Even when the outlook remained murky, there were still times when C.J. Mosley appeared to have at last an outside shot at returning this season.
Some light tackling drills after the Jets’ bye week at the end of November.
A “progressing in the right direction” update at that same juncture.
A full practice to start this week, in the days leading up to their Week 14 game against the Dolphins.
But any of those hints at progress were erased Friday, when interim Jets head coach Jeff Ulbrich said they planned to place Mosley — who hasn’t played since Oct. 20 due to a herniated disc in his neck — on injured reserve, all but ending his season.
He’d be eligible to return for their Week 18 finale against the Dolphins after missing the additional four games required for an IR stint, but that would seem unlikely.
And with a cap hit of $12.784 million next season, the final year of a five-year deal he inked back in 2019, Mosley could have played his final snap in a Jets uniform.
“A hard decision by a very prideful, amazing player, leader, all those things for us,” Ulbrich said Friday. “It was not an easy decision for him, but it’s the best decision for him and our organization.”
Mosley had already missed three games earlier this season with a toe injury, but the 32-year-old’s campaign took a scary turn before the Jets’ game against the Patriots on Oct. 27 — just his second after starting to ease back into the lineup with a limited role.
He gave a pregame speech on the field. He started to move toward the other linebackers for warmups. It wasn’t different from any other week.
He’d done this pregame routine countless times before. With the Jets. With the Ravens, who drafted him in the first round of the 2014 NFL Draft.
With Alabama, his college team, before that.
But then his neck “just locked up,” Mosley said last month, according to The Post’s Brian Costello.
He felt a “burning” feeling. And that prompted plenty of unknowns about what the rest of his season — as well as the rest of his Jets and NFL careers — could look like.
After the injury, doctors told Mosley that he wouldn’t need surgery, but despite practicing in either a limited or full capacity all three days last week and logging a full session Wednesday, Mosley wasn’t able to heal enough for a return.
So his 2024 ledger will end like this: 17 total tackles, his fewest in a season since 2019, when he injured his groin just two games into his Jets career and didn’t return the rest of the season.
But when Mosley returned to his linebacker spot in 2021 — he opted out of the 2020 season, which occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic — and stayed in the lineup, he became the heartbeat of the Jets’ defense.
That’s what they originally signed him for back in 2019, when Mosley inked a five-year, $85 million deal after the Ravens let him walk in free agency.
He took a pay cut this offseason when he agreed to a revised two-year deal, but his role remained unchanged.
Mosley topped 152 tackles in each of the last three seasons entering 2024 and served as one of the veteran voices in the locker room, helping stabilize the Jets through their latest stretches of losing and dysfunction.
“I might have some nightmares here and there, but I’ll be able to go to sleep peacefully knowing that I gave this team and my teammates everything,” Mosley told The Post’s Mark Cannizzaro last week. “At the end of the day, if you’re going to be on the highest pedestal, you’ll be judged off the wins and losses and championships. That’s why I came here. That’s why I’m still here. And, as long as I’ll continue to be here, that’s going to be my goal and my motivation.”
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The Jets already possess a logical successor for replacing Mosley in the short- and long-term.
Jamien Sherwood, in his fourth season, would need a new contract in the offseason, but he has started 11 games in Mosley’s spot this year and leads the Jets with 107 tackles.
He also took over the green dot for communication, too.
But now, the Jets won’t have the quarterback of their defense again Sunday, the rest of the season and possibly into the future.
As they enter a stretch filled with unknown — about Aaron Rodgers’ outlook, about their new head coach, about their new general manager, all of it — and uncertainty, Mosley’s future becomes the latest wrinkle.
