I Had A Heart Attack...But The Jets Beat The Patriots

A win is a win. But my god the Jets’ gave me about twelve seizures in the process. I could write seven different articles about the Jets’ overtime victory over the New England patriots. Instead, I am going to separate this into four categories to explain what the Jets can take from the game that put them in first place, and gave them their biggest win of the season.

1. Brett Favre, Leon Washington and the offense:

I will begin by saying the following. The Jets’ offense played their best game of the season. I know you want to look at the scores of the Arizona and St. Louis games; but if you don’t agree that this was the best game the Jets’ offense played thus far, you are a big stupid doo-doo head.

Brett Favre by far was the key to this. Favre not only played a mistake free game, but his personality was also electric. So basically, the only reason why I enjoy watching Brett Favre was on full display tonight. The reason why will come later, but more importantly, this was the first close game of the year where it looked like every member of the offense was totally in sync.

Leon Washington deserves a ton of credit for this. The Jets have a slew of great young receivers and tight ends, including Keller who put on a show and Cotchery who made one of the best catches you will see all season. But a lot of them got those openings because of the immediate impact that Washington had. After the dump off and kick return TDs, New England was giving some wildly different defensive looks when Washington was in the backfield. And those looks created opportunities for the Jets’ receiving core.

Favre was flawless, but I have said it from day one of this season and I will repeat myself: Leon Washington is the MVP of this Jets team.

2. Kris Jenkins, Eric Barton, and the defense:

The defense played a great first half. Then New England came out in the second half with a new scheme, and the defense got rolled on. My issues however come far less with the personnel and much more with the coaching, so we will elaborate on that very shortly.

With that said however, there were two great defensive performances. Kris Jenkins was pivotal in completely shutting down the Pats’ running game. If anyone managed to get by Jenkins, it was okay because Eric Barton apparently channeled his inner Bobby Boucher and had some “tackling fuel.” The Patriots have a ton of offensive weapons, and the Jets were not able to stop them in the second half. With that said however, if they didn’t play as well as they did in the first half, they would have lost, by a lot.

3. Eric Mangini, Brian Schottenheimer, Bob Sutton, Mike Westhoff and the coaching:

As a head coach, you are responsible for overseeing the entire process and making adjustments when they need to be made. And a lack of adjustments almost cost the Jets the game. But first let us give praise where it is due.

Mike Westhoff is immediately off the hook because the Jets’ special teams delivered another phenomenal performance.

Brian Schottenheimer also deserves a ton of praise. The Jets’ coaching crucial in Brett Favre’s terrific play; and it is all because they never abandoned the run. It never once got to the point that the Jets looked conservative either. I am not going to expect Jets to score on the Patriots every possession. Bill Belichick is a brilliant coach who will not let that happen. But the balance, and more importantly, success of both the running and passing game was great to see. A successful run game kept a lot of great passing lanes open for Favre who never once panicked or threw into tight coverage. Perfect game for the Jets’ offense.

Here is the issue. Eric Mangini was exposed in the second half of this game. Belichick went in and made significant offensive adjustments and also instructed Matt Cassel to play the second half like he was Randall Cunningham. He ran everywhere, passed everywhere, and the Jets had literally no answer to it. In Layman’s terms, Belichick came out of halftime, and totally out-coached Mangini.

Had the Jets not jumped out to an early lead, they would have lost. And that was especially on display during the Jets astonishing attempt at a prevent defense. This entire final series was my biggest issue with Mangini.

Matt Cassel has shown many great qualities in his time as the starting QB. However, he lacks the ability to throw the long ball. Somehow, the Jets’ solution to this was dropping four safeties into prevent coverage and not jamming any wide receivers with a minute left in the football game. Matt Cassel could be heard saying “thanks guys for allowing me to routinely make the only pass I am comfortable throwing,” and the Patriots literally went more than half the length of the field.

So now it is 4th and 1, near the Jets’ 20. Everyone and their grandmother know this ball is going to Randy Moss. And somehow: THE MAN WHO ENDED UP FACING MOSS IN SINGLE COVERAGE WAS TY LAW. YOU KNOW TY LAW? THE GUY WHO HASN’T PLAYED ORGANIZED FOOTBALL IN NINE MONTHS?

So the Patriots score, but lucky for Mangini, the Jets’ offense came to play. Favre to Keller on multiple occasions, Jay Feely field goal wins it, Takeover’s heart returns to normal pace.

4. Conclusion

The Jets are in first place in the AFC East. But they still have a ton to learn. The good thing is that they have an extended week to train for their match-up against the undefeated Tennessee Titans. There have only been two games so far this season where the Jets won and I thought to myself “wow, they really deserved to win this one.” And unfortunately, this victory was not one of those games.

The good news is, if they scheme well enough and beat Tennessee, they go from crew of inconsistent players and coaches, to a legitimate Super Bowl contender. And as a fan, I couldn’t ask for anything more.

Just maybe a little Alka-Seltzer or something next time…