Will McDonald IV asked the Jets for a trade, the Jets said he is staying, and a team that just fell to 2-7 now owns a hostage situation with a losing record attached.
https://x.com/RapSheet/status/2119776362580136317
The request surfaced a day after the Chiefs beat New York 35-12 at Arrowhead. McDonald was the 15th pick in 2023 and piled up 10.5 sacks in 2024. This season he has 3 sacks, a forced fumble and 13 tackles. ESPN reported that he has played 263 defensive snaps in nine games, 23 of them Sunday, and topped 30 snaps once in the last five. He raised the playing time issue weeks earlier. Nothing changed.
The Jets also exercised his fifth-year option, which means $13.8 million guaranteed in 2027. Paying a man that much and then using him for 23 snaps is a decision somebody made on purpose.
Aaron Glenn’s answer: “I just know we’re in the business of keeping good players, so Will’s going to be here.” Rapoport reported the Jets do not plan to shop him. The trade deadline is 4 p.m. ET Tuesday, and nothing in that sentence from Glenn sounds like a coach working the phones.
The counterargument deserves a fair hearing. A pass rusher with 3 sacks has a thin market, and a team does not sell a former first-rounder at a discount just because he is cranky. Fine. Keeping him on those terms still means pairing a player who wants out with a snap count that tells him he is not wanted much, and nobody has explained how that gets better by Sunday.
Meanwhile the building is on fire from every other direction. Geno Smith finished 18-of-32 for 165 yards and was sacked five times, then threw his helmet at the bench after a fourth-quarter sack. “Just frustrated with not getting it done,” he said. Right tackle Armand Membou spiked his own helmet after Chris Jones got to Smith and drew an unsportsmanlike conduct flag. Two helmets in one afternoon, and the Jets can’t buy a clean stretch even when the only thing on the schedule is a football game.
The numbers back up the frustration. The defense has given up 127 points over four straight losses. The offense has gone five straight quarters without a touchdown, and it spent 32 plays in Chiefs territory on Sunday without finding the end zone, the most since Week 3 of 2022. Breece Hall described the scoring problem as something that has lingered for “the last however many years we’ve been here.”
Glenn summed up his own week with “I have a lot of thinking to do.” That is the most believable thing anyone in the building has said. A coach who is still thinking, a quarterback throwing equipment, a tackle spiking equipment and a defender who has formally asked to leave do not add up to a plan. They add up to a team hoping Tuesday at 4 p.m. goes quietly.
Glenn left himself one door, and it barely opens: “Never say never, but right now I know we’re going to stand pat.”
