Saturday, August 26, 2006

Jets Preview

I haven't been following the NFL too closely, but I have seen most of the first three Jets preseason games. It's going to be a long year for the Jets. While I think they are better than the four wins they had last year, they look like the kind of team that will take a few weeks early in the season before things start to really work out well.

On offense, it's been pretty miserable so far. They haven't been able to score points, and they haven't gotten much of a passing or running game together. The offense has also had a lot of drives killed by penalties. It looks like Pennington will be the QB and Barlow and Blaylock should be enough to be serviceable at RB. WR is surprisingly deep with Coles, McCairens, Cotchery, Dwight and Smith, but the issue will be whether or not anyone can get them the ball. TE was supposed to be a possible offensive option but the TE's haven't seen much preseason action. In general, there's some nice talent on this side of the ball, and a lot more speed than they've had in the past, but most of it's pretty raw, and they'll need to do better with sustaining drives if they want to win.

Players on defense have all been asked to make pretty major adjustments since the scheme now includes 3-4 and 4-3 formations. The defense hasn't looked too bad so far in the preseason, although it would be nice to see a little more pass rush. A number of players will need to improve in order to make the defense work, including Bryan Thomas, Shawn Ellis and Dewayne Robertson. Cornerback may end up being a position of relative depth with Dyson, Barrett, Miller, Strait, and Mickens. So far in the preseason, the first team defense seems to have held up well against the opponents, but I suspect that once the season starts, the Jets will have a lot of 3 & outs on offense, leading to the defense getting worn down.

Finally, special teams seems to be the unit that may be the best for the Jets. Unfortunately, special teams are so unreliable for point production that this may not make much difference. Justin Miller and Leon Washington have been excellent return men so far this preseason, and I think special teams had TD's in the last 2 preseason games. The one weak link may be kicker Mike Nugent, who has still been somewhat unreliable in the preseason.

All in all, I think the Jets could improve at best to about 8-8, and I think they will certainly improve on their 4-12 campaign from last year. That would be a respectable debut for Coach Mangini.

Yankee Mustaches




Three new mustaches sprouted up on the Yankees recently. They look kind of sleazy, if you ask me. Since they all showed up around the same time, I think that Damon, Giambi and Wright must all be in on it together.

Tuesday, August 15, 2006