Gang, Birds cross paths at rainy crossroads

The Jets suffered a brutal loss last Sunday. Blowing a two-touchdown lead in the fourth quarter to a division rival is the kind of loss that can derail a season. The Jets will take the field at MetLife on Sunday, with heavy rain in the forecast, against the Falcons trying to bounce back from that 31-28 loss to the Dolphins instead of letting it define their year.

“We’re resilient, and like I said the other day, it was bitter taste, but we’ve moved on,” quarterback Josh McCown said. “Everything is still in front of us, and let’s go out and get the next one. It’s the same mentality we would have if we won the game.”

Jets coaches and players said the right things this week about putting that loss behind them, and they appeared to have good energy at practice. This feels like a critical juncture of their season. They are 3-4 with three games left before their bye week. The season could get away from them quickly here.

Coach Todd Bowles’ message this week was simple: “Just finish and play mistake-free football.”

That is something the Jets were unable to do last week, when they blew a 28-14 lead in the fourth quarter and made a bunch of mistakes — from 12 penalties to McCown’s killer interception with under a minute left.

McCown has done a pretty good job of protecting the football this year, but he has had crucial interceptions near the end of a half in each of the past two weeks. Last week, Bobby McCain’s pick with 39 seconds left finished off the Jets. McCown had to work through it.

“I held onto it throughout half of the day on Monday and you watch the tape,” McCown said. “It’s one of those things where once I see the play on film, analyze what happened, I learn and move on. It’s all that you can do.”

The Falcons come to town with their own issues. The defending NFC champs have lost three games in a row. At 3-3, they are at their own crossroads. The Falcons are struggling to adjust to new offensive coordinator Steve Sarkisian.

But Bowles did not want to hear any talk that the Falcons are struggling.

“They’re seventh in the league in offense,” Bowles said. “They may have a hiccup here or there, but they can run the ball and they can throw the ball. That’s without question so they’re scary coming in. I don’t worry about them not coming together. I just hope they don’t score a bunch of points.”