NY Jets vs NY Giants

That was some ugly, ugly football. The Jets were outplayed on both sides of the ball. This is the 2nd week in a row that the Jets starters lined up and were soundly beaten by the opposing team.

OFFENSE

The offensive line looked terrible again, and outside of the opening TD play, the offense was anemic. The Jets have the obvious hole at LG, but may also have a problem at LT. This is the 2nd week in a row that LT D. Ferguson was beaten multiple times. We can dismiss many things in the preseason, but the coaches NEVER want to put their starting QB at risk and yet the pass protection has been horrendous. Don’t be fooled by all the “vanilla offense” talk – the line play has been very, very bad.

The rookie OL J. Bender played LG and looked like a rookie. That is to be expected, and the Jets will need to coach him up fast, or they will need to find a replacement. The other option, A. Clarke again looked like a back-up at best.

When the offensive line play is poor any offense will struggle, but with QBs like Pennington it seems even worse. He needs a solid offensive line and strong running game to operate effectively (Paul Hackett was right). He struggles terribly when the pocket collapses. This pattern seems to date back all the way to the 2002/03 playoff game against the Raiders. His arm strength limitations demand that he execute proper mechanics when delivering the football, and pressure seems to disrupt those mechanics. If they clean up the line play and can establish a running game, Pennington should improve his performance. If not, it will be a very long season.

DEFENSE:

The Giants dominated the ball in the 1st half for 21 minutes! The Jets defense may have been in vanilla mode, but they made a vanilla Giants offense look good on both running and passing plays. If the Giants make 2 FGs (40 and 42) the half-time score would have been 18-6. I suspect the Jets pass defense will be decent when they move to the more complex blitz and coverage schemes, but I remain very concerned about the run-defense. I know Vilma is loved in NY, but replacing him with Harris on rushing downs seems to make sense as Vilma plays more like a 3^rd safety than an ILB.

POSITIVES:

2nd year QB K. Clemens looked comfortable at QB and made some good decisions. I especially liked the hurry-up, goal line QB sneak. He is starting to string some nice performances together. Once they fix the line, I'd love to see the kid play against some real competition.

RB L. Washington is a play maker. The Jets need to find ways to get him the ball in space. The kid has some special talent.

Rookie CB D. Revis seemed to handle his assignments well.

Rookie LB D. Harris is an excellent tackler and seemed to be in good position when he was on the field.

Bottom-line: Mangini will never admit it, but he must be concerned. I haven't seen anything during the preseason that indicates this team is ready to compete with New England or Baltimore. But then again, it is only preseason. The team is still undefeated at 0-0 and fans can always “hope”. Mangini has 2 weeks to clean-up the mess, or opening week against the Pats will be the Massacre at the Meadowlands.