DHarris52's "The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly" Jets vs. Rams 08/14/09 The Good: QB Play - While the post-game media has a hard-on for Sanchez, Kellen Clemens was no slouch tonight either. Both quarterbacks played solid, mistake-free football while managing the game and didn't have any bonehead turnovers. Mark Sanchez has one of the most lethal pump fakes that I've ever seen from any quarterback ever. For those who were not there, you should have heard the reaction from the crowd when Sanchez took the field. The place went nuts. At this point in the QB competition, I give the slight edge to Sanchez only because I believe Clemens would have had be light years ahead of Sanchez to win the job. David Clowney - What can I say? The kid flat out made some plays. The only question is if this was just another pre-season "flash in the pan" like last year. Dustin Keller - This kid just keeps getting better and better. Nice, crisp routes and caught everything that came his way. Showed a lot of heart on running plays; he blocked his ass off. Calvin Pace - This guy was flying around making tackles all over the field out there. We are really going to miss him the first 4 games. Sorely. Bryan Thomas - As much as I ragged on BT during the offseason, I'll give credit where it's due. Another guy that seemed to be all over the place coming up with some big stops tonight. David Harris - He seems to have returned to his pre-injury form and was the brick wall in the middle that we so sorely missed last year. The Bad Shonn Greene - Greene did not impress me in the least, but I can't put much stock into tonight given the fact that our offensive line was like Swiss cheese. Bart Scott - I may get some flak for this, but just telling it like I saw it from my seat. He just wasn't the presence in the middle that I thought he was going to be, and I believe Harris far outplayed him. Maybe my expectations were too high. Maybe he wasn't going 100%. Maybe he had an off night. I don't know. Dwight Lowery - I was one of his biggest fans last year, as I thought he played phenomenal as a rookie, but he just looked lost out there tonight. In my opinion, he has regressed from last year to tonight. The Ugly Special Teams - Our special teams tonight left much to be desired. How many times did we muff a return ball? Neither of the two punters on the roster are worth a hill of beans. Simple, simple stuff that could very well cost us a game or two during the season. We have one of, if not the, best Special Teams coaches in all of football. I hope our ST unit looks like it come the regular season. Donald Strickland - This guy cannot make a tackle to save his life. Period. I lost count of how many times he thought he could just throw an arm at a ball carrier only to fall flat on his face and be left in the dust. Vernon Gholston - I'm not ready to jump on the "bust" bandwagon just yet, but this guy certainly is not helping his case any. He looked like he was going half speed on every snap. He appeared to want to be anywhere but on that football field tonight. Maybe the coaching staff wanted him to slow down and work on his technique? Who knows. Time will tell. Just my opinions from having been there and being able to zero in on a guy and watch what he does on multiple consecutive plays. Agreements? Disagreements?
I agree with you completely. Good post. Not totally sure about Bart Scott though since I was watching other players. And if our offensive line was 'like Swiss cheese', Greene should have been able to find a hole. :wink:
nice summary, DH52..... I mentioned this in another thread....but I was also impressed with K.Cummings' motor tonight....Gholston could learn a thing or two in the "effort dept" from Kenwin, IMO.
I was also there and instead of starting a new thread i'll just post my good/bad in here: Starting with the good.... 1. Mark Sanchez looked great in his first action for the Jets. He gets rid of the ball extremely quickly and seems to have no problem making reads and finding the open receivers. Also, the one semi deep ball he threw was perfect and landed right over the receivers shoulder in a place where the CB had no chance for a play. I do not want to overstate it and say that this one drive moved Sanchez up on the depth chart but he definitely outplayed Clemens. 2. David Harris is going to have one hell of a season. I don't know if its the fact that he's healthy or Rex Ryan's system but Harris was all over every play while he was in tonight. He ended with 3 tackles and 1 sack but he was right there on every play. 3. Dustin Keller will lead the Jets in receptions this year. No matter what QB starts Keller is going to be the Jets #1 receiver. He has the speed and has no trouble finding spots in the defense where the QB can hit him. 4. SIGN LEON WASHINGTON. Leon is clearly Jets fans favorite player. Every time he steps back to return a kick the entire stadium goes crazy. If you have to give him 5 million a year to stay just do it and get it over with. Now to the bad... 1. Clemens seems to be copying the Chad Pennington template of being a QB. He went 4-4 but only ended up with around 35 yards. Most of the first two drives were spent throwing little 2 yard patterns to receivers. He did not impress tonight. 2. Thomas Jones. I can't be too hard on Thomas Jones tonight because he was missing 3/5 members of the o-line. However, the mere fact that he rushed 9 times for 13 yards earns him a thumbs down for his performance. I'm sure he will come back with a stronger performance next game. Only a crowd of about 25,000 (maybe less) tonight but it was still great to see the Jets on the field again. As always, it gives me goosebumps when Leon steps back there for the opening kickoff and I look forward to more in the coming weeks
Shonn Greene averaged over 5 yds per carry this game. Granted it was off 1 big run but he wasn't bad by any means.....Not to mention he was running behind the great O-Line depth that we have. And Feely was money today from what I saw(Solid to great kickoffs and hit his FGs) so I dont know if Special Teams falls on Ugly. Hodges wasn't AWFUL either.
That was my bad. I was going back over it and I realized the one possession I was basing it on (I thought it was him that was in) Ainge was really the QB.
It was great to see Westhoff stalking the sidelines with fire and brimstone and not using a cane! Slauson does not look as intimidating without the face paint. I might have to get a 36 Leonhard jersey before the season is over, hopefully he can be our Lynch for many years to come.
It was even worse than you said - 4/4 for 24 yards. It was only two series, but you're being kind in saying he didn't impress - I think he is playing himself out of any chance of starting even the beginning of the season unless he plays a lot better very soon.
I went to the game tonight granted I missed the first and second offensive drives and our first defensive stand this is what I got from it. Keller- he will be the number 1 reciever on this team. Wrs- Our wideouts played pretty well. I have a feeling that Clowney is just a gamer, some players just dont play well in practice. I would really like to see more of him. Wallace Wright made a bunch of nice catches. Brad smith was brad smith. Stuckey had some nice grabs and Britt Davis had a great catch too. I really think that having cotch and Keller will be enough. As we know this will be a run first team and I really feel that we can fill in the 2nd wr with whoever depending on what we are looking for... clowney-deep threat stuckey-all around decent wr wright-blocking Rhodes- Kerry was back on his game tonight he had a sack im pretty sure and he was in on a bunch of tackles. Look for him to have a big year. Gholston- Once the starters starters started coming out I changed the jet ram game off and just watched Gholston. Obviously I have a pessimistic look at him in the first place but I didn't see anything in the direction towards progression. All I wanted to see tonight was Gholston to beat his man and hurry the qb. I wasnt even looking for a sack. Everytime he went to rush the qb he bull rushed the tackle... and he was only getting one on ones. Two of the big runs the rams got were towards his side where Gholston missed the initial tackle. The tackles he got were in my opinion merely him being there at the right time. PLAYING ZONE ETC- I noticed Gholston did maintain his contain assignment at times which i was happy about but dropping back into coverage he looked lost. On a play where we got a sack and gholston faked the blitz (which was nice btw) gholston dropped back into coverage over the middle and actually turned around to see if anyone was behind him after he was standing in the middle for a second or so. After that it was all down hill. Erik Ainge- Why was everyone impressed by him? Is it because hes a 3rd stringer and took the majority of the snaps? Im not gonna say he played bad because the o-line was pretty shitty, but he made a bunch of horrible throws 2 of which should have definitely been picked off. Granted he made a bunch of pretty good throws, he did look uneasy in the pocket at times. It almost looked like he was rattled to get the ball out. I'm not knocking him because he did step up to the occasion, but on the Post game show I think he was getting a lot more love then he deserved. Maybe I was watching another game, Idk.
So are we blaming Clemens for that screen or the out routes, when there was no one headed downfield? Even though it was Schotty calling the plays? Clemens made all the throws he was supposed to, made a great block for Smith and turned a sure sack into positive yards. Maybe not "impressive" but can't we wait till he actually makes a mistake before we tear him a new one?
I agree. I think they both played well. Sanchez wound up with the Stats though. I felt like Clemens was managing the game and Sanchez came out firing but that was likely the play calling. Either way, they both did their job. I loved seeing an aggressive D. I feel more confident with our WR's but it was a preseason game against the Rams so who knows. Gholston still seems to lack fire....Pace looked great!
I thought Ainge looked like Peyton Manning in the pocket. And by that I mean he had some ugly-ass footwork.
why do people keep saying green was bad when the guy broke a huge run and i didnt see the others running the ball well.. granted i was in and out of the game after sanchez left the game
+1. If anything, the lack of production from the ground game is indicative of the talent on the OL, not the RB corps. We need some better backups on this team. Tannenbaum better pay attention to the waiver wire this season.
How did you leave Jones off the ugly?..he was really ugly. 9 for 13 and almost a fumble. That with whatever part of the 1s we had. Yet you think Greene was bad?
