He has been the Jets owner for a decade now. He watched John Mara and Steve Tisch bring a Super Bowl championship back to New York three years ago, and he was 30 minutes from getting the chance to play for one a year ago.
He has chased the dream with Al Groh and Vinny Testaverde, with Herm Edwards and Chad Pennington, with Eric Mangini and Brett Favre, and now comes his best chance — with Rex Ryan and Mark Sanchez, rookies no more.
What would it mean to Woody Johnson — who has watched and supported as Ryan has become the mouth of the Team They Love to Hate — to win a Super Bowl?
“That would be a dream come true,” Johnson told The Post yesterday inside the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center.
“That’s what every owner fights for. That’s what I’ve been trying to do since I got in here. It’s my goal, my dream. . . . It’s the dream of this organization. Every person in this organization has that dream, and everybody works for it. We’re a single-purpose organization.
“Our job is to win the Super Bowl.”
He loves being the Jets owner, and does not in the least hate the fact that after the Ines Sainz fiasco, after the Braylon Edwards DUI, after the Sal Alosi black eye, after the foot-fetish stories and most recently a lawsuit filed by former club massage therapists, and after all the braggadocio from Ryan, his team is the Team They Love to Hate.
“I think it’s great,” Johnson said. “Whatever feeling they have, as long as it’s a vivid feeling. I think it’s more positive than having apathy or any of that. I’m glad they feel strongly about us.”
Really? You don’t mind being The Team They Love to Hate?
“I don’t mind it at all, no,” Johnson said. “People are gonna like us. People aren’t gonna like us. But we’re gonna be who we are.”
You don’t think Rex talks too much?
“No, not at all,” Johnson said. “I hired him because of his personality, not in spite of it.”
Indeed, it was love at first sight for the owner.
“He was 45 minutes late for the interview with [general manager] Mike Tannenbaum and I,” Johnson said. “I think the thing that struck me more than anything else, after about 30 seconds, I forgot about that. It was not what he said, but maybe how he said it.”
Ryan talking Super Bowl from the minute he barged through the door has been music to Johnson’s ears.
“As a business person, that’s what I do all the time,” Johnson said. “When we communicate where we want to go, we’re always very specific. As specific as we can be.”
The owner defers questions about whether Ryan has expressed remorse for his unexpected role on the sidelines in the National Foot League.
“I’ll let him explain that to you,” Johnson said.
But Johnson sees anything but a distracted head coach.
“I look at what happens on the field, and I think if anything, he’s more focused than I’ve ever seen him,” Johnson said. “And he’s usually very focused.”
Focused on Peyton Manning Saturday night.
“I think the way the team responds to him, and the way he communicates with the team — the way he communicates with everybody, including me — I think he comes off very authentically,” Johnson said.
The growth of Sanchez buoys the owner.
“He understands the cadence of the game, and the way the game flows,” Johnson said. “He’s not afraid to win a game. Some quarterbacks are. He’s not afraid to win. He likes to win. But he’s not afraid to win. And he’s not afraid, if it’s a minute, 40 seconds to go, he says, ‘Yes, we can win this game.’ And he did that.”
Johnson has rolled the dice on players with baggage, most notably on Santonio Holmes.
“I think he’s a tremendous player and a tremendous person,” Johnson said. “I have a lot of respect for Santonio. He’s just a different type of person. The talent that he has, I’ve almost never seen on the football field.”
Last season, Johnson rolled the dice on Edwards and he got burned when the receiver was arrested for DUI in September.
“He’s remorseful,” Johnson said. “He’s prepared to change, and he’s a tremendous person as well.
He recalls the quiet of the locker room and the flight home following the AFC Championship game loss to the Colts.
“We were disappointed because we had come so far,” Johnson said.
The Jets go back to Indy again now, and Johnson was asked what he would say to Jets fans.
“Keep watching,” he said. “Keep watching. Because I think you’re gonna be happy with what you see, I hope. I’ve got a lot of confidence in the team, came back from practice now. I can see a lot of energy there. We’re in the postseason. This is where it all starts for us right now.”
steve.serby@nypost.com