The Jets are 2-7, the trade deadline came and went, and Aaron Glenn spent it telling everyone the team is “right on the cusp of trying to break through.” A coach says that when he wants credit for patience. A fan hears it and checks the schedule for the next heartbreak.

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Here is the entire sell-off. ESPN’s Rich Cimini reported that New York sent safety Andre Cisco to the Detroit Lions for a sixth-round pick. That is the move. A safety, for a sixth-rounder, from a team at 2-7, with a stack of players other teams wanted.

Glenn said the philosophy “hasn’t changed from last year.” Nobody should be proud of an unchanged philosophy attached to a team that has lost five one-score games already.

The one-score record is the part I can’t get past. The Jets are 1-5 in games decided by a single score. Once, you call it bad bounces. Six times, you are describing a team that doesn’t know how to close. “On the cusp” requires the team to be winning the coin flips it keeps losing, and nothing in the film or the standings says it will start.

Now the fair counterargument, because there is one. Cimini’s reporting says the Jets were only willing to move expiring contracts, so the quiet deadline was partly a choice to keep the 2027 roster intact. Fine. Protecting next year is a real strategy. But it’s a strategy for a team that has a plan for next year, and “we are on the cusp” is a sentence about this year.

Take the names one by one. Geno Smith was never seriously considered for a trade, in part because the Jets have no experienced backup and fourth-round rookie Cade Klubnik hasn’t taken a snap. That is a plan built on a mediocre starter and an untested understudy. Garrett Wilson drew interest from the Chiefs and 49ers, but a trade was never realistic with him signed long term, and he said “I love it here.” Fine, keep him. Breece Hall just signed a three-year, $43.5 million extension in May and shares the backfield with Braelon Allen.

Then there’s Will McDonald IV, who asked out. Jacksonville made what ESPN described as a significant offer, which one AFC personnel director valued at a second-round pick. The Jets kept him anyway. Glenn calls him a “huge part of what we’re doing.” The player who is frustrated with his usage got the same answer the Geno Smith drama did: stay, play, and trust the plan.

Maybe that holds. Maybe a team with a strength of schedule ranked 23rd by ESPN Analytics gets a few breaks and the one-score games start flipping. I’d bet against it. Teams on the cusp win one of those six games, then another. These Jets have one.

Glenn has his roster for the rest of the year. The rest of us get the one-score games.