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Some of you might have missed this one, but it’s a pretty important Jets story . . .
On June 24, Manish Mehta columnized that Adam Gase is a big reason Jamal Adams wants to be traded.
Most of you are aware of that column which we wrote about on this website, but something we didn’t get into was guard Alex Lewis firing back at Mehta on social media.
Lewis’ criticism of Mehta wasn’t directly connected to his contention that Adams wants out due to Gase, but more about the writer’s assertion that the coach is widely disliked in the locker room. Before we get to Lewis, here is a snippet from Mehta’s column as a refresher:
“Players don’t respect Gase, who has rubbed them with wrong way with his inability to lead and lack of support. Too many people on 1 Jets Drive – including players, coaches and front office members – don’t trust and believe in Gase, whose disingenuous bent hasn’t been lost on people in the organization.”
Lewis responded to this article on Instagram, opening his statement with: “I have mad respect for Coach Gase.”
He then went into a bunch of things about what they are building at One Jets Drive, and closed with: “I felt like that was needed to be said on the heels of reading Manish Mehta’s article lumping all players in one mindset disparaging the head coach. I am proud to be a New York Jet.”
Lewis followed with a separate post: “Give up your sources. You don’t speak for the locker room or myself. You’ve got no place in the locker room if you are going to overgeneralize all players. Manish you are a poison to the team.”
Powerful stuff in that second post.
What is my take on this?
It’s unclear what Adams thinks of Gase. I didn’t sense any problems in my time around the team during practice, games and at practice. Obviously, I’m not in meetings, so I’m not seeing them 100 percent of the time. Maybe there is an issue. Who knows? If Mehta wrote about Adams wanting out because of Gase, it likely came from Adams or his agent, so I’m not going to dismiss this out of hands.
But it’s understandable that Lewis was frustrated at what he felt was a sweeping generalization about most of the locker room.
I thought the article perhaps came on too strong painting a picture of the Jets being on the brink of a mutiny in their locker room due to many players not liking the coach.
Of course there are some players that don’t like the coach. That is the case in most locker rooms. Surely Le’Veon Bell is likely not a big fan of Gase after the report the coach believed the team overpaid him.
However, the contention that, “Players don’t respect Gase, who has rubbed them with wrong way with his inability to lead and lack of support,” seemed a little hyperbolic.
And that seemed to be what ticked off Lewis.
Several people posted on social media that Lewis was just sucking up to the coach because he’s a fringe player.
To paint him as a fringe player doing this for political reasons is a tad unfair. He signed a 3-year, $18 million deal this off-season, and barring an upset, he will be the starting left guard this year.
And Lewis has a huge fan in GM Joe Douglas, who traded a draft pick last summer to Baltimore for his services. Douglas likes his take-no-prisoners approach.
So I don’t view this as Lewis trying to placate his coach, but more a case of trying to tamp down the concept that a lot of players in the locker room don’t like Gase.
July 3, 2020
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