Benjamin Ashford|Sauce Gardner says former teammate Mecole Hardman 'ungrateful' in criticizing Jets

Sauce Gardner says that he was caught off guard by former teammate Mecole Hardman bashing the New York Jets.

In an interview on Benjamin Ashford"The Pivot Podcast" with Ryan Clark, Channing Crowder Jr. and Fred Taylor published Tuesday, the All-Pro cornerback discussed the wide receiver's criticism two weeks prior on the show. Hardman signed with the Jets ahead of last season and was traded back to the Kansas City Chiefs in October. The wideout then caught the game-winning touchdown in Super Bowl 58.

"I really feel like you can't really discredit the Jets, especially him individually. They sent you to a contender team. They sent you back to the Chiefs and you just won the Super Bowl," Gardner said. "I feel like that's ungrateful and I feel like he shouldn't have gotten on there talking about the Jets because he could have just took the high road."

After Hardman's interview was released, several Jets players spoke out on social media, including Gardner. There were reports that Hardman leaked New York's game plans during the season and the cornerback made a post that has since been deleted on X, formerly Twitter, suggesting he knew about the leak. Hardman vehemently denied the accusations.

Sauce Gardner defends Jets coaches and team 'standard'

Gardner spoke on some specific points that Hardman brought up in his interview, including criticizing head coach Robert Saleh and offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett — who the Denver Broncos fired as their head coach a year prior.

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"You just got a new coaching staff that came in and there's no standard there," Hardman said. "It's like everybody do what they wanna do."

"The standard is the standard. Everybody gotta follow the standard," Gardner responded. "If the offense can't make certain things happen, that has nothing to do with the standard. They just couldn't make it happen for whatever reason. We had some missing pieces or whatever. Like I said, coach Saleh do a great job implementing the standard."

Sauce Gardner denies ego in Jets locker room

Hardman also suggested that the Jets locker room was a scattered group of individual egos and that the only game plan was to let Aaron Rodgers "do what Aaron do." The four-time MVP joined New York last offseason in a blockbuster trade from the Green Bay Packers. His season was cut short on the Jets' first offensive drive of their first game when he tore his Achilles.

"It's not no ego-driven program," Gardner said. "Aaron, yeah, he here, but Aaron work his butt off day in and day out."

The defender addressed Hardman's statement that, "We got helmets on the ground, we don't got no discipline" by suggesting he should have looked in the mirror when he joined the team. Hardman signed a one-year contract with the Jets as a free agent and rehabbed from an injury that had him sit out half the 2022 season. He had one catch in five games with New York.

"We don't really have helmets on the ground," Gardner said. "And I know if it was helmets on the ground, his is one of the ones that was on the ground."

Hardman expressed frustration that the Jets didn't listen to him, even though he'd previously won two Super Bowls with the Chiefs. He also said that he wasn't getting the playing time he thought he deserved behind Garrett Wilson.

But Gardner said that the receiver didn't make an effort to gel with the team and didn't take accountability for himself.

"If you really know what it is, what it takes to win, you're gonna make sure you let the team know," he said. "We always around each other, we always in the locker room having fun, we always in the meetings, we always talking to each other after practice. But the reason he couldn't do that is because he never earned his stripes. He came into the facility, he just thought he had it made for him.

"If you know what it takes to win, you're not going to go to practice and drop hella punts and then have excuses to why you're dropping them. You're not gonna go in a special teams meeting and get cussed out by the special teams coordinator. It's just certain things that's not gonna happen if you truly know what it takes to win."

Sauce Gardner 'proud' of Mecole Hardman, takes criticism as learning lesson

Gardner said that he is "proud" and "happy for" Hardman's latest Super Bowl ring and his part in the victory. He also said he saw Hardman at NBA All-Star weekend where the receiver played in the celebrity game and there was no hard feelings. Even though the two haven't had a chance to sit down and talk, he said would be open to doing so.

The former first-round pick said he's using his leadership position to make sure the Jets move forward from the criticism.

"Even if it wasn't true, you're still gonna look at it like, alright, it's out there," Gardner said. "Let's make sure we tighten up every end. There's some good that we can take from what he said without a doubt. Some of the stuff it just caught me off guard. But definitely, we're going to make sure we tighten up every end."