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The Jets culture is not in a good place right now.
They have a lot of work to do this off-season.
It wasn’t just their embarrassing humiliation by the Cleveland Browns on Thursday night featuring 12 penalties, but the Washington game was another example.
To blew such a sizable lead to a bad team, at MetLife Stadium, and needing Greg Zuerlein to bail them out at the end, was a bad look. The Commanders are a terrible team likely about to fire everybody.
When you get gashed against the run week-in and week-out, it’s not just a scheme issue, it’s a culture issue.
Good run defense is a strong indicator of a tough-minded team, also a disciplined team. One problem with the Jets’ run defense, is guys are constantly out of their gaps, flying around with little discipline. Their gap integrity is bad.
The art of asking tough questions after games seems to be broken with most reporters also.
If I hear one more candy-ass question about a loss from a timid reporter starting with “How frustrating is it?” I’m going to scream.
And all these questions about Garrett Wilson about his stats, like him getting a 1,000 yard season. Who cares about that after such an awful performance?
Now, I’m not blaming Wilson, who is wired right, he’s just responding to bad questions.
But, if I were him, I’d answer, “The only stat that matters is winning.”
Hat-tip to ESPN’s Rich Cimini, an old-school reporter from an era when tough questions were the norm, asked Robert Saleh why he didn’t seem more upset after the Jets embarrassing loss in Cleveland.
Saleh flippantly responded, “Do you want me to turn over the podium?”
Perhaps yes.
Long-time Daily News writer Gary Myers used to write sometimes about losing teams that somebody needs to get pissed off and turn over a table in the locker room.
Other reporters used to joke about that question from Gary, but I totally get his point.
Get pissed off.
You don’t need to embarrass players publicly like Sean Payton, but stop congratulating players as they come off the field down big in a game.
Stop celebrating meaningless plays on the sidelines in lopsided games, like you are Jim Valvano after N.C, State won the college basketball championship.
You might not have seen this on TV, but down 17 in the fourth quarter, Jordan Whitehead
stripped the ball away from a Cleveland Brown, and it looked like it might have been a fumble.
Instant replay determined the runner was down.
But when Whitehead picked up the ball and started to run with it, Saleh went crazy, like he just won the Super Bowl.
They were down double-digits at the time.
Be more even-keeled. It will help your team more even-keeled.
Also, in a strong culture, there are no double-standards.
The Jets threw RB Michael Carter under the bus for a few bad plays, cutting him, but Mekhi Becton is playing very poorly right now, giving up sacks and committing too many penalties, and he seems beyond reproach.
The Jets need a cultural rebuild this off-season.
Like I said, if you don’t want to listen to me, ask Aaron Rodgers. He addressed this on ESPN a couple of weeks ago.
Don’t kill the messenger. I’m not being a hater.
I’m actually doing you a favor.
And it needs to start this week with some lineup changes (give Chazz Surratt some run) and no Twitter posts about what uniform combination you are wearing this week.
Those uniform tweets are contributing to the cultural decay because it has nothing to do with winning. NOTHING! it sends a terrible message about priorities.
It’s the players inside the uniforms that matter and how they’re coached.
Once again, don’t kill the messenger.
They have missed the playoffs 13 years in a row.
As my old friend Dave Hutchinson from the Star-Ledger used to say in his southern accent “You gotta fix the dern thing.”
December 29, 2023
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