EMPTY THE TANK
JETS PUT IT ALL TOGETHER TO ROUT FISH, GET FIRST WIN
Tank this. On a day the Jets locked arms to show their unity before the game, they notched a resounding 20-6 victory over the Dolphins at MetLife Stadium, ending any talk of an 0-16 season and ruining the days of the pro-tanking legions who are dreaming of the No. 1 draft pick.
“It felt good to come out for the home opener and get the ‘W’ before the home crowd with all the talk saying that we couldn’t win,” tight end Austin SeferianJenkins said. “And it looks like we won, so the experts I think were off on that one.” Everything clicked for the Jets. After a shaky two weeks, the Jets played suffocating defense. They held Miami to 30 rushing yards and 225 total, shutting down quarterback Jay Cutler (26-of-44, 220 yards, 1 TD, 1 INT), running back Jay Ajayi (11 rushes, 16 yards) and wide receiver Jarvis Landry (six catches, 48 yards).
“They just beat the s--t out of us. That’s the best way to put it,” Dolphins coach Adam Gase said.
On offense, Josh McCown (18of-23, 249 yards, 1 TD) was efficient and protected the ball. He connected with Robby Anderson on a 69-yard touchdown pass in the second quarter that broke things open.
The win ended all of the talk of the Jets going winless this season. They are now 1-2 with the Jaguars coming to MetLife Stadium next week. A few players gave “told you so’s” after the game, but coach Todd Bowles said proving the critics wrong was not his motivation.
“We block thathat stuff out,out,” Bowles said. “Thatat has noth-nothing to do with ourr motiva-motivation to win. We’re’re try-trying to win ballgamesgames because we wantant to get to the Super Bowl, not because we want to prove people wrong. That’s ext ra motiva-motivation, but we’re competi-ompetitive and we’re goinggoing to compete everyvery week.”
The day beganan with the J e tt ss interlocking armsms along the side-e line during the national anthem.m. President Trump’sp’s criticism on Fri-riday night of thehe NFL protests sentent shock waves throughugh the league. The Jets opened their teameam meeting Saturdayday night with a discus-cussion of those com-mments and whatat they wanted too do in response. The meeting was emotional at times, players said. They ultimately decided on interlocking arms as a sign of unity. Jets chairman and CEO Christopher Johnson spoke with each player in the locker room before the game, offering his support and asked if it would be OK to join them during the anthem. He did that, along with general manager Mike Maccagnan and team president Ne i l Glat. Jets owner Woody Johnson, Christopher’s brother, is in England serving as Trump’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, making this situation particularly sticky for the Jets. “I wen t around to each of the players ii nn dd -iivvii dd uu aa ll ll yy and askede them if it would be OK if I joined them,” Johnson said. “To a man, they said yes, so I was incredibly honored. I was just glad that we were one team today, and we did really well … because we were one team. I’m glad that everybody stood ... and that we were together.”
Bowles presented Christopher Johnson with a game ball in the postgame locker room.
Once the politics subsided, football took over. After a sloppy, scoreless first quarter, the Jets took their first lead of the season on a 40-yard field goal by Chandler Catanzaro with 7:17 left in the first half.
The Jets were hit with 10 penalties in the game, including four offensive holding calls. One of them erased a 55-yard run by Bilal Powell late in the second quarter. On the next play, McCown found Anderson, who had beaten Dolphins corner Alterraun Verner down the sideline, for the 69-yard score and a 10-0 lead.
The Jets added 10 more points in the third quarter, a 1-yard touchdown from Bilal Powell and a 22-yard field goal from Catanzaro.
The story of the game, though was the Jets defense.
After getting torched by the Bills and Raiders, the Jets looked like the unit people expected to see this season. They swarmed to the ball, made gang tackles and got pressure on Cutler. They had seven quarterback hits and three sacks.
Linebacker Demario Davis (12 tackles, three tackles for loss, one pass defensed) and rookie safety Jamal Adams (two tackles, one sack, two tackles for a loss, one quarterback hit, one pass defensed) led the way for an active, feisty bunch.
“As a whole, our defense just played great today,” Leonard Williams said.
The Jets are now 1-2 with two games that look winnable coming up on the schedule. The Jaguars notched an impressive 44-7 win over the Ravens on Sunday, but now must return from London and shake off the time change before coming to MetLife next week. Then, the Jets go to Cleveland to face the 0-3 Browns.
Could the Jets actually have a winning streak?
“People still going to say what they are going to say,” cornerback Morris Claiborne said. “They’ll probably say we aren’t going to win another game after this one. But it is what it is. We hear it but we don’t hear it. We feed off of it. We have a rough start, but we can turn it around right here and now.”