Few gamers are nearer with Jeff Ulbrich — whom the Jets named their interim coach after firing Robert Saleh on Tuesday — than C.J. Mosley.
Mosley is in his fifth season with the staff (he opted out of the 2020 season because of the COVID-19 pandemic) and was already a staple at linebacker when Ulbrich was employed as defensive coordinator in 2021.
Mosley has been a staff captain every season with the Jets and emerged as one in every of Ulbrich’s most trusted leaders.
“He’s an final competitor,” Mosley stated on a Zoom name Wednesday. “Simply working with him day-after-day, going by the battles we’ve been by the final 4 years, I do know what makes him tick. I do know his story, I do know his why, I do know his household — when you realize somebody that intimately, then you definately naturally need to carry out at your greatest for him and also you need to do issues to make him proud.
“He’s simply a type of coaches that brings that out of you each single day. Even whenever you’re drained, even when he’s drained, he discovered a strategy to encourage our defensive employees and our defensive room each single day.”
Ulbrich’s unit is second-best within the NFL in yardage this 12 months. He oversaw top-five models every of the earlier two seasons as nicely.
Past serving to excessive draft picks Quinnen Williams and Sauce Gardner remodel into superstars, Ulbrich has helped develop much less heralded gamers — like Quincy Williams and Michael Carter II — into among the greatest at their positions throughout the NFL.
And his affect has gone past regular members of the protection, stretching to punter Thomas Morstead.
“I keep in mind having a dialog with [Ulbrich] final 12 months and asking how he ran his defensive conferences,” Morstead stated Wednesday. “He stated ‘Hey man, you’re a part of the protection. You set us up earlier than we go on the market. We’d like to have you ever come sit in our night-before-the-game assembly.’ So I did that for the remainder of final season. At one level, I even acquired an opportunity to talk to the blokes, which was actually cool.”
Ulbrich performed 10 seasons within the league as a linebacker, all with the 49ers. His vitality as a former participant is infectious.
“I feel the factor that I respect about [Ulbrich] is No. 1, he performed the sport on the highest degree,” Morstead stated. “He is aware of what it’s wish to be a participant on this league. Most guys aren’t able to be performed enjoying in the event that they actually love the sport, and he nonetheless has kinda a participant’s ardour for the sport. You possibly can see that with how he talks to the blokes. I hope he’s simply who he has all the time been.”
Ulbrich briefly addressed the staff Tuesday, and the staff additionally held a players-only assembly.
What was the brand new message?
“The principle factor that I heard so much yesterday was accountability,” Mosley stated. “That’s what we now have to remember going ahead. All of us should be accountable each single day we come to the constructing, each single day that we get up. Each resolution that’s made inside our group, particularly with our staff, all of us should take some type of accountability. … I feel this was undoubtedly a wake-up name and an eye-opener for lots of people.”
