For people who knew a young Jeremy Bates, they might be surprised to hear him speak today.

The Jets’ new offensive coordinator preaches positivity, something he learned during a four-year sabbatical away from football between 2012-16. After 30 years around football, Bates needed a break and spent part of the time hiking the 3,000-mile Continental Divide Trail and the 2,200 Appalachian Trail alone. As he walked through mountains, through storms and past wild animals, on what he calls “my journey,” Bates’ perspective changed.

“Sounds crazy, but I was really hard on myself at a younger age,” Bates said Monday. “I was a perfectionist and everything had to be right, and if it wasn’t then instead of just moving on and, ‘Hey next play,’ just like I talk about with the quarterbacks, I just kind of let it get me down in a way, because I’m trying to strive for perfection. It’s hard to be perfect.”

Bates learned on his hike that he should not strive so hard for perfection.

“If you have a backpack on your back and it starts raining and you’re like, ‘Aw, man, it’s raining,’ and that backpack all of a sudden gets 20 pounds heavier, that hill gets 10 degrees steeper,” Bates said. “I think just kind of slowing down and just the power of positive. If you’re positive when it’s raining and you’re like, ‘Oh it’s beautiful. I’m going to listen to the sound of rain.’ Then all of a sudden, your backpack is light and the mountain is not as steep. So just being positive I think has changed me.”

That is a far cry from the intense, perfectionist people describe Bates as earlier in his career. The son of a coach, Bates was born into football. After playing quarterback at Tennessee and Rice, he got into coaching. He spent three years under Jon Gruden in Tampa Bay and three years with Mike Shanahan in Denver. Bates was a rising star in the coaching profession. At 34, he became the offensive coordinator of the Seahawks in 2010.

He was fired after one year. In 2012, he went to the Bears as their quarterbacks coach, reunited with Jay Cutler, whom he mentored in Denver during his Pro Bowl season. That gig also lasted one season. Burnt out on football, Bates vanished from the game.

He reemerged in 2017 when Todd Bowles hired him as the Jets’ quarterbacks coach. When Bowles fired offensive coordinator John Morton in January, he turned to Bates, who had impressed people inside the Jets in his one season here, to replace him.

Now, Bates, 41, is arguably the most important person at the Jets, charged with developing Sam Darnold as the franchise quarterback.

“If you’re a young quarterback, especially someone like Sam Darnold, who is not coming from a college system that was very complex, this is a really good fit,” said Matt Hasselbeck, the ESPN analyst who played quarterback for Bates in Seattle in 2010.

Players who played for Bates describe an intense coach who can be hard on players. That intensity rubbed some people the wrong way in Seattle and Chicago.

“He’ll cuss you out in a minute,” said Michael Robinson, who played fullback on those Seahawks and is now an analyst for the NFL Network. “Some people don’t always deal with that the right way. I liked it. He was challenging us. I felt it came from a good place.”

Both Robinson and Hasselbeck said Bates can make players believe in themselves. The 2010 Seahawks made the playoffs despite going 7-9. In the first round, they faced the Saints, who had won the Super Bowl a year earlier. The Seahawks had set a record for player transactions that season, but Bates made the Seattle players believe they could win, and they did, 41-36, thanks to a creative offensive game plan Bates hatched.

“He did a great job of instilling confidence in us,” Robinson said. “He has a way when he’s talking to the offense of making you feel like you’re a god, you’re He-Man and really giving you that confidence and assurance that what we’ve got will work.”

After that season, Bates was fired. There was a bit of a power struggle on the coaching staff, and Bates ended up out of a job.

“I knew that not everybody is able to take the way he speaks to people or the way he did back then,” Robinson said. “That may rub some people the wrong way.”

Hasselbeck, describes him as someone who puts his head down and does his job, pointing out that Bates just got a smartphone this year.

On the practice field, Bates is active. With dip tucked into his lip, Bates was flying around the field Monday, working with wide receiver Jermaine Kearse on his releases, chatting up the quarterbacks, playing the role of a defender against tight ends running routes. He looks at home on the football field.

“He’s not looking for limelight,” Hasselbeck said. “A lot of coaches are looking to hire an agent, get their name out there, be mentioned for every head coaching job every year. That’s not Jeremy Bates. Jeremy Bates would rather just coach football and never have to do an interview, never have to do a press conference. That’s just kind of who he is.”

Hasselbeck said he still remembers Bates’ West Coast system because it was easy to learn and to remember. One example he gave was Bates preached completions on third downs even if they did not go for first downs.

“As a quarterback, when you have just some things you can absolutely hang your hat on, like, I know my coach is going to be happy if I get this completion,” Hasselbeck said. “I’m not worried about it’s third-and-7 and I need this many yards. You play more free. You’re in a situation where you can just go out and play ball and not overthink things.”

The bottom line, Hasselbeck said, is the Jets and Darnold are getting a football coach, pure and simple.

“Some people love to coach in the NFL and some people love to coach football,” Hasselbeck said. “He’s just a guy that wants to coach football. That’s what it’s about.”