I will be at MetLife Stadium this Sunday to see our beloved New York Jets take on the Cleveland Browns! If you will be too, say hello to fellow GGN Contributor BoyGreen25 and me at parking lot J2 for our tailgate. When we looked at the schedule in June, I specifically picked this game for our tailgate because I wanted to make sure we’d be witnessing a win for our annual (and only) in-person experience. I even figured it could be the Jets’ first win of the season.
Now that the game is here, the Jets
are 1-3, and the same fanbase that merely eight days ago was ecstatic about the progress shown in a ‘competitive loss’ is now up in arms and ready to fire the same coach they were so confident in during those moral victories. Perspective is really an interesting concept because I think most fans expected 1-3 or 2-2 heading into this game. I heard zero fans, not even the most optimistic ones, predicting 4-0 or 3-1 heading into Week 5.
Is it the contrast of beating the Titans by two scores in Week 1 to then losing to the Tyson Bagent Bears in Week 4? Was that Week 1 performance so shocking that people got their hopes up and couldn’t fathom finishing the NFC North gauntlet 0-3, even though that was the consensus-discussed scenario all summer? Or is it more that the pain of losing to backup quarterbacks is so painful that losing by two scores to Tyson Bagent just drummed up the decades of PTSD associated with our “Same Old Jets”?
For what it’s worth, teams in today’s NFL lose to backup QBs fairly routinely. The same New England Patriots that just beat invincible Josh Allen and the Bills started their season losing to a backup QB. The reigning Super Bowl Champion Seattle Seahawks lost to a backup QB. Losing to a backup QB is far from a death sentence in today’s NFL. Losing four games straight, however, has a much higher mortality rate. Still, I respectfully disagree that this game is a “must-win.”
Of course, should the Jets win? Yes. Would it go a long way toward quieting the fanbase’s uproar? Yes. But they could lose this game and then win the next three (Patriots, Dolphins, Raiders), and the entire fanbase would be completely revitalized and incredibly hopeful for the Week 9 showdown at Arrowhead Stadium against the Chiefs. The season will have a pulse on Monday, October 12, no matter what happens on Sunday.
Let’s assess some of the things worth looking at during the game on Sunday and let’s see their impact on the final outcome of the game:
Capture the Flag
One of my earliest memories of the Glenn Era is all the bragging he did during press conferences. Glenn blasted the previous regime for all the penalties committed and blamed it on the coaching. He said he would coach the team to be better players, more disciplined, and take specific measures (such as hiring referees for training camp) to right these wrongs.
The New York Jets are currently 4th in the NFL in penalties committed per play. They’ve been penalized frequently in all three phases of the game but have apparently earned the most delay-of-game penalties of any team through the first four weeks of any season this century. If you’re curious who leads the league in penalties per play this season, it’s the Cleveland Browns.
Another fun stat: in Week 5, no NFL defense was more penalized than the New York Jets. They were tied with the Cleveland Browns’ defense, which fell victim to Aaron Rodgers’ infamous hard counts on Thursday Night Football. Between the Jets’ delay-of-game penalties and the Browns’ neutral-zone infractions, we’ll see if any chicanery happens on the lines when these teams match up on Sunday.
The goal is simple – don’t commit penalties. Last week specifically, the Jets lost several interceptions to penalties that could’ve been avoided. It would’ve been incredible to end an interception drought with a downpour of them, but the team’s (lack of) discipline wouldn’t let that happen. Needless to say, had those interceptions stuck, the game’s outcome might’ve been very different.
Pressure Cooker
You may look at this article and say, “yeah yeah yeah, any football game can have the same three things to look at,” and list generic goals of every football game. Every football game, you want to take care of the football, move the ball down the field, and pressure the opposing quarterback. This article matters because it’s not that simple: every team is different and has different things going on. Each team’s different qualities get highlighted when they face off against each other.
Deshaun Watson seems much closer to his Houston Texan form than any other version of Watson we’ve seen in orange. Not only is his accuracy back on all three levels, but he’s also elusive and confident on his feet again. He is third in the NFL for rushing yards among QBs and is only behind Josh Allen in rushing attempts. They have designed run plays for him, but he’s most lethal when there’s blanket coverage downfield, and he finds his lane in the pocket.
This is where I’m calling for the Jets, currently 5th worst in the NFL at generating pressures per dropback (18.2%), to finally generate pressure on dropbacks. To be 4th in blitzes per dropback (33.6%) and 28th in pressures per dropback is a level of embarrassment I’m not ready to fully discuss right now.
There’s been a lot of unwarranted criticism hurled at number two overall pick David Bailey, and some debate about whether it’s a talent issue or a usage issue. If I’m weighing in, I’d lean toward usage, since he’s already dropped back into coverage more times this season than he did in his entire senior year at Texas Tech.
Regardless of the true answer to that debate, it’s up to Aaron Glenn to find some way to get into Deshaun’s face this Sunday. If not, he’ll be free to sit back, diagnose, and scramble as he pleases on his way to carving up the Jets defense. Will we see Will McDonald IV be relevant in any way? My call is for Bailey and Ossai to set the edge and force Deshaun into the middle of the field where the Jets have so many strong tacklers. With all the different things you can say about the Jets this year, you can’t say they’re bad at tackling. It’s been one of their strengths all year.
2-Minute Drill
You may have seen my earlier article about Aaron Glenn’s biggest weakness, and I hope it stays front and center for them every day until they get this monkey off their back. With the first interception in 21 games finally caught, I’d imagine they’ll keep coming here and there for a team that has finally addressed the elephant in the room. The next largest elephant in that room is their horrid play at the end of halves.
After the failure at the end of the first half of the Bears game, the Jets’ streak is now up to 15 consecutive scoreless 2-minute drill attempts. I didn’t do a deep dive into every NFL team’s 2-minute drill history, but in that article I explained that I looked at every team’s 2-minute drills this season, and since everyone has scored points at least once this season, we can say with certainty that this streak of 15 is the largest active scoreless streak in the NFL.
Nick Folk’s game-winning field goal against the Falcons in Week 13 was the last time they scored any points within the last two minutes of a half. Overall, Aaron Glenn’s Jets have scored six times in 34(!) attempts. That is a putrid 17.6% rate. What’s even crazier is how often the Jets end up with the ball in their hands in this situation. Some teams had only two or three opportunities through the first four weeks, while the Jets have had six! So it makes it even worse to have so many opportunities and still come up short so often.
If the Jets are going to end this losing streak, they’re going to need to put points up on the board and be able to swing momentum. There is perhaps no bigger momentum swing in the game then scoring those last-second points. Can the Jets do it? I hope so, I’ll be in the stands this week! Let’s go Jets!
