Jets owner Woody Johnson calls the F grade from players 'bogus'

PALM BEACH, Fla. — Jets owner Woody Johnson trashed the annual NFLPA report card, calling it “totally bogus” after he received an “F’’ grade from the players.

“My first read is I think it was totally bogus,” Johnson said Monday at the annual NFL meetings.

He took issue with the “whole thing” and said the process was “violated” by how the survey was conducted.

Johnson was the only owner to receive an “F.’’

“According to the agreement we have with the league, it’s supposed to be a process that is we have representatives and they have representatives so we know that it’s an honest survey, and that was violated, in my opinion,” he said. “So I’m going to leave it at that.”

Johnson already had stated publicly a month before the report card was released that he knows he has to be a better owner and that he’s working on it.

He said Monday that relationships with the players are “very, very important” and that he wants to have better and more communication with them on everything, including what food they want to eat at their training facility.

“We want to get better every day in every category,” Johnson said. “I want to be number one in everything, all of our people do. We want to be number one.

“So if there’s areas that we can improve, and I think there’s always areas we can improve, not because of this bogus report, we’re going to do it. Relationship with the players is very, very important. So we want to make sure the players are involved now.”

Johnson and the Jets also are implementing other changes in hopes of improving the organization and the culture. It coincides with the changes in the football department with the hiring of coach Aaron Glenn and general manager Darren Mougey.

The Jets offered buyouts to roughly 170 noncontractual employees, and Monday was the deadline to accept the buyouts that were offered for financial reasons. Johnson said there will be no layoffs, but he wanted to give his employees the opportunity to make a change if they’re not “all-in” with this franchise.

“That’s something we thought was consistent with what we’re doing and changing culture,” he said. “Giving everybody a chance to go in a different direction if they wanted and seek other opportunities, but also to move the whole organization forward and maybe a new and slightly different way.

“We thought that this is a good time to give everybody an opportunity to reevaluate what they’re doing in their lives. The plan we’re going to is we want people that are all-in 100% to what the plan is with Aaron and ‘Mooge’ and what we’re trying to do on the football side. On the business side, they have to be exactly the same and they have to be together to serve our public, serve our players in a much more innovative way than we have.”

The Jets have missed the playoffs for 14 consecutive years. Glenn said “people” are the biggest factor in changing and establishing a culture.

“Me sitting up there giving a rah-rah speech, that has nothing to do with culture,” he said. “Culture is about the people that we bring in the building. I’m not just talking about players. I’m talking about coaches, too. I’m talking about support staff, too. So we’re trying to do a really good job of bringing the right people in the building, and as we do that, the culture will begin to change.”

One person who won’t be back in the building is Aaron Rodgers, as Glenn and Mougey decided to move on from the quarterback. Johnson said it was “a good experiment” to bring Rodgers in but that it “just didn’t work out.”

“I have a lot of respect for Aaron Rodgers,” he said. “I’m sorry that it didn’t work out, but we had to make a choice. I think we made the right choice. They made the right choice.”

By Al Iannazzone

al.iannazzone@newsday.comAl_Iannazzone

Al Iannazzone covers the Jets for Newsday after spending nearly two decades on the NBA beat with Knicks and Nets.