Come in off the ledge for a moment, Jets fans. We need to talk. Your annual dose of late autumn angst is completely understandable, given the precipitous and entirely predictable fall from grace now under way. It doesn't make it any easier seeing Brett Favre, whose arm nearly fell off at this point last year, recapture his MVP form for the Vikings after un-retiring for a second time. But do yourselves a favor and look at the season from a slightly different perspective. Just imagine whether you would have taken these accomplishments before the season began: Rookie quarterback Mark Sanchez would perform well enough in seven of 10 games for the Jets to win. The Jets would beat the Patriots at home for the first time since the 2000 season. The Jets would lead the NFL in rushing after 10 games. First-year coach Rex Ryan's defense would be ranked fifth overall in yards allowed - 11 spots higher than last year. Darrelle Revis would blossom into a Pro Bowl cornerback. The Jets would acquire former Pro Bowl receiver Braylon Edwards in a trade. connections Philadelphia Eagles San Diego Chargers NFL Eli Manning Atlanta Falcons Of course, none of that does nearly enough to wash away the bitter taste of a 4-6 record, especially after a 3-0 start. But with the playoffs virtually out of reach and the sad refrain of wait-'til-next-year now reverberating through Jets Nation, a dose of perspective can't hurt. Drinking the Kool-Aid? No. The Jets are not a good football team right now, regardless of any aforementioned silver linings. Come to think of it, their biggest problem is what happened earlier in the season. Getting out to that 3-0 start elevated expectations, fueled even more by Ryan and his merry band of trash-talkers. Had the Jets started out slowly and gotten to this point, the perspective would have been much different. In fact, they would have been right on course; after all, we pegged this team at 6-10 heading into the season. That said, there still is a lot to play for these last six weeks, and still a lot to learn about Ryan and Sanchez, whose fates now are forever intertwined. That's what Ryan told Sanchez this past week when he pulled him aside not long after his five-turnover meltdown against the Patriots last Sunday. Sunday will be an important test for that new relationship, especially against a Panthers defense that potentially is one of the most potent in the league. Key word: potentially. The Panthers have been even bigger underperformers than the Jets, although they have shown flashes of getting back to form in recent weeks. Carolina is coming off a 12-4 season but still hasn't fully recovered from an 0-3 start. But Julius Peppers remains a premier pass-rusher and Jon Beason is one of the league's top middle linebackers. Ryan and Sanchez have developed a very rudimentary communication system based on whatever situation the Jets confront, using one-word cues to reflect what Ryan wants in a given series. The coach wants to give Sanchez a sense of when he needs to take chances and when he needs to back off and live to see another series. "The biggest thing there is getting his point across, what we need to do as a team, what mentality we are in, how the game is going," Sanchez said. "It's managing the offense, moving the chains." Will it work? After four interceptions and a lost fumble by Sanchez against the Patriots, it can't hurt. Ryan is quick to point out that he is not trying to step on offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer's toes. Ryan knows he is responsible for what goes on during the games. So changing things up makes sense. It also shows why this season still is worth watching, just as 2004 was worth watching for Giants fans who knew their team wasn't going to the playoffs with another struggling rookie quarterback. Eli Manning took his lumps back then, just as Sanchez is doing now. If Sanchez is going to be the guy, then watching his apprenticeship, no matter how painful, is part of the process. These games might not mean much in terms of the postseason, but they mean everything in terms of the Jets' future. Thank you for your attention. You may now return to the ledge.
This is the scariest thing I've heard in weeks now. How exactly is Ryan going to communicate to Sanchez what he wants done, and more importantly why the heck is he not going to do this through the offensive coordinator? The Jets offense is needlessly complex already. The play calling is very shaky at times. So now Sanchez is going to have to process all of that and also listen for the occasional guttural grunt from Ryan also? I really don't think I've ever seen a Jets offense with as much potential for disaster as this one. Just to make it clear: Ryan should be telling Schottenheimer when to tone it down, not Sanchez.
its gotta be Schotty's countdown to being gotten rid of. Its an obvious sign that he's not running the offense Ryan wants. I can't wait until he's gone, and a basic, hard nosed OC comes in and does it right.
what ryan is going to be doing with sanchez, is something a smart qb should be doing before every play to begin with. with all the talk of how smart the kid is, whats so difficult about the process of the pre snap. at every break of the huddle, the first thing sanchez should be thinking about is the present game situation, then reading the defense, then executing the play to it's safest end. either run the play as called, or call an even more conservative play. we should only be calling a all out offensive effort if we should fall many points behind, otherwise stick with the ground and pound that this team does so well. the ravens called a extremely conservative game for flacco his whole season, and even in the playoffs. it was a run, run and run some more offense. something shotty hasn't even tried from the very start. he's been throwing the ball on a regular basis, hense why sanchez has looked so much worse than flacco's first season. it all starts with shotty actually calling a ryan type game, or ryan laying down the law for shotty to do so. then it's up to sanchez to think before every play, the game situation and not take the stupid risks he's been taking. this all goes back to sanchez only having the one year of college qb experience. we do not yet know if he is going to be a smart leader, or a stupid risk taker that doesn't think enough about the consequences of his actions until it's too late, ala jeff george, ryan leaf, etc; etc; etc.
He's a rookie with only 16 games of college experience. There are a lot of things he has to think about out there and it's obviously not second nature to him yet. He has to think about progressions, blitz pickups, cadence, pre-snap reads, etc. If Rex can help him out by giving him one less thing to think about right now, it could be helpful. The actual communication will probably be from Schotty to Sanchez. All Ryan will be communicating is a Green, Yellow or Red to specify how careful he needs to be with the ball. It seems like a decent idea to me to take a little thinking off Sanchez' plate. I don't see how it could be a disaster.
I agree with everything you say, except it is the CS that needs to think about the game situation for Sanchez and stop treating him like a veteran. They have unnecessarily put him in positions to make mistakes.
uh, NEVER. THeir defense won them that super bowl, i dont care about "the catch". No Justin Tuck in that game, and the Pats go 19-0.
I don't think concerned fans are "on the ledge". Very few of us expected miracles this season. Hell, I predicted 5-11. We knew Sanchez would have his problems and give away games. Its the nature of the beast. What has fans like me upset is some things we are seeing on the field - undisciplined play, major mental mistakes, stupid penalties (12 men on the field? TWICE?), bad clock management, erratic play calling. Mr. Ryan was supposed to "change the culture" in Jet land. Right now it looks alot like it's looked for the last 40. No one expected to win the SB this year. But with all of his talk, we did want to see some improvement in the style of play in this team. If you play hard and smart, and get beat by superior talent, well, thats the game. But to play poorly and lose is hard to take time and again. I think that's what has fans like me upset with what we are seeing on the field.
