trophy, as well as a couple of outsiders.

Not only did Cowherd leave the Jets off his Super Bowl bubble, but he also didn't include them as a "hoverer." He placed the Kansas City Chiefs, Buffalo Bills, Philadelphia Eagles, Cincinnati Bengals and San Francisco 49ers in the bubble and had the Baltimore Ravens, Dallas Cowboys, Los Angeles Chargers and Jacksonville Jaguars as his "hoverers."

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For Cowherd, there's a clear distinction between the "hoverer" teams and the Jets.

"I don't think Dallas is going to be atrocious or Jacksonville or Baltimore or the Chargers will be atrocious," Cowherd said. "Maybe they won't be in the Super Bowl bubble, but I don't see them being ‘Man Overboard’ teams."

While things look all sunshine and rosy for the Jets at the moment, Cowherd thinks there's a chance that might not be the case come the middle of the regular season.

"They have an excellent defense," Cowherd said of the Jets. "And here comes Aaron Rodgers with a young offensive line, a young receiving corps where you hope a young player delivers, a young running back coming off a major injury, and they have a brutal early schedule. Say they go 2-4 or 3-3, there's grumbling and it becomes an incredibly grumbled situation and the New York media's got their fangs out and it goes sideways."

The Jets aren't the only team that Cowherd feels could "go either way" in terms of being a "hoverer" team. He feels similarly about the Miami Dolphins.

"For Miami, the upside is that Vic Fangio is as good as any defensive coordinator in the league," Cowherd said. "They went and [traded for Jalen Ramsey] and have two elite corners, which was a problem for them last year. It's the second year for them in Mike McDaniel's system. They have the fastest wide receiver corps in the league and Tua Tagovailoa is really accurate.

"Really great offensive coaches, even Kyle Shanahan, it usually takes a second year with a system for things to truly pop. They could be really good, or Tua could have a concussion. They play Mike White, backup, as a result, and they end up a six-win team."

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Cowherd said he's been a bit more "glass-half-full recently" with the Jets as Rodgers has reportedly risen the standard for the team. If Cowherd sees that trickle into the early part of the season, he'll be more bullish on them being a Super Bowl contender.

"The best hope for the Jets is you get the new and improved Aaron Rodgers," Cowherd said. "You see that with products, they come out and they say, ‘Well, this is a new and improved Tide!’ And you say, ‘I was doing just fine.’

"But if you get the new and improved Aaron … you always try to be a better version of yourself when you take a new job. A little less snarky, a little more accountable, a committed offseason Aaron, that feels like Year 8 Aaron in Green Bay."

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