![\"Justin](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/MixCollage-29-Mar-2026-03-43-PM-1521-e1774813450913.jpg\")
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGetty\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Former New York Jets quarterback Justin Fields and Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid.<\/p>\n
There are high expectations for Justin Fields<\/a>.<\/p>\n The New York Jets<\/a> traded Fields to the Kansas City Chiefs<\/a> this offseason for<\/a> a 2027 sixth-rounder.<\/p>\n At the Annual League Meeting, head coach Andy Reid shared some strong words about his new quarterback.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, we snuck out and got a good quarterback to back him up,\u201d Reid said when asked if the team\u2019s offseason planning has been for [Patrick] Mahomes<\/a> to be ready Week 1 via NFL Network\u2019s Judy Battista<\/a>. \u201cSo, if he doesn\u2019t, you know, if he\u2019s not able to make it for the beginning of the season, then we know we\u2019ve got a legitimate backup there that can go win games for us.\u201d<\/p>\n The Jets Would Not Come to the Same Conclusion<\/p>\n Last offseason, the Jets took a swing. They signed Fields<\/a> to a two-year contract worth $40 million with $30 million guaranteed.<\/p>\n He was brought in to be the QB1, to turn his career around, and to win games for the green and white.<\/p>\n Fields started nine games<\/a> in 2025. The good moments were fleeting, and the winning was basically non-existent. He finished with a 2-7 record as the starting quarterback for the Jets last season.<\/p>\n The Jets\u2019 vision before the year was to let Fields play quarterback. To unlock a part of his game that the NFL<\/a> hadn\u2019t seen before. In a way, they accomplished that feat. We had never seen Fields look as bad<\/a> as he did with the Jets compared to the rest of his career.<\/p>\n Copy and Paste From Recent History<\/p>\n If Fields finds immediate success with the Chiefs, both statistically and in terms of wins and losses, that wouldn\u2019t be new.<\/p>\n Plenty of quarterbacks have left the lovely confines of 1 Jets Drive, and their lives eventually got a lot better.<\/p>\n Geno Smith<\/a> was sucker punched<\/a> in the locker room in 2015, which ended his days as a starting QB in New York. He went on a seven-year sabbatical before returning to the starting lineup in 2022 and becoming a two-time Pro Bowler.<\/p>\n Sam Darnold<\/a> was traded from the Jets to the Carolina Panthers<\/a> during the 2021 offseason. He bounced around with the Panthers, San Francisco 49ers<\/a>, the Minnesota Vikings<\/a>, and found his forever home with the Seattle Seahawks<\/a>. Darnold just won a Super Bowl ring with Seattle this past season.<\/p>\n Fields would simply be continuing a long and embarrassing conga line of ex-Jets QBs to succeed.<\/p>\n However, the Jets do deserve credit<\/a>. For as bad as Fields looked on the field, the Jets were still able to get an asset for him via trade.<\/p>\n Not only did they pick up a draft choice, but they also saved money on his contract. As part of the trade with Kansas City, the Jets saved<\/a> $3 million.<\/p>\n The green and white are paying Geno Smith $3.3 million this year, with the Raiders<\/a> footing the rest of the bill. That makes that swap a near wash.<\/p>\n There is a chance the Jets could face off against Fields in 2026. The Jets are scheduled to travel to Kansas City. If Mahomes is healthy, Fields will be on the bench. However, if Mahomes isn\u2019t ready to go and their scheduled contest is early enough in the season, we could see a revenge game.<\/p>\n The full 2026 NFL schedule will be released in the second week of May.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tPaul Esden Jr.<\/a> covers the New York Jets for Heavy.com. A New York native, he co-hosts a morning show, “The Manchild Show with Boy Green Digital.” Before joining Heavy in 2021, Esden Jr. covered both national and New York sports for FanSided, Elite Sports NY, and The Score 1260. More about Paul Esden Jr.<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Jets\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Former New York Jets quarterback Justin Fields and Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid. There are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":841643,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2051],"tags":[7,226,1917,255,2321,2097,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-841642","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-jets","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-jets","10":"tag-new-york","11":"tag-new-york-jets","12":"tag-newyork","13":"tag-newyorkjets","14":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116314517473818907","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/841642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=841642"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/841642\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/841643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=841642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=841642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=841642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}