Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Mecole Hardman ended his 2023 NFL season the way every football player dreams of—catching the game-winning touchdown in the Super Bowl.
But it began much differently. Hardman signed a one-year deal with the New York Jets last March and appeared in five games before being traded back to his former team, the Chiefs, in October.
In a recent interview with host Ryan Clark on The Pivot podcast, Hardman gave honest thoughts about his time with the Jets.
"You just got a new (offensive) coaching staff that came in and there’s no standard there,” Hardman said, addressing the team’s culture [via Rich Cimini]. “Everybody does what they want to do. Granted, the defense has more of a stabilized standard with the coaching staff on that side, so the defense has a standard.
“But the offense is just like, 'We’ll just figure it out. It’s Aaron [Rodgers’s] show. Let Aaron do what Aaron does.’ Then, when Aaron goes down, it’s like we don’t know what to do.”
Rodgers infamously suffered an Achilles tear on the Jets’ fourth offensive play of the season. Without Rodgers, the Jets stumbled to a 7–10 record and missed the playoffs for a 13th straight season.
Hardman also revealed that he refused to return punts in a Week 4 matchup against the Chiefs because special teams coach Brant Boyer had misled him about the punt-returning job in training camp.
"It’s the lies and the way they handled me,” Hardman said when explaining why it didn’t work out in New York. “I didn’t like it at all."
