JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Coach Adam Gase is on the verge of losing the locker room. Yes, it's that bad. The New York Jets are 1-6, making the same mistakes week after week. The players are beyond frustrated. Privately, some wonder whether the team has the necessary resolve to handle in-game adversity. They're losing hope. When hope is gone, it's like injecting poison into the bloodstream. Soon enough, it's over.
The Jets are close to that moment. They travel to the winless Miami Dolphins on Sunday (1 p.m. ET, CBS), and a loss to one of the worst NFL teams in recent memory would be a rock-bottom moment for Gase, who was fired by the Dolphins only nine months ago. If the players can't come together and win a revenge game for their coach, it will raise questions about how much they really want to play for him.
The Gase Bowl will be ugly on the field, but it will paint a vivid picture of the Jets-Gase marriage. Heck, not even Rich Kotite was 1-7 in his first season.
On Sunday, the Jets sounded utterly demoralized after the 29-15 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars at TIAA Bank Field. Safety Jamal Adams, the team's energy source, was the picture of dejection. He spoke slowly, seemingly sighing between words. Frankly, he sounded fed up. He's 10-29 since entering the league.
"We're 1-6, man," said Adams, shaking his head. "I can't even count how many times" -- he didn't finish the sentence. "It's been three years, man. I'm frustrated. I just want to win."
Running back Le'Veon Bell, another energy source, was nowhere to be found. In an out-of-character move, he left without speaking to reporters. That spoke volumes because Bell, amid the gloom of this rotten season, always has been Mr. Sunshine. Maybe he was ticked off because he had only 12 total touches. If that were the case, he had every right to be upset. It was a major flaw in Gase's playcalling.
Defensive lineman Leonard Williams, who could be traded before Tuesday's deadline, shared what Gase told the team in his postgame address. Gase talked about not quitting on the season. When a coach has to address quitting before Halloween, it's never a good thing.
"We still have half a season to go, and we can either come together and keep fighting or we can roll over and quit," said Williams, parroting Gase. "Obviously, we're not going to try to quit and we're going to try to stick together, and this is the time to come together."
Make no mistake, there's a lot of doubt in the Jets' locker room. Gase is supposed to be an offensive mastermind, but quarterback Sam Darnold (seven interceptions in two games) is a wreck, and the offense has produced only seven touchdowns in seven games. Clearly, their 24-22 win against the Dallas Cowboys was an aberration. The players haven't bought into Gase's system; anybody can see that. And there's the sticky situation surrounding the release of guard Kelechi Osemele, which has undoubtedly been a factor in the locker room unrest.
The offense was supposed to get better when Darnold returned from mononucleosis. It took one step forward and two big steps backward. Darnold took the blame, calling the past seven days "two of my worst games ever." But it wasn't all his fault. Save for the two touchdown drives, only one of nine possessions lasted longer than four plays -- and that was a six-play drive that ended with a punt.
In a quiet locker room, the theme was familiar: We have to get on the same page. The players sounded beaten. No one came out and said, "We'll get it fixed." There was no swagger, no confidence, only resignation. Gase, for one, seemed to question his team's mental toughness.
"They, obviously, handled adversity a lot better than we did," he said of the Jaguars. "We didn't really do anything we talked about in all three phases. We were poor and made a lot of mistakes."
Gase talked about rallying out of this funk, saying, "We have to do it. We have to go back to practice. We have to go into our meetings and make sure we are getting better every day. We have to do it. No one else is coming to save us."
It could get worse before it gets better -- a lot worse.