More on line for this Pats-Jets chapter
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — We’re in Week 6. Usually at this point of the season, we’re close to handing another AFC East title to the Patriots. Typically, the Pats have gotten off to a good start, having already beaten up on the Jets, Bills and/or Dolphins, with everyone from here to South Florida knowing the best is yet to come from Bill Belichick’s crew.
But because of a scheduling quirk, the Pats haven’t played a division game yet, an uncharacteristic start to the season. Today, they are in the Meadowlands to battle it out for first place with the team formally known as their rival and that was supposed to finish 0-16. Yes, we’re talking about the Jets.
Who knew we’d have an AFC East game in mid-October that matters? It’s almost surreal. The Jets technically enter his game as a playoff team, while the Patriots are on the outside looking in.
Yet here we are, with both teams 3-2 and tied with the Bills. The AFC East currently is a crapshoot, with the Dolphins also in the mix at 2-2.
So instead of the Patriots coasting to a division title at this stage, they’re facing the Jets for the first time in a game that stacks up as fairly significant on a number of levels.
After an 0-2 start, the surprising Jets have won three straight and are on a mission to prove wrong everyone who said they would tank the season for the first pick in the NFL draft. Beating the Dolphins, Jaguars and Browns is one thing. They’d love nothing better than to add the defending Super Bowl champs to the list to further validate their season.
“I think (they’re) 3-2 and they’re fighting,” Patriots quarterback Tom Brady said. “I think they’ve played really well. I think they have a good team, and I think every time we play down there, it’s been a tough game. In the last five years, (there have) been a bunch of tough games. That’s what we’re expecting.”
Added receiver Danny Amendola: “We’re excited. It’s an exciting place to play. It’s always tough to play there. It’s a hostile environment. They have a good group . ... We’ll be ready to go.”
They better be. The Jets are above .500 for the first time since 2015, also the last season in which they won three straight games. They might have cleaned house of all their high-priced veteran talent, and they don’t have a franchise quarterback, but they’ve played well on defense with an infusion of young players while veteran Josh McCown has led the offense.
Asked if his team was fueled by all the negative projections, coach Todd Bowles didn’t shoot down the notion.
“As a coach, you have to tune out the outside noise, and you know what you have in the building, and you just work,” he said. “As a competitor, from a player’s standpoint, you hate to have people talk about you negatively, especially when you’ve played bad and there’s only two things you can do with adversity. You can come back and fight against it, or you can succumb to it.
“And the guys have been fighting hard, but that’s not our sole purpose, to win because people picked us to fail. They’re trying to get to the playoffs and win a Super Bowl like everybody else, and that’s our motivation going in. Now is that extra motivation for them? Probably so, but nevertheless, our motivation is to try to win ballgames.”
The Jets also remember being embarrassed the last time they met the Patriots. They had a lot of forgettable and embarrassing losses in 2016, none as painful as the 41-3 massacre in Foxboro on Christmas Eve. So they’ll be looking for some revenge.
Speaking of motivation, Patriots coach Bill Belichick has no fondness for the Jets, the team he left before coming to Foxboro. He hates the organization. That feeling hasn’t dissolved. Maybe that’s why The Hoodie had no Christmas cheer last year, making sure to demolish the Jets.
The Patriots have won 10 of their past 12 regular-season games against the Jets dating to 2011, with those two losses coming at the Meadowlands.
Belichick, of course, struck a cautious tone even though his team has had extra time to prepare, having played two Thursdays ago in Tampa. Given how poorly the Patriots have played in the first five games, he’s taking nothing for granted. With Brady nursing a sore left shoulder,
and a defense that’s last in the league in yards allowed, he’s not about to let the Pats look past an opponent that technically sits above them in the standings.
competitiveWe’ve “It’s had alwaysa againsthard been very time the Jets. down there, played a couple of overtime games, got beat two years ago,” Belichick said. “We know what it’s like to play the Jets in New York, , and we’ll have to be at our best, be ready for their good players and their schemes. They’re a tough team to prepare for. We’ve got a lot of work to do, so we’ll kind of grind it out here this week and see where we can get to.”
Right now, 4-2 and first place in the division is the goal.