Clark Judge's take on the J E T S D.

Rhodes' colossal proclamation sounds smart as Jets D delivers
Sep. 20, 2009
By Clark Judge
CBSSports.com Senior Writer

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- Maybe Kerry Rhodes was right. Maybe the New York Jets have the best defense in the NFL.

Yeah, sure, you have Pittsburgh, Baltimore and the New York Giants, all good defenses and all defenses that can claim to be the best in the league. But, tell me, which of them hasn't allowed a touchdown in their first two games? I'll tell you which: The New York Jets, and that's a considerable achievement when you consider their first two opponents were Houston and New England.


Kerry Rhodes (25) and Shaun Ellis sense confusion and frustration from New England's prolific QB. (Getty Images)
The Texans put up 34 points on Tennessee -- the Jets' next opponent -- on Sunday, while the Patriots ... well, the Patriots are the benchmark by which everyone else in the AFC is measured. They won three Super Bowls in four years. They won five straight division titles. And they beat the New York Jets eight consecutive times at Giants Stadium.

But that streak is over, and it's over because the Patriots met a defense they could not solve. I don't know if it's the best one out there, but Rhodes can make his case -- again -- after Sunday's 16-9 defeat of New England, a game in which Patriots quarterback Tom Brady looked so off, so out of sync, so rattled that Rhodes later said he was confused.

Tom Brady? Confused? Listen to Rhodes.

"He hasn't seen all the pressure we put at him," Rhodes said. "We threw a couple of new wrinkles in today, and I don't think [the Patriots] knew exactly where we were coming from. In key situations where he has to read the coverage ... I think he was a little confused."

Normally, I'd write a comment like that off to an over-exuberant winner. But this is Rhodes, and Rhodes is the guy who last week had the guts -- or temerity -- to call out New England, saying he wouldn't be satisfied with a victory over the Patriots; that he wanted total domination and wanted to "embarrass" them. That's tough talk, but it's typical for Rhodes, who this summer called the Jets the best defense in the business.

Well, maybe it's time we start listening. Because the Jets not only beat Brady for only the third time in Tom Terrific's career, they held him to under 50 percent in completions for the first time since Dec. 3, 2007, kept him out of the end zone in three series inside the New York 20 and had him so flummoxed he took three delay-of-game penalties, including back-to-back calls late in the third period.

OK, so they didn't sack him. Big deal. They hit the poor guy so many times he hurried throws and missed open receivers. He even threw a first-half interception when he was rushed by blitzing safety Jim Leonhard, and get used to it, people.

"Was he rattled?" linebacker Bart Scott asked. "That's a question you have to ask him. He may be comfortable with people at his feet, the pocket collapsing and getting hit. He may have been comfortable the whole game.

"We were just trying to get a hit ... like in boxing. You get the body hits, and the cumulative effects take hold later in the game. You want to hit a quarterback as much as you can, especially early, because you get that clock to speed up in their heads."

I don't know about any clock; all I know is that Brady wasn't Brady.

"He looked frustrated," Jets defensive end Shaun Ellis said. "I could see it in his eyes. His eyes were wide open. He was trying to figure out where everyone was coming from."

I don't blame him. The Jets went into the game dressing 10 defensive backs and only four defensive linemen, and they did it because they knew what they were up against -- which was the best quarterback and one of the best passing games in the business. So they dared the Patriots to run and mixed their defenses, rushing Brady from the outside, inside, blitzing cornerbacks, linebackers and safeties -- and bringing the house on the Patriots' last snap, a fourth-down pass that fell incomplete.

Perfect.

"I play against these guys every day," Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez said, "so I feel for Tom. It's like you're playing against 20 people."

In fairness to Brady, he was without star receiver Wes Welker, scratched prior to kickoff because of a sore knee. But he still had Randy Moss who, like Welker, had 12 catches in the season opener. Moss had exactly one in the second half Sunday, and that's a testament to a defense that should have the attention of the rest of the AFC -- and the league.

I don't care how many yards the Jets defense surrenders or how many sacks it does or does not have -- it hasn't allowed one freakin' touchdown in eight quarters, and it survived Brady and the Patriots after losing cornerbacks Lito Sheppard and Donald Strickland to injuries.

"Even when [Brady] had receivers open he couldn't really hit them because of the pressure," Rhodes said. "He felt the pressure. I said it before: When any quarterback feels the pressure, he is not going to be accurate. He had some throws could've made, and he didn't make them due to the pressure. The game plan worked."

Hey, everything works for the Jets these days. It suffocated Houston last weekend. It overcame the Patriots this weekend. It is winning with a rookie quarterback. It is winning with a rookie head coach. It is winning despite bold and outlandish proclamations from its players and its head coach, and maybe, just maybe, that's a signal that it's time to pay listen to these guys because maybe, just maybe, this is their time.

I know it's early. But I also know whom they just beat.

"You know what the big deal is?" coach Rex Ryan asked. "We're a football team that should be respected. Sometimes we talk a little bit, [but it's] only because we have confidence in our football team. And we believe it to be true ... that we're an outstanding football team. And we have to show it each week."

They just did.

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