Remember when Ty Montgomery was a prominent piece of Adam Gase’s offensive gameplan? Better yet, remember Ty Montgomery?

With Le’Veon Bell sitting out, Montgomery started three of New York’s four preseason games and made enough of an impact to make it a foregone conclusion that he would see the field a decent amount in the regular season. Bell was always going to be the workhorse out of the backfield, but Montgomery showed enough throughout the summer to cement a role in Gang Green’s offense.

Or so everyone thought.

Since the regular season kicked off, Montgomery has barely seen the field, taking 45 snaps through four games. He has carried the ball no more than three times in a game and played only five snaps against the Bills in Week 1. Montgomery ran for 25 yards and 8.3 yards per carry against the Browns in Week 2, but even that was not enough to convince the Jets to give him a larger workload. He has taken only four carries in New York’s past two games, rushing for one yard in each game.

Why has Montgomery been shunned to the sideline? Nobody really knows. Gase summed up his decision to play Montgomery only five snaps in New York’s season opener as one he made simply because he could as the head coach, providing no insight into why a player who was so productive in the preseason was wasting away on the bench.

It’s understandable that the Jets want Bell to be a focal point of their offense. They didn’t give him $52.5 million to share carries or only play on certain downs. However, there’s something to be said about New York’s puzzling decision to stick almost exclusively with Bell instead of occasionally giving Montgomery the chance to make plays.

For whatever reason, it looks like Montgomery is in Gase’s dog house. There’s really no other reason to explain why he’s not playing. You’d think Montgomery would see more snaps in an effort to jumpstart New York’s sputtering offense, but that has not happened. As a supposed offensive mastermind, it’d benefit the Jets if Gase experimented with having Bell and Montgomery on the field at the same time, but that has yet to happen either.

Montgomery is being wasted on the bench — there’s no other way to put it. It remains to be seen if Gase will change his mind and give Montgomery the role he deserves, but either way, there’s no excusing the way he’s been utilized so far this season.