Beating up on Blake

THE GREAT thing about the Jacksonville Jaguars advancing to the second round of the playoffs this weekend is that everybody has finally stopped beating up on poor Blake Bortles. He’s winning! He’s The Man!

“They are the best team,” said former Tampa Bay Bucs QB Chris Simms. “The problem is they have the 70th best quarterback.”

“I want to make him look like Blake Bortles if I can and try to catch a couple picks,” said Titans All-Pro safety Kevin Byard, in reference to Tom Brady.

Oops. Well, as my good friend Ron Burgundy likes to say: “That escalated quickly.”

Bortles is everybody’s favorite pinata. Poke and punch. I’ve busted down a few of those back in the day, making a mad dash to the ground in search of candy, small trinkets, toys and other prizes.

That pretty much sums up the Bortles’ NFL dossier. You just don’t know what the heck you are going to get. We saw that last week when he struggled to make even the most fundamental passes, throwing for a paltry 87 yards in a 10-3 victory against the Buffalo Bills in the wild-card round.

But Bortles also ran for a team-high 88 yards, extending drives and allowing the Jags’ dominant defense to rest before continuing its dirty work in the trenches.

But the first number is still unacceptable against the Steelers. Bortles knows that. So does Simms. So does Byard. And the rest of the world.

Bortles would not be the first ho-hum quarterback to lead his team to the Super Bowl. Trent Dilfer had that covered for the Baltimore Ravens in 2000.

Of course that was before Facebook launched in 2004, followed by Twitter in 2006. It’s created a universe of 24-7 engagement and instant reaction. Or simply rants and food fights. Tag, you’re it, Blake Bortles. “It will probably never stop,” Bortles said earlier this week. “There are people who think LeBron James sucks. If that happens, I’m sure there will be a lot of people that