Keidel: To My Twitter Foes, #ToldYouSo -- The Joke's On You And The Jets
By Jason Keidel
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What a difference a weekend makes.
Two weeks ago, I declared that the Giants had a better shot at making the playoffs than the Jets, and I was branded a buffoon. I mean, the Jets were 1-0 and the Giants were 0-1, so clearly I was crazy.
Then the Giants were 0-2, and I still insisted they had a smoother ride to January than the Jets, who were 1-1. Madman!
Then came the last 48 hours. The Giants looked like a playoff team while whipping the previously unbeaten Texans, while the Jets gagged another game to the NFC North. This time, it was at home, against the Chicago Bears. The game, like their history, ended a few yards short of relevance.
Yet I wandered onto Twitter and the online tough guys scattered like roaches when the kitchen light flicks on. Both teams are 1-2, wobbling like Rip Torn during a DUI stop. But a pulse is there, and, yes, both teams are still quite alive. Equally alive.
Not so silly now, is it? Now the Jets are gazing up at the Bills and Patriots, saddled with the twin burdens of the rugged AFC East and their savage schedule, that still includes games against the Lions, Chargers, Broncos, and Patriots in the next month -- all of whom will be favored.
Monday night was ugly for Jets fans but a beautiful microcosm for those of us who so tirelessly tried to explain the franchise's endless refrain. The Jets are the perfect NFL dichotomy, the brainchild hatched by the mandated socialism of the sport, where the league tries to legislate a cluster of mediocrity. The goal is to create a conga line of 8-8 teams, and the Jets do all they can to accomodate. Heck, the Jets are so good they're $21 million under the salary cap. They don't even need to spend their cash to maintain their cachet. As they say on Twitter ... smh.
The Jets are an amalgam of disparate parts. Great defensive line, suspect secondary, solid running game, dubious wideouts. Best backup QB in the league, bottom-rung starter.
Or is he?
It's typically Jet to have their largest question mark superimposed over their most important player.
Is Geno Smith a bust or a beast? Is he the stud who whips the ball through a donut or the baffled rookie who throws a pick-six two plays into the game? Smith looks sublime one drive, and like Tim Tebow the next.
Mike Francesa said it earlier tuesday, and I've been saying it for months: Michael Vick should either be the starter or allowed to take a shot at centering the wobbly Jets offense.
The only argument against it is the idea that the brass must dance around the minefield of feelings that will overwhelm Smith should he be benched on national television.
Stop it. We've known our entire lives that playing in the NFL is the most ephemeral career of all, a turnstile at every position. Unless your last name is Manning, Brady, Rodgers, or the other few, minted messiahs we list every year, the possibility of being hurt -- physically or emotionally -- is part of the implicit agreement you made with the sport since you played Pop Warner.
Some use a demotion to kindle the inner fire. Some retreat beyond the bench, to the Ryan Leaf wing of self-absorption.
Whatever it takes, Geno has to snap out of his rookie funk. He got his mulligan last year. This year is big boy football. There must be marked improvement or he will find the pine. Rex Ryan doesn't have the temperament or the luxury of patience. The next 8-8 season or worse will surely be his last as General Gang Green.
Three touchdowns and four interceptions this young year doesn't hack it. And if you saw that pass on the final drive that fluttered into the air and landed softly in the breast of a Bear -- who bungled the easiest INT he will ever have -- then you can't trust Smith, who has millions of men stretching their bald spots from the head-scratching throws he makes way too often.
If you watched the postgame coverage you saw Steve Young, Trent Dilfer, and Ray Lewis laugh at the skeleton crew the Bears trotted out at the end of the game. The three-man panel -- two of whom are of Canton stock -- said they didn't know the names of half the players that Chicago shoved out to play defense.
And that battered, tattered defense, already emaciated when at full strength, was enough to stop the Jets, who had the benefit of a dropped interception, a gift call from the ref on fourth down, and all kinds of momentum and mojo with first down in the red zone.
Why call a pass every play when Chris Ivory is running like Bevo through the Bears' defense is beyond me, but Smith is still quite culpable.
As is Gang Green, who is no better than the Big Blue. Maybe the Jets and Jets Nation need to know their place before they can make any progress.
To my Twitter foes ... #ToldYouSo
Follow Jason on Twitter at @JasonKeidel
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