I don't think Gase will get us over the hump. I believe his ceiling is .500 with a healthy roster. Apparently he skipped Thanksgiving dinner with his family to game plan for Cincy, and we all saw what the fruits of his labor gave us. He's in over his head.
The only time he's had a healthy roster, he took the Dolphins to their only playoff appearance in 15 years.
I know you and others have asked, "Do I think Gase can take the Jets to the Super Bowl?" And I agree with you that that's an important question. I just don't think it's one that can be answered yet.
I turned on Bowles faster than almost all of you. MBGreen and I were the first two I remember on the fire Bowles bandwagon. He made atrocious in-game decisions and the team stopped trying to compete for him.
I don't think this team has stopped competing. They've played hard all season, despite the lack of success. I also haven't seen any egregiously bad clock management/in-game decisions from Gase, other than punting down 16 to the Patriots with Falk, but they might have had a better chance to score on another muffed punt than they did with Falk running the team.
I think it's a high bar to fire a coach after one season. We are 4-5 with Sam Darnold as our quarterback. The 2.5 Falk games were unwinnable. What I saw from the Cincinnati game was a team that could not compete in the trenches offensively, even against an atrocious Bengals team. Some of that is coaching, but the vast majority of that is talent. And defensively, they couldn't get off the field when they needed to.
Entering the season, most of us agreed that the Jets had talent to compete, but they lacked depth. Well, when your QB gets mono, your #2 WR gets hurt, your OL changes every week, your 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th LBs all miss multiple games, and your cornerbacks change seemingly every week, that doesn't help a team that lacks depth.
He's definitely on the hot seat when next season starts, but as long as we're happy with where Sam Darnold is in Week 17, I think Gase should come back another year.