Jets Experience Déjà Vu all over again

The Jets sense of urgency, a product of the Foxborough Massacre the prior week, has just turned into a feeling of unrestrained panic. Of course, the average Jets fan takes this with a degree of equanimity, having experienced feelings of impending doom which have played themselves out in reality numerous times since Joe Willie roamed the gridiron.

The Monday prior to the match with the Dolphins, Rex Ryan buried the game ball from the Patriot fiasco before the first practice of that week. As per Darrelle Revis:

“This morning (Ryan) made us get out of a team meeting and he buried a football in the ground along the sideline on the field and said, ‘Just forget about it, forget about this game.’ It was actually a game ball from Monday night,’’,

Thus Ryan officiated at the funeral of the game ball. He told the team that they were going on a “field trip.” Rex had already dug the hole. Reportedly, the entire team was in shock. Some coaches say “lets bury that game.” Ryan was perhaps the first Head Coach to do so in the literal sense. Rex then gave a short homily: ” We’re burying this game and what happened Monday night, and let’s move forward.’"

Requiescat in pace

The Jets entered the tunnel leading to the field of the New Meadowlands optimistic that they could run the table the final four games of the season. However, the blip began morphing into what looks like an ominous pattern, as the Jets lost to the Fish 10-6. This, despite the fact that the defense came back to expected form and held Chad Henne, who had dissected the Jets secondary in their initial meeting, to 55 passing yards and a QB rating south of woeful.. The entire Miami offense managed to garner only 131 total yards and a miniscule six first downs.

How much trouble are the Jets in? Although they are currently safely ensconced in a wild-card spot, next week they face the Pittsburgh Steelers on the road. Who except the most diehard optimist expects Gang Green to prevail? The Jets offense has not scored a TD in 9 quarters. Ground and Pound has been pulverized into meatloaf. The Sanchise has played so poorly that Ryan contemplated benching him in the second half. Last Sunday, Sanchez lost the football five times, resulting in two Jets turnovers. He could easily have thrown three interceptions. His final line was 17-44. The wide outs continue dropping passes at an accumulating rate. The potential TD catch dropped in the end zone by Santonio Holmes could have been caught by your mother-in-law. The Offensive line was a revolving door, which allowed five sacks, and was unable to block for Tomlinson and Shonne Green. Or perhaps Tomlinson is running out of gas, and Green just isn’t very good. Three sacks occurred on the Jets last hurrah, a final drive starting from their own 25 with a bit over 2 minutes left in the match. The Dolphins do have the fourth rated defense in the NFL, but no one has ever confused them with being the Monsters of the Midway until Sunday.

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If it looks like a collapse, and feels like a collapse, is it, in fact, a collapse? One thing is for certain; at this time of the season, the Jets are not seen as a potential Super Bowl squad. The myth of the awesome, intimidating defense was put to rest by the Patriots. The offense looks impotent. In short, to paraphrase Dennis Green, the Jets are not what we thought they were .

Coach Bill Parcells always discussed the importance of momentum down the stretch. He talked about the impelling force of “psychology of results.” Although the Jets record still stands at a seemingly imposing 9-4, they have two difficult road games ahead of them, at Pittsburgh and Chicago. They may very well be playing for their playoff lives in week 17, at home against Buffalo. At the same time, the Dolphins have two home games coming up against the Bills and Lions, bottom-feeders of the AFC. The most interesting match of the season could well be game 17, when Miami plays the Patriots. Bill Belichick is not beyond playing his third string players, in an attempt to sabotage the Jets playoff chances.

Beyond the Jets difficulties on the field, they are once again involved in an imbroglio due to lapses in their personal conduct. The Jets strength and conditioning coach was suspended for tripping Nolan Carroll of the Dolphins on a third-quarter punt. Carroll was injured on that play. It now appears that Carroll had encouraged players to form a wall along the sidelines, impeding the play of Carroll, who was the “gunner”, or in real life terms, the kamikaze special teams players on punts and kickoff returns, who run down the sidelines attempting to box in and tackle the returner. What began as a small incident is quickly escalating, and many suspect that Coach Ryan gave the orders to form the wall. Rex, of course, is in a denial mode, but this is but one more incidence of the immaturity of the Jets brass as an entity. What were somewhat endearing incidents when the Jets were winning have now become an embarrassment.

By: Paul J. Nebenfuhr
ProFootball-fans.com New York Jets Correspondent