AT 1-7, Eric Mangini ap parently has as few answers for his team as he is willing to give the media.
“The [Bills] had a really good plan,” said Chad Pennington, the doomed starting quarterback who a year ago, with the same injury-reduced arm, passed for 339 yards at Minnesota, scored 31 first-half points at Green Bay, outplayed Tom Brady in a game at Foxborough and took the Jets unexpectedly to the playoffs.
“[The Bills] changed some things, even from when we played them [in Week 4] up there. They are doing good things to counter the tendencies they had in the past.”
And most of the same Jets – minus Pete Kendall, plus Thomas Jones – who went 10-6 a year ago managed only 154 passing yards and 254 total in the 13-3 loss in part because they didn’t have answers to the Bills’ new answers.
It boggles the mind that the same coach and coordinators that boggled opposition minds in 2006 without having a game-breaker on either side of the ball, this time are failing. But if the Mangenious became celebrated enough to get a prime table at Artie Bucco’s place, logic cannot absolve coaching from blame for this half-season disaster anymore than can injuries.
Until Jonathan Vilma went out in the second half last week, the Jets were all the way to 1-5 without the loss of a key player.
As Mangini points out in that generalized and deflective way of his, everything changes year to year. And as Pennington said yesterday, the 2006 Jets usually were a fourth-quarter play away from losing.
But why then, this season, do they never make those plays on either side of the ball? Being not especially gifted, they need more of the coaching help that was so abundant in 2006, it made all reservations about Mangini’s dearth of head-man experience quickly melt away. That aid is not coming the second time around, even if, as Mangini insists, there is no change in practice habits that somehow are not producing the same execution.
“It’s not the same [thing every week],” he said. “It’s the same ending.
“Today it wasn’t very good on third down, wasn’t very good in the red zone, wasn’t very good in terms of minimizing Aaron Schobel or giving up a deep ball to Lee Evans with two defenders [Darrelle Revis and Abram Elam] there to defend.
“It’s not a function of confidence; it’s a question of execution. It’s disappointing because these guys care; are inclined to do everything they can to prepare.
“The game was 6-3 [with five minutes remaining]. I don’t think that was a function of anybody not putting in maximum effort. I don’t think there was anything from this game that indicates anything but what it was, a game in which we were unable to execute and finish.”
The Jets need help with that finishing part, aren’t being provided it like when they doubled their usual amount of blitzes for the win in Foxborough, or better utilized a tight end, Chris Baker, who can catch the ball.
Yesterday Pennington, master reader of defenses, recognized his only option on too many third downs was the same checkdown pass in the flat to Jones.
Those three sacks and too many hurries that made Pennington inaccurate or hopelessly bound to seven-yard throws were not all caused by the absence of Kendall, as unfortunate and unnecessary as a starting guard’s falling out and trade may have been. Overmatched as Adrien Clarke was, the outnumbered and outguessed Jets weren’t giving him enough help.
Certainly, a deep-receiving threat or a monster pass rusher would make the coach and his coordinators look brighter than ever. But the Jets didn’t have either of those animals a year ago and still went 10-6.
Confidence builds from big plays and dissipates, of course, when you rarely make them. It ebbs when players are not as often put in position to make those plays, too.