AFC Playoffs

If you had told me a month ago that the Jets would still be playing on 1/11/10 and the Patriots wouldn't, I would not have believed it. If you had said Wes Welker was injured then I _might_ have believed that the Patriots would be out of it, but not that the Jets were in it. Yet here we are on 1/11/10, and that's exactly the situation.

The Jets looked good in the Wild Card round, although the Bengals certainly helped them out. This weekend's game vs San Diego should be pretty interesting since each team has pretty different strengths. San Diego seems to be more of a passing, and screen throwing team, whereas the Jets are a run-heavy attack. The blitzing from the Jets might be countered well by the San Diego screens, but I think that the Jets have a decent shot here - they just need to make sure they control the ball with their ground game.

I think the Jets have a better shot than most people give them. It's good for them to be in the underdog role here. Also, Kerry Rhodes did a pretty good job of shutting down Antonio Gates in the past, so perhaps the Jets will use him in that role. It seems like most of the Chargers' recent games against good teams have been close, so the Jets should have a chance for it throughout. My biggest concern about the Jets is their middle linebackers. Coaching-wise, for some reason Norv Turner never seems to be able to get the job done. I wonder if this is the year.

If the Jets win, a match-up with the Colts or Ravens would be fascinating. If it's the Colts then it would be funny since most people blame the Colts for letting the Jets into the playoffs. If the Ravens, it would be a home game, and the Ravens are the team the Jets are modeled on. But that's getting ahead of ourselves.

Jets season is over...

You know, I just saw this statement on Facebook from a Patriots fan after they blew the game against Indianapolis:

"ARRRRGGGGHHHH!!! And this is why I can't stomach Pats games. :P"

-Was this person SERIOUS? What recent Patriots game has been hard to stomach? Please. The Pats are still handily in first place in the AFC East, certainly going to the playoffs and are firing on all cylinders. Oh, boo hoo, you haven't won the Super Bowl since 2004. What misery it must be watching the Patriots. Try watching a Jets game. That's a team that couldn't even miss a tackle on purpose.

Jets vs Ravens

This blog post by Tim Graham at ESPN.com pretty much sums up my opinion of last night's game, so why rewrite what has already been written?

http://espn.go.com/blog/afceast/post/_/id/2164/a-few-thoughts-on-sanchez-clemens-etc

Jay Cutler

To the Jets:

Please don't acquire Jay Cutler. Sure, he has a great throwing arm, and he's probably better than anyone that the team currently has. But the way he's reacting lately to the situation with the Broncos is extremely out of proportion compared to what has actually happened. And remember when he had a mini-feud with Philip Rivers? I believe Kerry Rhodes also said "I don't like him" after the team lost to the Broncos last year. It's tempting but don't do it!

Jets Release Coles

Or let him become a free agent, or whatever. He's not back next year. I hope this doesn't mean he joins his very good friend Chad Pennington. I'm not optimistic for next year even with a new coach.

Super Bowl Halftime Show

I'm catching up with the second half of the Super Bowl as well as the halftime show.

For my money, the MVP was LB James Harrison, who ran back that 100 yd interception. That caused a nearly 10 point swing and ended up being a huge play in terms of the final score. Maybe I'll change my mind if the 2nd half has some impressive plays.

During the halftime show - did Bruce Springsteen slide crotch first into a camera? Is that the Max Weinberg 7 from Conan O'Brien? I knew Max was in the E Street Band, but to see the rest of the gang there was something new. The bald guy on keyboards looks like David Letterman's sidekick Paul Schaffer!

2nd Half
-Denny's gave away free breakfast this AM? There's a Denny's in Manhattan? Wish I had heard this sooner, although I wonder what the crowd was like there.

-I find the Budweiser clydesdales this year completely unfunny and uninteresting. Are there going to be more commercials with them?

-In the game, Arizona can't get out of their own way in the 3rd quarter. I'm counting 3 personal fouls on the first Pittsburgh drive. Luckily they still hold Pittsburgh to only 3 on the drive with two good goal line stands.

-Kurt Warner's wife has long blonde hair? What happened to the 1999 version of Brenda Warner?


-Briefly annoyed by Chuck ad that claims "flattened" versions of the characters are 1 dimensional because it should be two dimensions.

-Cash4gold.com is a real website? I thought it was a joke!

-Arizona's passing game picking up in the 4th. It looks like what they're able to do is send 2-3 receivers down the same side at different depths, force the Steelers defensive players to commit to showing how they'll cover them and hope that Warner has enough time to spot the open receiver.

-Wow, a safety! Yet I still can't get the 5's I need. Also a rule I never knew: holding in the end zone is a safety. Is that the only penalty that leads to points?

-That the Cardinals kept it close was a huge shock to me. That they even ever got a lead in the 4th quarter even more impressive. I think in order to be successful in today's NFL, a team absolutely needs a huge receiver like Larry Fitzgerald. Just look at the differences that Randy Moss, Terrell Owens and Plaxico Burress have made for their teams.

-After the catch to put the Steelers ahead, I'll change my mind. Santonnio Holmes is the MVP. Great catch and he had 9 catches overall. When the Cardinals were winning, I guess the candidate would have been Warner, or maybe Fitzgerald.

-On the final play of the game, Kurt Warner's play is an incomplete pass in my opinion. Al Michaels called it a fumble because "his arm is not coming forward" but it sure looks like it's coming forward to me. He also cocked his arm back in a throwing position to release the ball.

-2004 looks like it was a great draft year for quarterbacks. Consider quarterbacks drafted in the first round of
2003: Carson Palmer, Byron Leftwich, Kyle Boller, Rex Grossman
2004: Eli Manning, Philip Rivers, Ben Roethlisberger, JP Losman
2005: Alex Smith, Aaron Rodgers, Jason Campbell
2006: Vince Young, Matt Leinart, Jay Cutler

-Pretty exciting game. I definitely didn't expect it to be this close, but a really strong finish. Why does Joe Namath present the Lombardi trophy? I shudder every time I see him on national television and remember his interview with Suzy Kolber on ESPN a few years back. Oh well, let the 2009 season begin!

Super Bowl Boxes

I entered a Super Bowl box pool at work and picked two boxes. Here are the numbers assigned to my boxes:

Cardinals 5, Steelers 9
Cardinals 3, Steelers 5

So if at the end of any quarter the ones-digit of the score are the digits above, I win. The problem is, I think 5 is one of the poorer numbers to have in this kind of game, and somehow I ended up with 5 in both boxes, one from either team. I don't have any proof to say this is the case, but a score of 5, 15 or 25 seems fairly unusual. 9 and 3 seem like a nice numbers if the team that has it ends up with a fairly low score (3, 13 or 9), but somewhat more difficult to attain at the higher levels (29, 33 ?). We'll find out on Sunday.

Welcome, New England fans!

Welcome New England Patriots fans, to the misery of rooting for the Jets. That's right! You too, get to taste the joys of watching the Jets lose a game that could have sent your team to the playoffs. Join me!

By the way, towards the end of the game, I was trying to decide which I would prefer - the Jets winning and helping New England or the Jets losing and Miami going to the playoffs. I decided that there's nobody on the Patriots that I like, whereas I do still like Chad Pennington. So congrats, Dolphins!

Also, I thought it is interesting that the Jets' collapse this year was actually similar to Tampa's collapse from 9-3 also this year.

Happy Jets Fan - Still an Oxymoron

Well that didn't last long, did it?

After two great wins against New England and Tennessee on the road, the Jets have now had two horrible losses against Denver and the 49ers in a row. Same ol' Jets?

11-30-2008 Denver Broncos at New York Jets

Maybe I should have entitled this, "Misery at the Meadowlands."

I got to go to the game on Sunday but the experience was horrible. The gate attendant wouldn't let me bring my umbrella in (despite the fact I wasn't going to use it as my seats were under the covering) and I had to "hide" it and hope it would be where I left it when I came out. It wasn't there. The alternative, since I took the bus, was to throw the umbrella out. Many people were throwing out perfectly good umbrellas. What a waste!

On to the game itself, it was a wet and windy day, and the Jets were horrible. The game was so strange with a number of big plays in the beginning, a fumble recovery that apparently wasn't a recovery (it sure looked that way on the replay), and a huge rash of Denver injuries towards the end of the game. In the third or fourth quarter, there was this really strange series of Jets offensive plays where after every play a Denver player required a trainer to come out to them. Literally five plays in a row. It was so strange that it appeared as if they were doing it on purpose!

Meanwhile, the defense had absolutely no pass rush. So sad.

Oh well, maybe this will be a wake up call for the team. The game did make the playoff prospects rather dim, as it exposed the horrible pass defense.

Here's a nice photo from the atrocious game, followed by an interesting ad I saw in Giants Stadium. I guess they don't update the ads very often.

Old and Slow

It's halftime, the Jets are up and I'm nervous they're going to blow it.

An interesting note that I saw this morning - apparently a Jets player anonymously said that the Patriots were "old and slow" but didn't want to take credit for fear of "bulletin board material." How does saying that anonymously make it any less bulletin board material. It still can read, "Jets: Pats are old and slow."

Jets - It's not looking good

The Jets are facing Buffalo today but it's not looking good for this game, or even the season. The Jets need a win at Buffalo if they want to stay close in the AFC East race. The problem is, they've been playing really close games against poor opponents - including the loss at Oakland. Now ILB and leading tackler David Harris is out with an injury and being replaced by David Bowens, who never has played ILB (he is a OLB / DE). WR's Coles and Cotchery are both banged up and the third WR, Brad Smith, has 1 catch this year.

In addition, the coaching has been horribly inconsistent, especially on offense. Against the Raiders, the running game in the first half was going really well, yet they ran very few play actions or even run plays and kept passing. Only until overtime did they try to run some more. With the Chiefs, worst running defense in the league, they came out passing. What is going on?

They're teetering right now and the rest of the schedule doesn't get any easier. I think we can call the season pretty soon - probably on 11/14 after the Thursday night game against New England. I'm guessing they'll be 5-5 at best, meaning they would need 5/6 to finish the season and feel good about the playoffs.

Bad Jets Loss

The Jets loss today to the Raiders was a bad one. The game was a typical "trap" game where the Jets had been winning well, and were facing off against a limping Raiders team. The entire game was sloppy with the Raiders committing too many penalties and the Jets making three huge turnovers. In the end, the Jets had gotten so many breaks just to keep the game even at 13-13 and force overtime, it was hard to imagine that they could win in overtime unless they improved their play. The Chiefs come in next week and the Jets need to win that game.

Jets vs Pats 2008

If the Jets win, I predict the following statements from NFL analysts:
1) The Jets are now the team to beat in the East
2) What a difference Brett Favre is to the team (and how Chad Pennington could not have made some throw in the game)
3) It just shows how valuable Tom Brady is

If the Pats win, I predict the following statements from NFL analysts:
1) Football is a team game
2) The road to the AFC East goes through New England
3) Defense wins championships
4) Brett Favre is still learning the system
5) That's why Bill Belichick is a hall of fame coach

I think this is going to be a close, defensively oriented game. For the Jets to win they will need their offensive line to get a good running game going against the Patriots, who are vulnerable in that area. On the flip side, they will need to stifle New England's run game with their own revamped defense. Biggest non-injury fear - Brett Favre is perplexed by the Belichick defensive schemes.

Brett Favre in New York

There have been many accomplished athletes who switch teams late in their careers, and many who have switched teams into New York City. But Brett Favre's arrival with the Jets has an even larger carnival-like atmosphere than I could have ever imagined.

Why is this happening? Certainly it's big news any time a team acquires a HOF-caliber player. But even most HOF-caliber acquisitions don't get press conferences at City Hall and "Broadway" signs. And it's been a week since his acquisition but ESPN is still doing daily training camp updates from Jets camp.

First, I think since the Brett Favre retirement saga was big news in the national media to begin with, the resolution has now led to increased focus on Favre. Second, since the Jets were such a surprise team from this trade, and in general the timing was surprising and last minute, there is a bigger reaction. Finally, although the Olympics are going on, there aren't many other stories in pro sports.

I'm not sure how successful this trade will make the Jets, but I am sure it has raised the expectations significantly for the team. That's not always a good thing. Lately, I've been noticing that NY sports fans (but especially Mets and Jets fans) seem to get really upset when the high expectations they have for their teams are not met. Chad Pennington was easily and frequently cheered and then booed. What will be his reception the first game he comes back as a Dolphin? Mets fans, in particular, are boo crazy and there is significant overlap from Mets to Jets.

The Jets season may start off bumpy. If there's ever a game Miami can steal, it will be week 1, with the Jets on the road, new QB and the general problems teams run into on week 1. Then the Jets go on to face the Pats and Chargers. Of course, Chad Pennington loved to feast on the Chargers (he beat them in their last 3 match-ups, including a 44-13 whipping while the Jets struggled and the Chargers were 6-1). Then Arizona, the team everyone always thinks will be better. So it could easily be a 2-2 or 1-3 start. Not so favorable. Fortunately the BYE week then comes up and the schedule is pretty good overall.

Another interesting comment I've heard - the Patriots have the easiest schedule in the league and the Jets one of the hardest. Well, sure that's true if you look by opponent's record. But their only opponents that differ are the Jets face the Bengals and Titans, whereas the Pats face the Steelers and Colts. So what accounts for the disparity? Easy - if you calculate the Jets' opponents records, you need to factor in the 16-0 Patriots twice. Whereas when you factor the Pats' opponents records, you put in the 4-12 Jets twice. But actually the schedule is only different in those two games. So yes, technically the Jets' schedule is harder because they play the Patriots, but the Patriots don't have to play against themselves.

Interesting to watch for: at what point will Brett Favre say "we" and "us" instead of "this team" and "these guys"? The latter phrases sound much more like an outsider looking in.

Favre is a Jet. Whatthahuh?

Let's hope this move is more like Joe Montana with the Chiefs and Wade Boggs with the Yankees than Patrick Ewing with the Sonics and Michael Jordan with the Wizards.

Poor Chad Pennington. He'll benefit from being in another place that has a good offensive line. The only reason he's leaving is that Brett Favre couldn't make up his mind about retirement.

Tiki Interviews Eli

For the Today show, Tiki Barber had a feature where he interviewed some of his former teammates.



Tiki Barber was mentioned quite a bit over the last two weeks and at some point, it might be interesting to write about how a guy who played so well has become so unpopular.

Are the Jets out of it at 1-3?

Watching the Jets last Sunday, I had the feeling that they were out of it if they lost to the Bills. Forgetting how poorly the team has looked in general, since they've lost to three conference opponents, it makes the playoffs even less likely in their case.

While this is a particularly pessimistic view of the rest of the season for the Jets, I was looking at the standings, and noticed a few other teams with very high expectations who are at 1-3. Do any of them have a chance? I'm not so sure.

Philadelphia
Chicago
San Diego
Cincinnati

New Orleans is 0-3, and they had high hopes. Minnesota, Buffalo and Atlanta are 1-3, but I don't think their expectations were as high entering the season.

The players keep saying it's a long season, but I don't think it will make a difference. All of these 1-3 teams have pretty significant weaknesses; barring injuries to the teams above them, I think the season might be over for them.

Boos and Illegal Cameras

Two more quick notes about the game yesterday:

-Many people have noted that the Giants Stadium crowd booed Chad Pennington when he limped off the field, including the ol' Wacky Chinaman. It's pretty embarrassing. While this is expected in a city like Philadelphia, it's not expected in New York. Perhaps it should be. New York fans, while considered to be educated, passionate, use whatever adjectives you want, have recently shown that they have a very short memory. The phenomenon has gotten worse and worse over time. At first I thought it started with the Mets fans, who had two recent cycles of big spending and underperforming. Most notably, Mike Piazza was getting booed towards the end of his Met career (despite being basically the best Met ever aside from Tom Seaver) and Carlos Beltran getting booed on opening day at home in his second year as a Met. But Yankee fans showed they are not immune to this sort of stupidity, booing Derek Jeter a few years back after his slow start. A-Rod heard the jeers from the crowd regularly last year despite winning the MVP the year before. Like I said, I don't know if this is something new or if it's just something I am noticing more often, but booing Chad Pennington isn't a huge surprise. However, just because it's not a surprise doesn't make it right. I have a theory that sports radio may be to blame, because it is the source of all kinds of outrageous opinions, but for now it's just a theory.

-Apparently the Patriots had some sort of camera on the sidelines that might have been used to steal the defensive signals of the Jets. Apparently this isn't the first time they've run into this sort of problem. As much as I would love to believe that this is why the Patriots beat the Jets so easily, I have a lot of trouble with this accusation. If it were true it would make the Patriots seem unbelievably insecure. Too unbelievably. They've beaten the Jets repeatedly in recent years and are on paper a better team. Why would they feel the need to cheat? There's also no way they could have maintained the sort of success that they have had even if they had stolen signs or whatever. Why were they doing something similar in Green Bay last year? Who knows, but I also don't think that the Green Bay people should have said anything until the investigation was complete. Was there something fishy going on? Perhaps, but I doubt it is as serious as it sounds in the news stories.

-Apparently the penalty for a team that does something like use an illegal camera to take photos during a game is loss of a draft pick or a fine. That doesn't seem like much to me. If it's such a big deal, the offending team should be forced to forfeit the game. However, I don't really know how a team could benefit significantly from this sort of gamesmanship. Who cares about fines and draft picks? Even the loss of one first round pick isn't the end of the world.

Patriots Win, Jets Lose, Let the Agony Begin...

The Jets lost to the Patriots today, 38-14 and really looked pretty beaten up throughout the game.

The game was totally over once the Pats returned a kickoff for 108 yards. You have to just tip your cap to Hobbs' return - I did not think he would have tried to run that back. Just goes to show how the day was going for the Jets. Kicker Mike Nugent spent the offseason bulking up, kicks a deep ball that he probably would have never kicked last year, and it gets run back for a record setting touchdown!

Well, my worst fears were confirmed as the lack of a left guard hurt the Jets this game. As you may recall, Pete Kendall had a contract dispute and got traded to the Redskins during the preseason. The lack of good protection affected Pennington and the running game. Here's a few things I noticed:

-First, the Pennington injury - shades of Vinny Testaverde going down in 1999 on opening day. One can blame this on Pennington's "lack of durability" all one wants, but let's face it - lack of a left guard was to blame here. The missed coverage came from the blind side. He was under pressure all day as well, it's impressive he passed as well as he did.

-The running game was in total disarray. The Jets didn't run much play action passing, which surprised me, but I suspect that the heavy pressure made it difficult to pull this off. Also a lack of running game - probably due to no holes being open. It was telling when Thomas Jones ran for about 10 yards in the second quarter and screamed and jumped in the air as if he had just scored a touchdown!

-Chad Pennington played very well in the passing game, but I was surprised about the fact that he only threw to Coles and Cotchery most of the game. Again, I blame the lack of a left guard here, as it didn't look like they ran much in a way of spread formations in order to keep Pennington protected.

Then there's the Patriots. They looked very good, although I wonder if the Jets offense had been more balanced if the game would have been closer. Pennington ended up passing pretty well, despite their pressure, and I think if the Jets had created some running lanes that they could have kept the Patriots off balance a little more. Randy Moss obviously is over his hamstring problem and Tom Brady looks like he's in great form despite his supposed shoulder problem. The Pats should be able to do very well in the passing game and put up points but I actually thought the Jets did reasonably well against the run. I was also surprised that it seemed like the Jets stuck with a three man rush against the Pats, and it didn't seem like they blitzed too much.

Overall, I'm surprised that the Jets got rid of Kendall so easily. The blind side of the QB was trusted to some novices and it looks like it's going to hurt in a number of ways. Now we have this injury to deal with as well. There are no favors in the Jets schedule either - they have Baltimore, Miami, Buffalo and the Giants coming up. Baltimore and Miami are going to be tough if the protection isn't there on the line, and then division game Buffalo will be intense, as will the inter-city battle vs the Giants. I think the Jets are more talented than the last three teams, but these games still seem pretty tough.