The defense allowed 10 points last game. That is good. It's not surprising they let in that final touchdown. It was obvious they were tired and worn down by the end. It was an appalling scheduling job. We have to expect our offense to put more than 13 points on the board. The way our defense played, that game should have been a blowout. The 2 main issues we have are the offensive line and Schotty. Rex is the overseer, but maybe he is a bit too defensive minded, but who really knows how it goes down behind the scenes?
I think it's clear Rex still has a lot to learn on the offensive side of the ball. If not this thing would be fixed already. I think the lack of performance is due to the fact that he has had to lean on schotty because he doesn't have the offensive background. Saying he only cares about the defense isn't fair. I think he says ground and pound because its a simple philosophy that works if you have the right personnel and mindset and you dont have to have 10 years of coaching offense under your belt to run it. Rex isn't going to invent some highly explosive offensive system out of nowhere after coaching defense his entire career. I think its pretty clear what needs to be done. He needs to get rid of schotty and get an offensive coordinator who is experienced and proven who he can lean on and learn from. Then after a few years working with a true offensive guru Rex would be better suited to fix some of the offensive problems. Schotty was thought to be an up and coming coach. I understand Mangini choosing him because Mangini being so young himself needed someone there who wouldn't second guess him. It's been too long now that the jets have been mid to bottom of the league on offense and that we have seen too many shades of Marty ball in his son and protege.
The blame can swirl in every direction for this year and there's probably not one culprit free of any blame. I was really hoping I was wrong but even through the pre-season I had my doubts about this team. So yeah, Schotty sucks, the O-line is swiss cheese, the D-line doesn't get a push, and Mark is still inconsistent. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that all adds up to a team that just plain isn't that great this year. Competitive, yes. But you're deranged to think this team is what it was these past two years.
When the OL is having trouble it's up to the OC to call plays to slow down the rush - something Shottenheimer never, never does. Where are the screen passes? (Real screen passes in the flat to the RB not the worthless WR screen passes that are more likely to be picked off or tackle for a loss that Shottenheimer loves). Where are the delayed draws up the middle? Why, especially now that the Jets #1 RB is Joe Mcknight, doesn't he ever spread the field with 4 WR and run up the middle? When the OC does nothing but split 1 man out (usually not even wide) and never throws more then 4 yards, it's very easy for teams to stack the box and crowd the middle of the field. It's the same every week. On the rare occasions when we do get into the red zone, why aren't they throwing a fade to Plaxico every time? I recall one fade this year to him that resulted in a TD, then the play was shelved. Why go out and sign a big, physical, 6'6 receiver if you aren't going to throw fades and jump balls in the endzone? The offensive line has underperformed, but that is no excuse for the same failing offensive "strategy" we see week in and week out.
He proved this conclusively in a vague game that nobody can quite identify when he didn't play like Peyton Manning or Tom Brady in one of their MVP seasons. That said, I fully support the move back to ground and pound because that's the only way we get Sanchez out of this season without making the David Carr factor uncomfortably large. The Jets fundamentally screwed the pooch under the constraints of the limited off-season and we'll be very lucky indeed if our Super Bowl window has not slammed shut for 5 seasons or more.
I think Ryan needs to work on his defense's conditioning. According to this forum every time we give up a critical score it's due to the defense being 'tired'. Not sure why it would be unexpected that the defense would need to hold for a whole game when we were playing with no running backs and only two receivers.
Schotty likes to call the same plays over and over again even if they have no chance of working. No adjustments to what the defense is doing. He never exploits the defense weaknesses like not throwing deep against the patriots when they had edelman playing as a defensive back or keep running the ball when the team is having success with it. Not to mention not using Sanchez properly. His strengths are the play action and rolling out but you almost never see that.
That's Quagliarella doing the airplane celebration after a goal. I don't know who did it first, him or Santonio Holmes. I am a big Juventus and Jets fan and what a coincidence both teams do the same celebration.
Those are just excuses. The Jets didn't have mediocre talent 2 years ago, when Rex turned a 10 win team into a 9 win team, with 2 wins gifted to them by teams that didn't care. Sure they got into the playoffs, but even a Pats fans would admit it was a talented team. Talented enough to win 12 games the next year. How did the Jets suddenly become "mediocre". Doesn't the buck have to stop somewhere. Is he going to be like his dad and scapegoat the offense and absolve himself of blame. Maybe the blame should fall on the FO. Does Rex have any say in the personnel decisions? Why is it that the Pats will play the Eagles today with their #3 Center. A FA pick up at RG and have their 2 OTs BOTH limited in practice all week, They have already lost their RT for 5 games and their LT for 1. The Jets OL fell apart when Mangold was lost for just 2 games. What do you think would happen to the Jets if they were in the the Pats situation. Same thing could be said for the defense. Today the Pats will start 3 players in their defensive backfield who weren't on the roster for at the start of the season. We will start our #4 and 5 safeties, our #4 CB and the slot CB is a WR. Where would the Jets be if they were in that situation? Face it Rex came into a very talented team. He deserves a huge amount of credit for the PR job he's done for the Jets and making them relevant again in NY. He deserves a lot of credit for his work in the playoffs 4-2 is 4 wins more than his father ever got. However as Jet fans you should be asking why is it we have a 12 win team that is suddenly "mediocre" with several holes on both sides of the ball. While BB seems to be doing more with less, is Rex guilty of doing less with more BTW - win the next 6 games and all this crap will be mute, :wink:
