Cleveland Browns 2022 opponent preview: New York Jets

The Cleveland Browns will host the New York Jets in Week 2 of the 2022 season. Here’s a preview of that matchup.

Right now, the Cleveland Browns are working toward the 2022 season as they continue to work through their OTAs.

The end goal for the regular season, as it always should be, is to make it to the playoffs. From there, the goal changes but every team has to take it one step at a time.

Here, we are doing that as well as we look at each game of the 2022 campaign and break down the opposing team. In Week 2, that brings us to the New York Jets.

Jets 2021 season

2021 started out poorly for the Jets and only continued to snowball out of control. They lost their first three games of the season before shocking everyone with an overtime win over the eventual No. 1 seed Tennessee Titans.

Overall, they ended up with a record of 4-13, but they did score another impressive win as they somehow took out the AFC champs, the Cincinnati Bengals, in Week 8.

It was the first season under new head coach Robert Saleh and while growing pains should be expected, this was a tough season, to say the least.

Key offseason moves

The offseason was much kinder to the Jets. They did lose veterans such as Marcus Maye, Morgan Moses, and Jamison Crowder but they added two starting-caliber tight ends in C.J. Uzomah and Tyler Conklin. They also beefed up the interior of their line by adding Laken Tomlinson.

But the real key for New York was their draft. They had three first-round picks and knocked them all out of the park. Coming in will be Sauce Gardner, Garrett Wilson, and Jermaine Johnson. If that wasn’t enough, they also added running back Breece Hall in Round 2, and he could end up being the NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year.

When do the teams meet?

Cleveland will have the Jets come to town in Week 2, which will be Sunday, September 18. It will be a 1:00 pm game, and will also be the home opener at FirstEnergy Stadium.

Last time the Cleveland Browns played the Jets

Cleveland fans are probably still a little sore about the last meeting between these two clubs. That took place in 2020 when the Browns made the playoffs and New York won just two games all season. One of those wins, however, came against Cleveland in Week 16.

It was the first year of dealing with COVID-19 for our country and the Browns got hit hard right before this game. Nearly their entire receiving corps was forced to miss the game as they had to turn to Ja’Marcus Bradley as their No. 1 option.

New York was able to use this to their advantage as they focused on forcing the pass — holding Nick Chubb to just 28 yards. The strategy worked as they dared Cleveland to pass and without solid weapons, they fell to the Jets 23-16.

Player to watch

There will be a couple of players to watch in this one, including Garrett Wilson who was a star at Ohio State, and Sauce Gardner who was a shutdown corner at Cincinnati. But the one who can make this a tougher game than expected is Breece Hall.

Hall will be relied upon in a big way all season with the Jets trying to take some of the pressure off of Zach Wilson. Cleveland also doesn’t have a huge run-stuffer in the middle of their line meaning if the Jets stay patient with the run, Hall can have a good day.

Still, the Jets top players are mainly going to be rookies. This early in the season, it will favor the Browns as they’re still learning the ropes but they still can’t take any of them for granted.