As former NFL player, Jeff Ulbrich makes strong connection with Jets players

Jeff Ulbrich walked into his first team meeting as interim head coach of the Jets earlier this week with the kind of respect and clout that not everyone in his position would be able to carry.

It wasn’t because he’d just been promoted by ownership to take the place of Robert Saleh. It wasn’t because he’d been the defensive coordinator of the organization’s top-ranked unit for the past few years. It wasn’t even because of the relationships that pre-existed with so many of the players now under his ultimate charge.

It was because as he looked out at the sea of uncertain faces staring at him for answers in what likely was and will remain the most turbulent time of their careers, every one of the athletes knew he’d been where they were before.

In October 2008, when the 49ers fired Mike Nolan and named Mike Singletary interim head coach, Ulbrich was a veteran linebacker on the team. It was just one of the experiences that Ulbrich carries with him now, even 15 years removed from his final snap, that resonates like little else can in an NFL locker room these days.

He was a player. And players recognize players.

“I've seen him coach and I know the relationship he has with the players, and they respect him, they trust him,” Jets owner Woody Johnson said this week on Ulbrich’s standing with the team. “I've seen it at halftime, and I've seen it in practice. When he talks, they listen to him in a way that probably represents the fact that he did play the sport at linebacker for 10 years, which is pretty unique. So he brings that knowledge and the respect, and the knowledge to the game in a way that I think will be very good for the players going forward.”

While the on-field portion of Ulbrich’s resume certainly carries weight, sorry Woody, it’s not unique. In fact, Ulbrich is part of what seems to be a growing trend in today’s league. He is now one of 11 active head coaches who once donned the helmets and pads and participated in NFL action. Just four years ago in 2020 there were only three.

While some have been flops — Jeff Saturday’s stint as the interim in Indianapolis was a predictable failure — many of the former players such as Dan Campbell and DeMeco Ryans have found success by utilizing the fire and passion they once had on the field in their new roles on the sideline. That’s something Ulbrich hopes to tap into.

“I love this game,” he said this week. “I've been part of the NFL for over 20 years now, as a player and a coach. All I know is how to be me, and I'd like to say that that's someone that relates to the players. I think playing has helped me do that at times . . . I'm going to be me every day, and bring a level of my authenticity and my energy, and my toughness and my grit, and my experience in this league. And from that standpoint, I'm very excited about connecting with this locker room, and elevating everybody.”

The current Jets players seem to be responding to that.

“He's the ultimate competitor,” linebacker C.J. Mosley said. “I know what makes him tick. I know his story. I know his why. When you know somebody that intimately you naturally want to perform at your best for him and you want to do things to make him proud.”

Added punter Thomas Morestead: “He played the game at the highest level. He knows what it's like to be a player in this league . . . He still has kind of a player's passion for the game and you can see that with how he talks to the guys.”

Ulbrich never wanted to be a coach, but he can pretty much pinpoint when that changed. It was late in his 49ers career after he’d been usurped in the starting lineup by future Hall of Famer Patrick Willis. San Francisco was playing Arizona and Willis, then a rookie, made a play that Ulbrich, his mentor, had been working on with him during the week.

“I still remember it just like yesterday,” Ulbrich said. “He snaps his eyes to me and I look at him and that felt better than any play I've ever made for myself, you know? And it was like, ‘I'm hooked.’”

He also recognized early in his second career that having been a player was an advantage.

“I've been in their shoes and sat in their chairs and know what it feels like, so it can give me perspective in that way," he said in 2021 when he was a defensive coordinator in Atlanta. "Hopefully it gives me a little street cred. The fact that I've done it and played for a while, that there's a level of trust there, maybe, that a former player can generate.”

Will any of this pay off for Ulbrich? That depends. He won’t be out on the field Monday night facing the Bills, only the guys who wear the uniform currently will be doing that. Same for the 11 games after this one. Ultimately it will be up to them whether Ulbrich is a success or failure in this new gig.

So far, though, Ulbrich likes what he’s been getting from his team.

“I've seen it go really well and I've seen it not go very well,” he said on Saturday of his experiences working under other interims as both a player and an assistant coach. “That's why I'm just so grateful for this locker room, the character in this locker room, because they could have very easily gone sideways. It might not have been as positive. But they've been absolutely fantastic . . .It's exciting and it makes my heart happy the way they've responded.”

At least a part of that derives from the fact that the players know Ulbrich isn’t only their new head coach. He isn’t only leading them. He’s also one of them.

By Tom Rock

tom.rock@newsday.com@TomRock_Newsday

Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.