Football Jets

WOOHOO! Jets Nation we are now going to be playing meaningful December football games.

A month ago we were 4-6 and lamenting our bad luck as lifelong Jets fans all the while enduring being once again the butt of jokes from those not bleeding the green.

Guess who’s laughing now.

At 7-6 the Jets are in the playoff hunt. Wildcard and Division titles are within our sights, with only 3 games to play. The Dolphins join us at 7-6 and we are both only 1 game behind the 8-5 Patriots for the AFC East division. FYI the Dolphins would hold the tiebreaker over us if it came down to that.  The Wildcard is certainly wild after both the 7-6 Jaguars and 8-5 Broncos lost this week. The 7-6 Ravens big win put them in the wild mix as well. So 5 teams, four at 7-6 and one at 8-5, are fighting for two wildcard playoff spots.

Compared to the other four teams, the Jets have the biggest hill to climb because they pretty much don’t hold any tie breakers and have arguably the toughest schedule going forward. Atlanta, Indianapolis, and Cincinnati is not going to be any kind of piece of cake.  The chance of winning all three is a daunting task, but the Jets momentum from their dominating 26-3 victory on the road against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers could be helpful. On the bright side, Atlanta is reeling and have a back up quarterback, Indianapolis has clinched home field advantage and could be resting players (Peyton Manning) and the Bengals offense can be shut down.

The 26-3 win in Tampa was a mix of Kellen Clemens managing a game as Mark Sanchez’s replacement, Thomas Jones running wild and The NUMBER 1 DEFENSE in the NFL doing what The NUMBER 1 DEFENSE in the NFL do shutting down opponents. In fact, the admittedly pathetic Tampa Bay offense didn’t get their first first down until the third quarter, and even that was after a personal foul penalty against the Jets defense.

OK, I hope I am not getting my hopes up to high, but I like our chances. The best defense in the league and a running game, that definitely spells possibilities. Let’s take this one game at a time.

Go Jets.

The New York Jets have to win football games. On Sunday they again found themselves playing catch-up and lost to the Jacksonville Jaguars 24-22 at home. This difficult loss to swallow against a very average NFL team puts the Jets record at 4-5 and really diminishes any playoff aspirations for the team.

With only four wins and seven games remaining, the Jets will likely need to go what is seeminly improbable 6-1 the rest of the way to get to 10 wins which possibly would be enough to make the playoffs as a wild card. This game on Sunday was tough, as Quarterback Mark Sanchez orchestrated a go ahead touchdown late in the fourth quarter to take the lead. The defense, which started the game very slow but was starting to produce results in the second half were unable to stop the Jaguars on their final drive. Big play after big play the Jaguars marched down the field. At the end was a Maurice Jones-Drew rush that looked like an easy touchdown run but he intelligently and unselfishly took a knee at the one yard line. By doing so, the Jaguars were able to drain the last couple minutes of the clock before kicking the chip shot go-ahead field goal as time expired. The brilliant heads up play prevented Sanchez from getting another opportunity.

This loss hurts and without going into details about how the Jets squandered opportunities within the game to get a must needed win Football Jets wants to cry.

But that is too late as Jets Head Coach Rex Ryan has already been crying about the game and the team. In front of the entire team during the morning meeting following this loss Rex Ryan had an emotional moment that brought him to tears. Ryan thinks the Jets are much better than their 4-5 record and the 5 losses over the last 6 games against mostly very average  opponents. Ryan will need to save any hope for the playoffs by going to New England and facing Bill Belichick, Tom Brady and a fan base which is still spinning from the Sunday night meltdown by the coach and team against the undefeated Indianapolis Colts. The decision to go for it on their own 28, up by 6 points and with just a couple of minutes remaining was hugely controversial and in my honest opinion borderline idiotic.