Everyone in the media is ripping on the defense. No question that it hasn't played well late in games, but when a team Like Houston puts up 20 unanswered points, some blame has to be squarely placed on the offense. The offense failed to give the defense a break by a combination of either short possessions or turnovers. It isn't 100% on the defense for a scoring run like that. When it's time to put a team away, the offense has to do it's part too, but because of the last minute heroics, the offense seems to be dodging any blame at all, other than perhaps the Greene fumble. Twice the offense gave Houston a short field in that 4th quarter. The offense failed to sustain any kind of a drive. Hey, the defense deserves at least some credit for holdingoff the Texans to a FG when they had a 1st down at the Jets'10 yard line. That WAS a big hold. The Jets would have been down 8 points if Houston scores there. Instead, Sanchez can win the game with a TD and didn't need to convert a 2 pointer. Is the defense a concern? Yes, but no less than the offenses' inability to run, kill the clock and sustain a drive late in the game too. When it's time to finish a game and put an opponent way, the offense has to do it's part as well.
It's never 100% on anyone or anything. Everything that happens in a football game is interconnected. It still doesn't excuse a wide open TE the first play after a turnover. The defense is supposed to be good enough to pick the offense up when it's struggling and it has been the offense that has been forced to pick up the defense lately.
This a good way of looking at it OP. I have ripped the defense this year because in our 8 wins we have scored 23-38 points in all of those games. That should be enough for a top-notch defense to work with. But yesterday, that fumble didn't help them as you mentioned.
well, plenty of people blamed the greene fumble. while you have a point it factored in,the proportion of blame is appropriate as is. The offense already had put up a fair number of points on the board, and only turned over the ball once. a defense is supposed to protect a 16 point lead within a quarter. That's not something ridiculous to expect.
Twenty unanswered in the fourth quarter is all on the defense. Yes, the fumble was a problem, but come on. You don't hand away 20 points in 15 minutes if you're a serious contender. And especially if you're a big mouth defense.
Their defense time and time again cannot finish games and that is why we continually are in these nail bitter games.Same problem they had last year!
Somebody in this thread is an Defense-apologist. The Offense does deserve the blame! Why weren't they on the field helping the defense stop them!!
Well it's true but lets not forget Folk missed a field goal earlier in the game that would have kept us on top
Houston's possessions in the 4th started at their own 22 (FG) NYJ 43 (TD), own 27 (TD), NYJ 10 (FG). Not a ringing endorsement for our D's ability to close the game out. I give the D props for the first 3 qtrs. and for doing the only thing that could be done to save the game- the 3 and out FG when HOU got the ball on the 10. Other than the Shonne Greene fumble the offense did enough to win a game. Tipped int's can happen and punting in the 4th qtr. is perfectly acceptable.
the only problem i had with the O yesterday was the overly conservative play calls after they recovered that Foster Fumble............they were like at the 20 or something there, and didn't take a shot at the end zone. They settled for 3 plays and a field goal............go for the throat! They gave Houston hope with that, and it started the snow ball rolling.
I blame Greene for fumbling in a crucial moment. He seems to have a knack for finding the worst moments to fumble in. We were driving well on our way to making it 30-10 IMO and BAM. It a matter of seconds it's 23-17.
And imo it's not like the D made a great play on him. He didn't seem to be holding it right. It's one thing if an RB gets held up, the refs don't blow the whistle and someone else, maybe even more than one player, strip it from him. But just one guy taking it out when the RB is trying to hit the hole should not happen. He fumbled too much last year. While he's not fumbling as often, which is great, yesterday was just awful timing.
He explained it. There was a miscommunication. Mark went to do one thing, Shonn another, and the Dl got on him before he could recover.,
Maybe. Maybe Mark was just trying to cover for the guy. We all know that the Jets need production from Shonn. He could be a factor, particularly in colder weather. He just makes me nervous with the fumbling.
Shonn explained it, not Mark. (which translates roughly to "I Blew the call, then couldn't fix it before getting stripped") Me too. He needs to be in when we're in scoring mode, not in Protect mode.
The Greene fumble was really the difference though between praising the D and O in this game. If Greene doesnt fumble we kick a field goal and are up 3 scores I believe. Thats atleast a fg too we could have taken another minute or so off the clock and scored a td as we were driving well. With that score the Texans are pretty much deflated. They would not have scored a td on the next play unless ST scores. If Greene held on we would all be saying how we finally played a great game keeping Texans to somewhere between 10-17 points imo and putting up big numbers on O.
