From the 2024 NFL schedule release comes story lines, and there’s no bigger one in the NFL this year than Aaron Rodgers and the New York Jets. And the league is leaning into that one—again—even after paying for it last year in a very, very big way.
Only three teams maxed out with six prime-time games—the San Francisco 49ers, Dallas Cowboys and the Jets, who had a similarly unforgiving prime-time schedule last year.
And only two teams have seven stand-alone games—the Kansas City Chiefs and the Jets.
In that group of four, you have last year’s two Super Bowl teams, one of the world’s strongest professional sports brands … and the Jets, a franchise that has the longest playoff drought (13 seasons) in the NFL by a margin of years over the other 31 teams. It’s also a team leaning heavily on a 40-year-old quarterback coming off a torn Achilles, with the NFL similarly leaning on Aaron Rodgers’s ability to stay healthy in keeping the Jets atop the marquee.
Fingers crossed.
And I could feel that sentiment talking to NFL vice president of broadcasting Onnie Bose late Wednesday night, less than an hour after the league took the wrapper off the 2024 schedule for everyone to see. He compared the dynamic to trying to schedule the Denver Broncos in ’12, with Peyton Manning returning from four neck surgeries that led to his release from the Indianapolis Colts. That one worked out, of course. Denver finished 13–3 before being upset by the Baltimore Ravens in double overtime in the AFC divisional round playoffs. He can only hope this game ends like that one did.
“We went all-in on the Jets last year with Aaron Rodgers, starting with that [Monday night] game, and it happens four whole plays into it,” Bose says. “They were playing the Chiefs early on and the Eagles. They had great matchups. The reality is we built a lot of our schedule around that premise that everybody gets a shot at Aaron Rodgers and the Jets. It’s the New York market. If they are a successful team, given that drought, it would be such a great story. And it kind of fell apart. On the other hand, despite that, viewership was up.
“The Jets are still a solid team at their core. We talked a lot about that. How do we go into it this year? He is coming off a big injury, but at the same time it’s still Aaron Rodgers. It’s still the New York market. They still play in the AFC East. They still play the 49ers and Houston and a bunch of big games.”
The answer, quite simply, was to go all-in again, with flex scheduling giving the league a bit of an escape hatch. The Jets’ six prime-time games all fall in the first 11 weeks of the season, including a stretch where they’ll play three in 18 days, with a 1 p.m. ET visit to the archrival New England Patriots, too. And then there’s a twist that some would consider a little cruel—just like last year, they’ll open on .
So if Rodgers's story line is burning in early September, that element is like throwing a can of lighter fluid on the fire. Which, in the end, the league won’t shy away from.
“A year ago, we quickly got to Buffalo at the Jets, Week 1, —,” Bose says. “This was not the same case. It was absolutely on our radar, a lot of different variations, probably across all the windows of Week 1. We started to see this come into shape. It’s a massive game. The reaction when ESPN announced that the other day was huge. It’s big. It’s Aaron going back to the area where he grew up. You always want to get off to a strong start. There are great games across Week 1. This was one of them.
“It was not a, . But as we saw schedules, we really liked that start. It’s enthusiastic for ESPN and everyone else. It’s a little bit that comes full circle from last year.”
So, buckle up, Jets. The hype and hysteria surrounding the team last year may have died down over the past eight months, but the league is betting—in a Jerry Jones sort of way—on it coming right back around.
And with that in my mind, here are some takeaways from my conversation with Bose …
