i dream of geno
With the season slipping away, Bowles & Co. up against a wall
INTELLECTUALLY, you know they’re done. They’re finished. They’re over. They’re tapped out. They’re toast. They’re hapless. They’re hopeless. Stick a fork in them. Dig a grave for them.
As Dandy Don once sang: Turn out the lights, the party’s over …
As clever word-players who specialize in both acronyms and lousy football figured out many years ago: Just End The Season And yet the Jets will host the Ravens, as scheduled, Sunday afternoon at 1 o’clock. It is just their third home game of the season, which is especially odd if you consider that in so many ways the season seems over already. And, let’s face it, may well be … And yet … “You just keep working and you keep fighting, and you keep grinding,” coach Todd Bowles said this past week. “As a competitor, that’s what you do. We know what this business is all about and it’s not going to be sunshine all the time. You’ve got to take the good with the bad. Right now, we’re 1-5.”
Well, yes, that is what Todd Bowles is going to say. That is the message a head football coach is going to convey to his team and his team’s fans, because without those embers of hope, what’s the point?
For now, the only five words of that quote that truly seem relevant are the last five words of the quote: Right now, we’re 1-5. For now, there is little reason to believe the Jets are good enough to beat the Ravens — or even good enough to beat the Browns, who haven’t been good enough to beat anyone yet, and will host the Jets next week in the midst of their civic celebrations of every other team in town.
The math is so stacked against the Jets recovering from 1-5 it makes no sense to explore it. But there is a certain truth about what awaits them now: If there is to be a recovery — even one that leads only toward mediocrity — it must begin with one game. It must begin with one victory. It must begin with one building block. Is that likely to happen now? Look, the Jets are banged up. Muham- mad Wilkerson is the most recent question mark to arise. Eric Decker already is out. The quarterback already has been replaced. Through the years the Ravens have had a habit of punishing the Jets. And they certainly could punish them again Sunday.
But if there is one thing that could propel the Jets beginning with Baltimore, it is this: desperation. For Geno Smith, this game begins his rehabilitation tour. It is the first step away from both his underwhelming first tour of duty as the team’s QB1, as well as from the broken jaw he sustained last summer att ththe hhandsd (or fists) of IK Enemkpali. It is, for him, the first step toward convincing the Jets (or someone else) he still belongs in the league as anything other than a backup.
There is the defense, which has been battered and bruised, both literally and by reputation. Bowles is a defensive guy, and it was thought the defensive line could be good enough that whatever flaws lay in the secondary could be neutralized. But the line has been mediocre and the secondary historically inept. If that continues, there really are no slivers of hope to grab on to.
And there is the coach. After six games this year it is almost impossible to remember Bowles won 10 of his first 15 games as a coach, that the Jets were right there in Week 17 last year. That’s t he natural result of losing six out of seven (including last year’s finale), a time in which Bowles has looked confused at best, overmatched at worst. You had better believe he is desperate, too.
And if he isn’t ... well, he sure ought to be.