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Jets cornerback Sauce Gardner has had an up-and-down season.
Aside from playing in a suspect scheme installed by the previous coach, another issue could be “Cantonizing” him too soon.
When Bill Parcells was asked questions about rookies, or young players in general, perhaps looking for him to praise the player based on the tone of the question, he would often say, “Don’t put him in Canton just yet fellas.”
Parcells knew what he was doing here. Heaping too much praise on young players can go to their heads and impact their play.
The hype emanating from 1 Jets Drive about Gardner, since his arrival as a first-round pick from Cincinnati in 2022, is off the charts.
It’s just too much, and it’s messed up his equilibrium. It’s not a good way to handle a young player.
Last week he was fighting on Twitter with a beat-writer who baited him about his missed tackle of Arizona tight end Trey McBride that should have been a stop short of the first down but went for 18. McBride outweighs Gardner by 50 pounds, and he had a hard time wrestling him to the ground and got no help.
After the Jets’ loss to Indianapolis, which was spearheaded by awful pass defense on two 70-yard TD drives by the NFL’s least accurate QB, Gardner was on the field a long time, exchanging jerseys, taking photos and so forth with Colts players.
It seemed excessive after the way he and the secondary played, but times have changed, people have changed.
In the past, you would see more players, livid about what happened, just shake a few hands, and go to the locker room.
It’s clear, all this losing is doing a number on him, and not helping matters over the last two-plus years is the Florham Park hype machine, which tends to put young players in Canton.
In general, there is so much multi-media stuff going on with this team. Sometimes it seems more like MGM Studios than a football facility in Florham Park.
And after games, it’s amazing how many interviews players have to do, aside from just the basic post-game interview at a locker with reporters. So many post-game shows/media partners who need guests.
Above is a photo from a recent post-game scene with all the media partner post-game interviews going on.
It’s out of control, and whoever the next coach is, needs to reel this in a little.
Just have players do one interview post-game for everyone, and let them get on with the day.
You always hear – “Make the main thing, the main thing” coming out of 1 Jets Drive.
Winning Emmys is not the main thing.
And Gardner is not in a great place right now because of a scheme that forces him into zone too much, when he’s an elite man-to-man corner, and also due to the Florham Park hype machine.
This art of putting young players in Canton too quickly needs to stop in Florham Parks.
It’s not good from a player-development standpoint . . .
As we have talked about yesterday, the Jets defensive scheme is broken. To make Kyler Murray into an elite pocket passer, which happened in Arizona, was ridiculous. That isn’t his game, but he looked like Peyton Manning against the Jets.
And then against the Colts, to allow a QB who was benched two weeks ago, who had 44.4 percent completion percentage entering the game, march his team on two 70-yard TD drives in the fourth quarter, to spearhead a win over the Jets, was unreal.
One thing that helped Murray and Anthony Richardson both look like Peyton Manning throwing from the pocket were receivers consistently flashing wide-open due to blow assignments.
The Jets’ defense is broken because of Robert Saleh’s outdated scheme that needs to be in the rearview mirror, just like rolling with players who consistently show they can’t get the job done on film, another Saleh thing, also needs to be in the rearview mirror. There are players on this defense who they should have moved on from after last season, but Saleh was too often a people-first, film-second coach. He falls in love with people, and Joe Douglas did not push back enough. The third issue is some of the staff Saleh assembled.
So what you are seeing on defense is mostly Saleh’s fault, not Jeff Ulbrich’s. Yes, Ulbrich was DC, but he was running the Saleh scheme, and continues to run it, because it’s hard to change schemes mid-season.
Whoever the next coach is, needs to take a blow torch to everything about this defense, from scheme to personnel to watching film with rose-colored glasses.
November 18, 2024
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