Jets' Hall of Fame Game vs. Browns Will Be for 'the Young Guys,' Not ...

The start to the Aaron Rodgers "era" of New York Jets football will begin as expected — with the Jets' vaunted quarterback watching from the sidelines — when the Jets open their preseason schedule against the Cleveland Browns on Thursday night at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium in Canton, OH.

"We're just trying to get the young guys a lot of playing time, see what we've got in them," head coach Robert Saleh said this week. "We're not anticipating any of our starters playing and [only] a couple of vets, for that matter, so it's going to be a lot of young guys running around and trying to showcase their skills and make the 53-man roster."

What that means at quarterback is that after Rodgers displayed his uber-leadership, high-energy, coach-as-a-player vibe entering the third week of Saleh's third Jets training camp, he will observe and perhaps get on the headset while Zach Wilson gets the start.

And Wilson, who started both of his Jets preseason openers in 2021 and '22 and the '21 season opener at Carolina, may get not only this start but all three other starts this summer. It would be neat for Jets fans to see Rodgers operating in game situations, to show his preseason passing form since 2008 (67.8% accuracy, 26/3 TD-to-INT ratio, 114.2 rating), which is even better than his regular-season stat line since '08 (65.3%, 474/104, 103.8 rating). But Rodgers hasn't played in a preseason game since Green Bay's 2018 Game 2 vs. Pittsburgh.

Saleh did tell ESPN this week that if Rodgers does play in the preseason, it would be for "a quick tuneup" at the Giants in the Aug. 26 preseason finale. Meanwhile, Wilson has become an eager student of Rodgers this offseason and camp and appears ready to let it rip regardless of the relative importance of the HOF Game.

"I love the way Zach is going about his business," WR Randall Cobb said Monday. "When you have a generational talent like Aaron that you can learn from every day, that'll help out in the future. He's taken that all in and I've been impressed with the way he operates and the way he handles himself in the huddle."