[S-Dubb]

Jets must ask what needs fixing Road test against Bills will challenge team that has struggled

By Michael Salfino / SNY.tv


Trent Edwards may have the upper hand in his matchup with Brett Favre on Sunday in Orchard Park, N.Y.

(AP) print this pageemail this page

The Jets are somehow 4-3 and get a chance to finally step up in weight class versus the 5-2 Bills in Orchard Park, N.Y. That's the same Bills team that regularly has its way with the Jets even when struggling. Buffalo has won three straight and five of seven. And this is a Jets team that was life-and-death last week at home against a terrible Kansas City team playing its third-string quarterback, Tyler Thigpen, who looked like vintage Len Dawson against the Jets' beleaguered defense. Now Boomer Esiason and many others in the media, with the tacit approval of Eric Mangini, are laying the team's woes at the feet of Brett Favre. That is absurd.

It's fair to say that Mangini is not altering this storyline because he spent yesterday explaining to reporters how he's working with Favre to not be such a gambler. Hey, Eric, maybe Favre wouldn't have to gamble so much if your offense, and especially your passing game, wasn't so completely and pathetically predictable.

Before we throw Favre under the bus, let's present the case against Mangini, legacy hire Brian Schottenheimer and whoever else has their finger in this putrefying offense pie.

Exhibit A is Chad Pennington. Sorry, Chad, for blaming you and your weakened wing for the Jets utter lack of any playmaking in the passing game since Mangini and Schottenheimer came on board. I assumed they saw you in practice and came up with that dunk-and-dink offense out of necessity. Who could imagine this is the way they think you should try to score in today's game?

There was evidence that Pennington could throw the ball downfield in 2006. And this year, he's proven that it's not him, it's them (Schottenheimer and Mangini) by going down to Miami (who are their receivers, exactly?) and ranking second in the NFL in yard per pass attempt (YPA). Favre is 20th, meanwhile. And those picks? Pennington tosses them on 1.4% of attempts (fourth-best) while Favre is a league-worst 4.98%.

Last year in New York, Pennington was 20th in YPA and 19th in interception percentage. If it's not the fault of the underlying offense, there sure are a lot of remarkable coincidences here. I don't believe in remarkable coincidences and neither should the Jets' brain trust (for lack of a better term).

I'm going to say it one more time, with feeling: Fire Brian Schottenheimer. If Mangini won't do it, broom him, too. Time is running out on this season. If the Jets weren't lucky enough to catch the Dolphins in transition in Week 1 (notice how Miami has gotten better and the Jets have not), New York would be 3-4 in what we all can agree is the easy part of its schedule.

ut Esiason gets on the radio and talks to the Daily News this week and says that it's Mangini who is being victimized by Favre and that if Favre were any other quarterback, he'd have been benched by now. How completely absurd. Pennington is playing as well as any other quarterback in the league right now removed from this system. Last year, he stunk in it. Favre was close to vintage last year and is one of the top five or ten quarterbacks in league history and this year he's struggling mightily (sans the Cardinals game). Case closed.

Mangini needs to look in the mirror, too, with this defense that's not fooling anyone. Yes, they're getting to the quarterback. But the team is 20th in interception percentage. And that's playing a slate of passers that's included Matt Cassel, Ryan Fitzpatrick, JaMarcus Russell and Thigpen. If you can't force these novices into mistakes, what good are you?

The Jets actually moved up a little last week to 25th overall in my Stat Power Rankings, which factors in only the four stats that most correlate to winning: net YPA, net red-zone possessions, net third-down percentage and net interception rate.

In contrast, the Bills are 12th. Yes, they are overrated by the punditry. The numbers don't back up their claim to being a serious contender. What Miami did to them last week was no great surprise.

The formula I use that to create a point spread has worked out perfectly the last two weeks. Of course, we ignored it when it said the Raiders were going to win by two-to-three points in Oakland. Last week, it predicted a five-point Jets win (they won by four). This week, it says Bills by eight. The Vegas line is 5 1/2 to six depending on where you look. This difference comes down to Favre vs. Trent Edwards. But I have to discount this Favre factor until I see evidence beyond the occasional play that the design of the Jets offense is up to professional standards.

A start would be getting Leon Washington some more touches. I'm tired of yelling about this, but it is malpractice that he can't even consistently find 10 or 15 touches. We have years of evidence that he can be a Brian Westbrook-type and Westbrook is only the best back in the NFL. The evidence that he can't be? There isn't any; it's all speculation relating to his size (and he's the same exact size as Westbrook). I really thought that Mangini, a Wesleyan graduate for cryin' out loud, was going to be smarter than this.

Prediction time: Buffalo's defense is supposed to be the strength of the team, but it stands out nowhere in our key stats and is 25th in interception rate. Offensively, it's the same deal except for YPA, where the Bills are fifth overall. But they don't pass enough -- just 12th in passing yards. The running game? It's not very good: 25th in yards per rush. They're also 19th in third-down percentage. Since third down is predominantly a passing down, that tells us that their YPA is the function of big plays, especially to the great Lee Evans, a Jets killer. Evans is the closest thing I've seen to Wesley Walker and Walker is one of the most underrated receivers in league history. The Jets offense and defense right now stink. Evans explodes in Mangini's face once or twice. Bills 24, Jets 16.

[theanalogkid]

Maybe this was the plan all along, play crappy offense the entire first part of the season, to get the Bills thinking this game would be no problem, and then during that game Schottenheimer is going to unleash some competency. That would be the ultimate deception of them all.

[J.E.T.S JETS JETS JETS]

Maybe this was the plan all along, play crappy offense the entire first part of the season, to get the Bills thinking this game would be no problem, and then during that game Schottenheimer is going to unleash some competency. That would be the ultimate deception of them all.

Would be nice to deceive them.
[attachment=780:united_s..._2492636.gif]

[S-Dubb]

Maybe this was the plan all along, play crappy offense the entire first part of the season, to get the Bills thinking this game would be no problem, and then during that game Schottenheimer is going to unleash some competency. That would be the ultimate deception of them all.

Hahahahahaaa anything to make yourself feel better huh?... Don't worry I got a ton of excuses too.

[gmany3k]

Maybe this was the plan all along, play crappy offense the entire first part of the season, to get the Bills thinking this game would be no problem, and then during that game Schottenheimer is going to unleash some competency. That would be the ultimate deception of them all.

Damm you have really changed your style of comments more to my liking. This is Trama based Mind control at its finest . you are a remote controlled Jet fan winning means
happiness , money is not the object .
great article many of us are in line with this guys thoughts and sometimes we were on the other side too.

[Chadforpresidentin08]

I think Favre's struggles were easily foreseeable, we were just willing to ignore it. What, the guy threw some footballs in Mississippi over the summer? Whoopee f***ing doo. The rest of the team was doing practice after practice in mini camps. He was only in TC for what, like 2 weeks? He had all of one month to learn a new, complex offense before he was going to be suiting up in Miami. If I had to make a guess why the play calling seems rather rote it's because he hasn't grasped the playbook enough to call too many plays. And of course by seeing the worst in Favre, we see the worst in Mangini. Mangini, if he lived up to all his mantras, he would not have played Favre game one. Or game two, or probably not for a few weeks if he wants the players who give him the best chance to win every week to play. But he's just like the rest of us, there's a highly renowned toy in the playhouse, and we wanna see how fun it is. When Favre was acquired, it's not like Mangini could just sit him so Kellen Clemens, the man most familiar with Mangini's offense, could play. He'd be hounded by the media, FO, players, and us if that was his excuse for starting Clemens. Favre was always a risky kinda guy, he's made a whole helluva lot of stupid throws in his prime, so rifling into double coverage is nothing new for him. It's just more apparent since he doesn't have a complete comprehension on the playbook or the guys around him, so a risky decision maker behind center meshed with a confusing and new playbook was only going to spell doom.
Here's the bottom line, at least in my opinion. I remeber when we got Favre, and we were all jumping up and down with joy. I remember visiting the site and seeing Super Bowl predictions. Yet we all knew what the other half of Favre was, which we saw in the Chiefs game. Yet, considering his lack of proper conditioning and knowledge of the system, he sure as hell could be doing alot worse. Really, getting him probably made Mangini throw out the idea of Kellen Clemens being our future signal caller, and I went into this year thinking he was going to make strides this season. Unfortunately, he was halted before he took a snap, and I honestly thought the guy had some potential to make some flashy plays this year. Clemens probably shoulda been given full, unconditional reins over the team this year without much competition at his position. He was obviously less than stellar when he played last year, but he made mistakes you'd expect a guy with his experience to make. I hope this year hasn't fazzed him much at all.
And as for our running game, all I can say is what I imagine all of you said last Sunday after the end of the game. Where the hell did that go? We play the god damned worst rush defense in the league, and we don't run it 15 times. Yet still, we got a 60 yard TD run by Leon (who gets 1 more handoff the rest of the game), and we fail to exploit that, relying on the unstable Favre. I think the article is absolutely right, we're seeing a lackluster offense because of moves from the sideline and GMs office, not as much on the field.
PS- It's good to be back with all me Jet brethern. Hope I can come back on a more frequent basis.

[Jetsfan0099]

I think Favre's struggles were easily foreseeable, we were just willing to ignore it. What, the guy threw some footballs in Mississippi over the summer? Whoopee f***ing doo. The rest of the team was doing practice after practice in mini camps. He was only in TC for what, like 2 weeks? He had all of one month to learn a new, complex offense before he was going to be suiting up in Miami. If I had to make a guess why the play calling seems rather rote it's because he hasn't grasped the playbook enough to call too many plays. And of course by seeing the worst in Favre, we see the worst in Mangini. Mangini, if he lived up to all his mantras, he would not have played Favre game one. Or game two, or probably not for a few weeks if he wants the players who give him the best chance to win every week to play. But he's just like the rest of us, there's a highly renowned toy in the playhouse, and we wanna see how fun it is. When Favre was acquired, it's not like Mangini could just sit him so Kellen Clemens, the man most familiar with Mangini's offense, could play. He'd be hounded by the media, FO, players, and us if that was his excuse for starting Clemens. Favre was always a risky kinda guy, he's made a whole helluva lot of stupid throws in his prime, so rifling into double coverage is nothing new for him. It's just more apparent since he doesn't have a complete comprehension on the playbook or the guys around him, so a risky decision maker behind center meshed with a confusing and new playbook was only going to spell doom.
Here's the bottom line, at least in my opinion. I remeber when we got Favre, and we were all jumping up and down with joy. I remember visiting the site and seeing Super Bowl predictions. Yet we all knew what the other half of Favre was, which we saw in the Chiefs game. Yet, considering his lack of proper conditioning and knowledge of the system, he sure as hell could be doing alot worse. Really, getting him probably made Mangini throw out the idea of Kellen Clemens being our future signal caller, and I went into this year thinking he was going to make strides this season. Unfortunately, he was halted before he took a snap, and I honestly thought the guy had some potential to make some flashy plays this year. Clemens probably shoulda been given full, unconditional reins over the team this year without much competition at his position. He was obviously less than stellar when he played last year, but he made mistakes you'd expect a guy with his experience to make. I hope this year hasn't fazzed him much at all.
And as for our running game, all I can say is what I imagine all of you said last Sunday after the end of the game. Where the hell did that go? We play the god damned worst rush defense in the league, and we don't run it 15 times. Yet still, we got a 60 yard TD run by Leon (who gets 1 more handoff the rest of the game), and we fail to exploit that, relying on the unstable Favre. I think the article is absolutely right, we're seeing a lackluster offense because of moves from the sideline and GMs office, not as much on the field.
PS- It's good to be back with all me Jet brethern. Hope I can come back on a more frequent basis.

Welcome back C4Pres! Good to see you return!

Favre right now is hurting, the guy is 39 yrs old and is constantly getting hit. We have to run the ball and be more consistent with the playcalling. Favre's shoulder is sore right now, favre before the Chiefs game told reporters his shoulder "hurts like hell".




Hopefully tomorrow the get on track, the Bills are missing their top pass rusher. Hopefully we can protect Favre and limit the hits on him. Get the ground game going, set some playactions, get some quick passes going. Get the TEs involved, get the kid Keller the ball some more this week, he shows so much promise and potential. The only way he will help us is by getting the ball. Push the seam tomorrow!

[Chadforpresidentin08]

Welcome back C4Pres! Good to see you return!

Favre right now is hurting, the guy is 39 yrs old and is constantly getting hit. We have to run the ball and be more consistent with the playcalling. Favre's shoulder is sore right now, favre before the Chiefs game told reporters his shoulder "hurts like hell".
Hopefully tomorrow the get on track, the Bills are missing their top pass rusher. Hopefully we can protect Favre and limit the hits on him. Get the ground game going, set some playactions, get some quick passes going. Get the TEs involved, get the kid Keller the ball some more this week, he shows so much promise and potential. The only way he will help us is by getting the ball. Push the seam tomorrow!

I agree, I do think that Favres' shoulders are doing him no good, plus add on all the hits any 39 year old QB has taken, he sure is beaten up. I think Keller is gonna be a stud, no doubt, the guy has a ton of promise. Plus, I think Leon oughta get at least double digit carries a game, he's just so explosive and dynamic. There was truly no good that was gonna come out of a banged up Favre being forced to put the entire offense on his shoulders last week. And in regards to the line, I'm really impressed by how D'Brick's playing, I don't think he's made a penalty all year, and it sounds like he's done a good job protecting Favre. I had faith in him all along.
But in regards to Clemens, am I the only one who still has faith in him? Favre's no long term solution obviously, and though next year sure as hell is far away in the playoff hunt this year, I'm just wondering what the opinions on Clemens are.

[Jetsfan0099]

I agree, I do think that Favres' shoulders are doing him no good, plus add on all the hits any 39 year old QB has taken, he sure is beaten up. I think Keller is gonna be a stud, no doubt, the guy has a ton of promise. Plus, I think Leon oughta get at least double digit carries a game, he's just so explosive and dynamic. There was truly no good that was gonna come out of a banged up Favre being forced to put the entire offense on his shoulders last week. And in regards to the line, I'm really impressed by how D'Brick's playing, I don't think he's made a penalty all year, and it sounds like he's done a good job protecting Favre. I had faith in him all along.
But in regards to Clemens, am I the only one who still has faith in him? Favre's no long term solution obviously, and though next year sure as hell is far away in the playoff hunt this year, I'm just wondering what the opinions on Clemens are.

I love you man! I've been saying all season how Brick has been playing really good, some people on this site disagree though and feel he has been the problem to the OL. I think Brick has been our best OL in pass protection this year, him and Nick Mangold. Brick only let up 1 sack this year, hes having a good season. The problem with the OL is Alan Faneca isn't a pass blocker, and Damien Woody struggles with speed rushers. And unblocked guys earlier in the season, but it looks like the OL is starting to pick up blitzers and communicate better.





With Clemens, I'm not sure. I thought he had some really nice games last year. But then in training camp he seem to not be that good. He holds on to the ball a bit too much. His preseason was alright, he makes some nice throws. His best is when he gets rid of the ball fast and makes quick decisions. He has a cannon, saw him throw 60+ yard passes before, is pretty quick. Has the ability to pick up a 1st down with his feet. Has a quick release.
I'm not sure about the future of the NY Jets in the QB realm. But I do feel that we may have a guy on our roster that will be the starter for many years to come, whether it be Clemens, Ratliff, or Ainge. One of these guys could turn out to be something. The Jets did hold on to all of them for a reason, instead of carrying depth at another key position.