Breece Hall read the tea leaves wrong.
After a disappointing 2024 campaign, Hall thought he might be gone from New York, tossed out with the bathwater as the Jets purged the previous regime's players.
Rumors before the 2025 NFL Draft suggested the Jets might trade the shifty running back and select his replacement.
"I was seeing it just like everybody else was seeing it," Hall said on Wednesday, via the team's official website. "But as I said, if people feel like you're not doing your job, you're going to be replaced. It didn't happen. I'm here."
Hall said new head coach Aaron Glenn called him and debunked the chatter.
"That meant a lot," Hall said. "At first, I just kind of like, OK, we'll just see what happens. And then, AG called me and told me: 'Breece, you think I want to trade you?' And I was like, I don't know. He's like, 'Breece, I don't want to trade you. I want you to be here. You're going to be here, you're our running back.' And so that felt really good. And then just to sit down with him and have a long conversation, and for him to fill me in. For me to get to know him and everything, it's been cool. And to see how our practices are run, how competitive he likes it to be, and how he likes to put the ball down and just let us play. It's been fun."
Bluntness with players is sure to be a staple of Glenn's regime in New York.
The 2024 season was supposed to be Hall's breakout. Instead, he regressed, generating 876 yards on 209 carries with five touchdowns. In an offense that skewed pass-heavy under Aaron Rodgers, Hall never saw a game with 20 carries and had five with 10 or fewer totes. The explosive runner had a single game with over 100 yards (113 in a Week 6 loss to Buffalo) while earning fewer than 50 yards in five tilts. He also added 483 receiving yards and three TDs on 57 catches -- 103 of those yards came in a single game (Week 7 vs. Pittsburgh).
Hall's mentality is to prove that the prognostications of his breakout weren't wrong, just delayed a year.
"I'm not obligated to anything," he said. "I'm around the new GM [Darren Mougey], new coaches, a lot of new faces. So for me, I got to prove that I am the guy. That's every day. I feel like my skill set, I'm a three-down back. We have a great running back room, and a lot of healthy competition. But my mentality is every day I'm going to prove that I am the best back on this roster, one of the best backs in the league.
"I have a quote on my phone. It says, 'If not me, then who?' I look at it every morning. And that's like my internal motivation because I'm very self-motivated."
The Jets not only didn't trade Hall before or during the draft, but they also didn't select a running back. Braelon Allen and Isaiah Davis are likely to siphon carries in New York's committee approach under new offensive coordinator Tanner Engstrand. Still, Hall enters as the lead back in New York under the new regime.
