Football is finally back.
The New York Jets open the 2026 preseason at home against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Friday, August 14. It will be the first of three preseason games this August for the Jets. Here is how to watch tonight’s game as the Jets prepare for their Week 1 regular-season opener against the Tennessee Titans on Sunday, September 13.
- Who: New York Jets vs. Tampa Bay Buccaneers
- What: Preseason Game 1
- Where: MetLife Stadium (East Rutherford, New Jersey)
- When: Friday, August 14, 7 p.m. EST
- TV: NFL Network
- Odds: Jets -5.5, Over/Under 35.5
- Weather: 84 degrees
If you don’t have access to NFL Network, our digital reporter Paul Andrew Esden Jr aka “Boy Green”, will be hosting a watch party and play-by-play coverage of the game on his YouTube channel at this link.
The Jets Will Be Playing Their Starters vs. The Bucs
Head coach Aaron Glenn announced earlier this week that he will be playing his starters in the preseason opener.
“Everybody’s playing. Everybody’s playing,” Glenn told the media on Tuesday, August 11.
“Because that’s what I want to do, for the most part, and listen, you have two new systems that’s going in and I think it’s important for our guys to play. Now, there was science behind this also, as far as having joint practices, and trying to get the guys, at least throughout the preseason, 25-30 reps, and I’m talking about all three games. I don’t know how I’ll divvy that up, it’s a feel when you go into preseason, but what they say is when you have joint practices where the ones get a lot of reps and then you have that many plays, 25-30 in a preseason game, throughout those three games, the risk of injury actually goes down in that first part of the year. Just talking to those guys, I’m a big believer in that, so I’m looking forward to seeing that,” Glenn explained.
On the “Jets Collective” podcast, ESPN’s Rich Cimini guessed that we would see “a drive or two” from the starters tonight versus the Bucs.
Coach Reveals the Top Things He’s Looking for in Bucs Game
“Here’s three things that I really want to see, and it’s something that we talk about quite a bit, I want to see the fundamentals of the game show up. And when I say that, I want to see blocking, tackling, catching, ball security, punching the ball, I want to see those things. And then I want to see the techniques behind that, also. I want to make sure that we operate in that aspect when it comes to the game. Then I want to see us execute. I want to see those three things and I want to see the discipline of our team, alright. So, actually four things I want to see in this game,” head coach Aaron Glenn said on Wednesday, August 12.
Jets rookie quarterback Cade Klubnik is set to make his preseason debut. I spoke with Bucs analyst and NFL draft expert Trevor Sikkema on “Boy Green Daily” this week.
“Fundamentally sort of one thing that I’m really looking forward to seeing from him this preseason is an area of weakness that I saw from him when he had this last year at Clemson. He still struggled with respecting safety rotations, disguise of deep coverage, and I felt like a lot of the poor throws from Klubnik over the last couple of seasons really came when hey I diagnosed this pre-snap and he’s pretty good at diagnosing what he is about to see pre-snap, but then if there was a very unique or well timed well orchestrated change okay there was a one-high safety now there is two-high safeties or one was deep on the left side but they’re totally rotating now and Klubnik was just kind of late to see that,” Sikkema told me on the podcast.
“He’d identify the safeties before the snap and maybe right at the snap, but then after that he is going to go to his target and through his progressions which you need to do, and then we’d get to a point where he couldn’t feel where the safeties are moving out of his peripheral or when he was scanning the field. So I kind of felt as though he had a hard time identifying those safety rotations post-snap. The preseason and training camp are a perfect time to continue to push the envelope in that regard. Understand what defenses are capable of and what true NFL speed in the secondary looks like,” Sikkema explained.
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