After making comebacks and close finishes a routine part of every win for the last three weeks, the Jets created a little more breating room last night, beating a bad Bengals team, 26-10, at the Meadowlands.
The Jets improved to 9-2, and so did the Patriots earlier in the day. The two teams will meet on December 6 in Foxboro in what will be one of the biggest – if not the biggest – regular season games in the NFL this year.
Here are some thoughts on last night’s game:
- The game ball goes to Brad Smith. He’s become one of the most valuable players in the league as he does just about everything for this team on offense and special teams. Last night he scored on a 53-yard run on the second play of the third quarter, then found the end zone again in the fourth quarter on an 89-yard kickoff return. The guy is simply amazing.
- The defense stepped up last night and shut down Cincinnati. Terrell Owens and Chad Ochocinco were non-factors and the Bengals only rushed for 46 yards. Carson Palmer was picked off twice and threw for just 135 yards. New York was able to put pressure on Palmer, sacking him three times.
- The Jets ran for 170 yards, a season-best. Shonn Greene led the way with 70 yards on 18 carries.
- Mark Sanchez was okay. He threw one really bad pick and threw for 166 yards. He threw a touchdown pass to Santonio Holmes, who had five receptions. Sanchez will have to play better in New England.
- The Jets outgained Cincinnati, 319-163. They recovered one fumble on special teams and recorded a safety (Trevor Pryce) late in the game.
- Special teams, defense, and a productive offense. Good enough to beat the Bengals. Here come the Patriots.
When the Jets beat the Bengals in back-to-back games last season, it was more than just an early-round TKO in the trash-talk battle between Darrelle Revis and Chad Ochocinco. The wins (in Week 17 and the playoffs) marked a turning point for both franchises. The Jets grew from one-trick wild-card hopefuls into legitimate Super Bowl contenders. The Bengals turned the page on one of their brief periods of competence, reverting to their true form as the N.F.L.’s noisiest underachievers. The Jets’ sweep also marked a changing-of-the-guard at quarterback: Carson Palmer, for years the chase car in the Brady-Manning-Rivers A.F.C. race, handed that title over to Mark Sanchez.
The Jets have enjoyed some good fortune in their three tightrope-walk victories against second-rate opponents, but they have also developed a new confidence in their passing game, not to mention a cushion in the standings. The Jets won’t need well-timed fumbles or last-second heroics to beat a team that couldn’t hold a 28-7 lead against the Bills last week. They can just run the ball and bide their time until the Bengals implode.
As for the usual serving of Twitter trash-talk wisdom, Terrell Owens has spent the week calling Revis an “average” cornerback and accusing Ben Roethlisberger of being “soft.” It sounds like the Bengals have stopped trying on and off the field.
Prediction: I said several weeks back that it was clear sailing for New York leading into their Week 13 Monday night matchup with the Patriots in Foxboro. It hasn’t exactly been clear sailing, but the Jets have been winning. I won’t go so far as to say that that’s all that counts because this team has to play better football in order to beat the AFC’s top teams. Let’s face it, they’ve been beating mediocre teams, and struggling each week to do so. The Bengals stink. They’ve allowed 262 points in 10 games, including 49 to the lowly Bills last week. T.O. and Chad Ochocinco are big talkers and they do put up numbers, as do quarterback Carson Palmer and running back Cedric Benson, but that’s not enough to win football games. Following tonight’s game, the Jets will play at New England, home vs. Miami, at Pittsburgh, and at Chicago. They could win three of those four games, but with the way they’re playing now, you’d take 2-2. That’s how important it is for the Jets to play a clean, crisp, and consistent 60 minutes of football tonight. In any event, this is a must-win. The Jets will improve to 9-2, with the real test coming over the next month. JETS 41, BENGALS 20
The Jets blew a 16-point lead in the fourth quarter as the Texans scored 20 unanswered points to take a 27-23 lead with 55 seconds remaining. New York responded with a five-play, 68-yard drive that took 45 seconds. It ended with a 6-yard touchdown pass from Mark Sanchez to Santonio Holmes, his second of the game. The big play was a 42-yard gain on a pass to Braylon Edwards that set up the winning score.
Sanchez finished 22-of-38 for 315 yards and three touchdowns. He connected with Holmes on a 41-yard touchdown pass in the third quarter, and found Edwards for a 4-yard touchdown in the second quarter. Holmes had seven receptions for 126 yards and Edwards caught four passes for 86 yards. The Jets finished with 103 rushing yards, 42 by Shonn Greene and 36 by LaDainian Tomlinson.
The Jets improved to 8-2 with the win. They host Cincinnati on Thursday night.
Here are some thoughts from today’s game:
- Right tackle Damien Woody left the game in the first quarter with an injured right knee. This in the same week that Sports Illustrated proclaimed the following: In a 2010 season devoid of a dominant team, the Lombardi Trophy is up for grabs, and a well-drilled, well-coached and supremely cohesive unit like the Jets’ offensive line could determine the champion. SI jinx?
- The Jets finally got their offense going in the second quarter when Sanchez hit Holmes, Patrick Turner, and Edwards for big gains. The drive ended with the TD pass to Edwards.
- The Jets had all the momentum – in fact this game was over at 23-10 – until Green fumbled in Jets’ territory in the fourth quarter. The Texans would score on their first play and before you knew it they had the lead.
And then the Jets did what they do best. Right down to the wire New York pulls it out. Unbelievable!
Where: New Meadowlands Stadium; East Rutherford, NJ
TV and Radio: Channels 2,3; 1050 ESPN Radio
Line: Jets -7
Prediction: Go back to opening week last year. It was the debut of Mark Sanchez and Rex Ryan, overshadowed of course by the debut of Jets Takeoff. The Jets opened up in Houston and beat a Texans team thought to be playoff bound. Houston ended up being average at best, the same position they find themselves in this year. Last year Darrelle Revis shut down Andre Johnson and Sanchez suprised many with the poise he displayed in his very first game as a pro, as the Jets got their season off to a good start. They ended up, of course, being the playoff team. Fast forward to this year, where New York is coming to the end of stretch of games they have to win. And they have, though the last two have gone into overtime. Houston is not a bad football team, but they’re a mediocre one. They can put points on the board, but they’ll also give up points. The Jets need to win a game without going down to the final minute of overtime. This is the game – at home against an inferior team – where they should be able to do that. It’s a win today for New York, another one Thursday night, and then here comes New England. JETS 33, TEXANS 16.
PREVIEW: (From the AP’s Dennis Waszak Jr. and Chris Duncan)
After starting 5-0 on the road, the Jets are home Sunday to host the Houston Texans (4-5) with an eye on improving their 2-2 mark at the New Meadowlands Stadium.
Not even hard-luck Houston, which has had some rough losses the past two weeks.
The Texans are trying to bounce back from a stunning 31-24 loss at Jacksonville in which Mike Thomas caught a 50-yard touchdown pass off a ball defensive back Glover Quin tried to bat down, but ended up hitting into Thomas’ hands as time expired.
Two weeks ago, Houston fell to San Diego 29-23 in another agonizing loss. The Texans were driving and at the Chargers 28 late in the fourth quarter when Paul Oliver intercepted a pass that was tipped by Andre Johnson. The play was reviewed, but the call was upheld and the Chargers went on to win.
So, Kubiak has been more demanding of his team, insisting on fewer errors in practice.
On top of everything else the Texans have been dealing with, starting quarterback Matt Schaub was hospitalized for a night earlier in the week with an injury to the bursa sac in his right knee. He was released Thursday and is expected to start — unless he has a setback.
The Jets certainly don’t want it to be this Sunday. After all, New York has won all four of its previous meetings with Houston, including last year’s opener in which Sanchez made his regular-season debut.
It never came close to an extra period as the Jets cruised to a 24-7 victory in Houston. Sanchez has improved since that game, becoming more of a playmaker and leader. His 891 yards passing in the last three games lead the NFL during that span, and he’ll be going up against the league’s lowest-ranked pass defense on Sunday.
New York knows it won’t be easy, not with the game against Houston on Sunday and another home game four days later against Cincinnati on Thanksgiving. The Jets’ defense will have a tough task against the Texans, whose offense ranks sixth overall and boast the league’s leading rusher in Foster.
The Jets ranked No. 1 in overall defense a year ago, and are fifth this season.
He’s the best in the business right now at providing insight and humor when analyzing NFL matchups. I present to you, the NY Times’ Mike Tanier:
The team that needs fluke plays to win in overtime faces the team that loses games in the last second on similar fluke plays. Assuming Mark Sanchez and Matt Schaub are both healthy (both appeared on the injury report this week), we can expect a wild finish. The Texans will lead by 3 with 0:04 on the clock, but Antonio Smith will jump offside to put the Jets in field-goal range, and a localized tornado will slurp the football off Nick Folk’s foot and deposit it between the uprights to tie the game. Sanchez, having completed 10 passes for 43 yards through 74 minutes of football, then finds Braylon Edwards on a deep post in the final minute of overtime for a 6-point win. The best news: we do not have to see Rex Ryan wearing a wig this week.
Sure there was Jerricho Cotchery’s catch, one of the best plays you’ll ever see an athlete make. We can talk about the balanced running attack, which featured Shonn Greene and LaDainian Tomlinson complimenting one another better than they had all season. How about Santonio Holmes’ overtime catch that he ran in for a touchdown? That was a memorable one, too. But the real story last Sunday was Mark Sanchez, who had a great game and continues to make remarkable progress in his second year in the league. Sanchez’s ability to escape pressure is becoming legendary. The Jets’ quarterback has been amazing when it comes to making things happen on plays when all hope appears lost.
Sanchez, who’s 17-10 as a starter, has been having plenty of fun thanks to an uncanny ability to escape pressure and extend plays. Look no further than two pivotal third-down completions in the Jets’ 26-20 overtime win over the Browns Sunday…
In the second quarter, Sanchez escaped pressure, deftly slid out of pocket to his left and threw across his body for a 25-yard touchdown to Jerricho Cotchery. In overtime, he spun out of an arm tackle from a linebacker, ran four yards away from the line of scrimmage, slid to his left and threw across his body again for a 10-yard completion to Cotchery.
“He’s able to avoid the rush, slip and slide (away from) guys and still focus down the field,” Rex Ryan said. “Most of your great quarterbacks have that. It’s almost like they have eyes at the back of their head. He’s got a great feel for it.”
Sanchez exhibited his elusiveness in Cleveland despite a sore right calf. Although Ryan said Sanchez was “pretty well beat up” and had swelling in his calf Monday, he expected that his QB will be fine Sunday against the Texans.
Whether it’s designed bootlegs or forced scrambling, Sanchez often appears comfortable amid chaos. Although the offensive linemen, who dubbed Sanchez’s out-of-pocket moments the “Mad Minute,” become exhausted, it’s well worth it.
“That’s how big plays get made,” right tackle Damien Woody said. “That’s why Ben Roethlisberger is pretty successful. Mark is doing that more and you’re starting to see that pay off.”
The other part of the equation is the ability of Holmes, Cotchery, Dustin Keller and Braylon Edwards to break off routes and keep plays alive when the original call breaks down.
“You can’t assume that you have him down as a defense,” Cotchery said. “We’re assuming that he’s not going to be down.”
It’s one of the greatest plays and catches you’ll ever see. In overtime of Sunday’s win, Mark Sanchez and Jerricho Cotchery, on a third-and-nine from the Jets’ 37, connected for a 10-yard gain that kept the drive alive. Whether it was Sanchez’s escapability, Cotchery’s dive, or the fact that he was severely hurt on the play, I challenge you to find another catch in the history of the NFL that’s as impressive as this one. Enjoy!
For the second week in a row, the Jets won on the road in overtime. Like I said last week, a win is a win. Here’s a game recap provided by the NY Times’ Karen Crouse:
Santonio Holmes never doubted that the Jets were going to beat the Cleveland Browns. Even when the clock showed 24 seconds left in overtime, he said he did not lose faith.
The Jets had squandered a 7-point cushion in the fourth quarter to give the underdog Browns renewed life. But Holmes, the veteran receiver, kept telling quarterback Mark Sanchez that the Cleveland defensive backs were giving him a cushion, and he knew he could exploit it.
So with time running out, Sanchez threw the ball to Holmes on a slant, and he turned it into a 37-yard game winner, making the catch and cruising into the end zone to give the Jets a 26-20 victory with 16 seconds left.
“A tremendous effort on his part,” Coach Rex Ryan said of Holmes. “It’s a short pass, but he makes a great run to win the game for us.”
Asked what he was thinking after Holmes caught the ball, Ryan said, “Run, baby!”
It was the second overtime victory for the Jets (7-2) in two weeks, but the circumstances could not have been more different. At Detroit, the Jets were the ones who came charging back in the fourth quarter for a tie at the end of regulation. They won in overtime on a 30-yard field goal by Nick Folk, who missed three field goals against the Browns, including one of 47 yards that sailed right with 4 minutes 56 seconds left in overtime.
Folk’s overtime miss came at the end of a drive that Jerricho Cotchery, who had a 25-yard touchdown reception in the second quarter, kept alive with a 10-yard diving catch on third-and-9 after he had injured a groin muscle. Sanchez, who was a yard short of his second consecutive 300-yard passing game, saw Cotchery clutching his upper left leg area, but threw the ball across the middle to him, anyway.
When framing the Jets’ eighth consecutive road victory dating to last season, Ryan thought Cotchery’s catch provided as indelible an image as Holmes’s.
“That’s got to be the gutsiest play I’ve seen in a long time,” Ryan said.
Sanchez also showed grit, playing the fourth quarter and overtime with a tender right calf after rolling his foot during a sack. The Browns brought him down twice, both sacks coming in the second half, and he scrambled out of the grasp of would-be tacklers several other times. He finished the game 27 of 44 passing with two touchdowns. He also ran for a touchdown, a 1-yard run that capped an 80-yard drive and gave the Jets a 17-13 lead late in the second quarter.
Sanchez was intercepted once, on the Cleveland 3 on the Jets’ second-to-last possession of overtime, on a fingers-crossed pass deep to Braylon Edwards that Sanchez rationalized was as good as a punt.
“The kid is tougher than nails,” Ryan said, adding, “He gave our guys chances, and when it was all said and done, we found a way again.”
It was a difficult defeat to swallow for the Browns (3-6), who forced overtime despite losing cornerback Sheldon Brown in the first quarter and their top receiver and returner Joshua Cribbs along with the veteran outside linebacker Scott Fujita in the second.
The rookie quarterback Colt McCoy, who had helped the Browns to victories over the New Orleans Saints and the New England Patriots in their previous two games, refused to be rattled by the Jets’ vaunted defense. After Folk hit a 25-yard field goal to put the Jets ahead, 20-13, with less than three minutes remaining in the fourth, McCoy ran the two-minute offense like a wily veteran.
He marched the Browns 59 yards in 1:58, completing 5 of 9 passes in the 10-play drive. He connected with tight end Benjamin Watson for 17 yards on a third-and-10 from the Jets’ 38 and then found Evan Moore for another 18 yards to set up a 3-yard scoring pass to Mohamed Massaquoi with 48 seconds left in regulation.
McCoy was 18 of 31 for 205 yards. He moved the Browns into Jets territory on their first series of overtime and connected with Chansi Stuckey, a former Jet, on a 14-yard pass play, only for Stuckey to fumble away the ball while fighting for extra yardage.
Browns Coach Eric Mangini, who was facing the Jets for the first time since they fired him after the 2008 season, said: “We were right there on the fringe of a field goal. That’s another thing with some of those mistakes; you don’t get that chance back.”
The afternoon began inauspiciously for the Jets, who started their first two offensive series in Cleveland territory and came away with only 3 points. On their first drive, Sanchez threw an incomplete pass to Edwards, who was being defended by safeties Abram Elam, a former Jet, and T. J. Ward, a rookie who had been encouraged by fans in the days leading to the game to hit Edwards early, often and with malice.
Edwards earned the enmity of Cleveland’s football fans by dropping too many passes in his four-plus years as a Brown, then holding nothing back in denigrating the city after he was traded to the Jets last year.
In the days before the game, Ryan had taken the spotlight off Edwards by playing up his sibling rivalry with his twin, Rob, the Browns’ defensive coordinator. It seemed to be a shrewd move by Ryan, who no doubt recognized that Edwards’s emotions would be running hot.
On the Jets’ opening drive, Edwards caught a 6-yard pass from Sanchez at the Cleveland 11 and was stopped by a wall of Cleveland players, led by Brown.
Defensive lineman Ahtyba Rubin took a swipe at Edwards, who retaliated in kind.
Edwards finished with four catches for 59 yards and received praise from Sanchez, who said, “I know he got emotional out there, but he was able to snap his focus back and be poised.”
The Jets were able to snap their focus back in time to win the game. That is what good teams do, Ryan said, adding, “I’ll take it.”
