Jets’ Swagger and Offense Appear Lost

From the NY Times

December 16, 2010

Jets’ Swagger and Offense Appear Lost
By GREG BISHOP
FLORHAM PARK, N.J. — The offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer heard the angry mob of Jets fans who chanted for his termination Sunday night. He saw his boss, Coach Rex Ryan, in the offensive meeting room first thing Monday morning. As far as approval ratings go, these are not good signs.

Usually, teams with the Jets’ record (9-4) and offensive ranking (12) escape that kind of scrutiny. Such is the sorry state of the Jets’ offense, which last scored a touchdown in November, nine quarters ago. Thursday marked the three-week anniversary of the team’s last offensive touchdown.

As Schottenheimer addressed reporters, he wore a full beard and the look of a man who spent this week inside a dark office, studying film, the N.F.L. equivalent of a horror movie marathon. A hot head coaching candidate less than a month ago, Schottenheimer found himself in circumstances that seem to surface every season — as a primary target for criticism, as a coach who must defend his job.

“I know I’m a damn good football coach,” Schottenheimer said, his voice rising slightly. “I’m good at what I do. We’ve had a lot of success here.”

Just not lately, not running, not passing, not blocking, not in anything, really, except practicing, which has not translated on game days. The Jets spent the week answering for the offensive behavior of their strength coach. They will spend the rest of the season answering for their offense, unless the pattern changes, unless the Jets, you know, score.

But Schottenheimer is not alone in earning, receiving or accepting blame, and that is the main problem. The offensive line played two of its worst games last Sunday against Miami and the previous Monday against New England. So did Mark Sanchez, whom Ryan considered benching against the Dolphins. So did the pair of grounded running backs, LaDainian Tomlinson and Shonn Greene.

The Jets answer all those issues with a single word, execution, or lack of it. With abundant talent, that means one of two things: either the players are individually and collectively underachieving after coaches put them in the right position, or the coaches are neither sufficiently preparing them to play, nor making full use of their talent. The likely answer: both, to varying degrees.

On one hand, Tomlinson said: “It’s not Schotty’s fault. It’s our fault. We need to play better.”

On the other, Schottenheimer said: “I appreciate the guys saying that, but over all, I’m in charge of the offense. I take a lot of pride in that. And we’re not playing well.”

Most disconcerting is Sanchez. He made significant strides earlier this season, in terms of turnovers, understanding the offense and leadership. But lately, his career arc is a classic study in regression analysis.

In the past three games — all clunkers — Sanchez posted one touchdown and five interceptions and completed fewer than half his passes. His season quarterback rating stands at 74.2, the worst for a starter in his conference. Against Miami, his two turnovers led to all the points the Dolphins needed in their 10-6 victory.

Throughout his career, Sanchez has struggled with bad body language after poor performances, with holding on too long, too often, to mistakes. On Thursday, he bounded through the locker room, upbeat, confident, full of jokes. He did not appear overly concerned. Perhaps he should be.

In Pittsburgh on Sunday, Sanchez will face arguably the N.F.L.’s best defense, one lauded by Ryan, the defensive guru, throughout this week. The Steelers present multiple coverage looks, blitz from varied angles and boast enough talent to beat offenses without their brilliant defensive schemes. They are, in a word, dangerous. Or, in another word, imposing.

This is where Sanchez’s exchange Wednesday with reporters presented more concern. Sanchez wondered aloud if perhaps he faced doubts “even in the building.” Pressed, he laughed nervously and dodged the question with an answer about thick skin. Asked if Ryan doubted him, because he considered benching him, Sanchez gave perhaps the most terse response of his career.

“You could say that,” he said. “I don’t know. Ask Rex.”

Ryan laughed off the possibility of a schism between the offense and the defense, despite the recent disparity between the units. Both he and linebacker Bart Scott referred to their time in Baltimore, where the Ravens’ offensive talent never matched the defense — “Man, c’mon,” Scott said, “I played with Kyle Boller for six years” — yet, at least according to Ryan, the two sides never split.

In fact, Ryan stepped back Thursday to put Sanchez’s accomplishments in perspective. He noted that Sanchez led the Jets to within a game of the Super Bowl as a rookie, that he owns a respectable record as a starter, 20-12, including playoffs.

“Mark Sanchez is our quarterback,” Ryan said.

Tomlinson floated another theory Thursday. He said the Jets boast so many offensive playmakers — tight end Dustin Keller; wide receivers Santonio Holmes, Braylon Edwards and Jerricho Cotchery; Tomlinson and Greene — that opponents struggled to decipher how Schottenheimer would deploy the available talent. Now, Tomlinson said, teams have film, and they have figured out tendencies and the Jets’ preferred methods of distribution.

That, too, seems to fall on Schottenheimer, who left his news conference smiling — and went right back to the film room.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/17/sports/football/17jets.html?_r=1&ref=sports&pagewanted=print

 

Graphics accompanying Bishop's article

Here's a link to some interesting graphs:



http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2010/12/17/sports/football/17jetsgraphic.html?ref=football

 

MB,

I actually think Bishop placed the heart of the article at the end:

Tomlinson floated another theory Thursday. He said the Jets boast so many offensive playmakers — tight end Dustin Keller; wide receivers Santonio Holmes, Braylon Edwards and Jerricho Cotchery; Tomlinson and Greene — that opponents struggled to decipher how Schottenheimer would deploy the available talent. Now, Tomlinson said, teams have film, and they have figured out tendencies and the Jets’ preferred methods of distribution.

That, too, seems to fall on Schottenheimer, who left his news conference smiling — and went right back to the film room.

This makes complete sense to me, in terms of noting the season's arc of the initial loss to the Ravens, when the Jets were still getting comfortable with their having added LT, and Holmes was not yet playing, through the early season successes, the GB debacle, which occurred against an imo well coached team with a solid D, the mid season struggles against mediocre opponents, and now solid thrashings at the hands of good to very good opposing D's.

I would also say we cannot discount poor execution, and drop off at both Qb and OL, but imo they do not explain the whole thing.

Turns out this is both a simple and logical explanation - give credit to opponents. They watch game film of the Jets. They have figured out what the Jets do on O, and now others have watched opponents before them, and what they do to beat the Jet O.

Meanwhile BS has not changed it up.

In fairness to BS, the other variables have made it difficult to isolate the variable that makes the most difference. But no TD's in nine quarters - it can't all be one thing.

Except for the one thing that imo ties together all the other variables - opponents seem to have figured out what the Jets do on O. We talked about this some after the Pats game. They seemed ot know exactly what was coming.

The other point in fairness I think should be made is that it is difficult with a relatively inexperienced Qb to totally change up the O in one week. Even if BS understood this was his mission, and had the ability on his own to come up with a changed approach, can it be put into effect?

I don't know. But we unfortunately have reason to be skeptical. Among other things, we don't know if BS and the rest of the Jet CS understands the real problem here.

But I do think Bishop is onto something, something that ties all the rest together.

 

Up to a point you have a point. But surely you are not suggesting that it is impossible to use that many game changers.

I don't know if you remember the Bills from the nineties. On O they had immense talent at ALL the skill positions. Didn't seem to hurt them any.

My theory slightly modifying what that article alludes to is that BS rested on early season success. What got them a certain amount of success was an O that combined those talents but in a simple enough scheme that it did not overwhelm the players new to the roster or Sanchez in his second year. But that scheme has now been analyzed and understood by a succession of opponents. And dealt with.

Now it is up to BS to change it up.

Here's the thing - if BS succeeds at that, he will go maybe not from goat to hero, but at least he can get out of the barnyard, and the Jets can get back on track.

If he does not...

 

I have been trying to make that point to the Schotty haters for months now. The point does not totally absolve him, but there is a collective responsibility here, a collective failure, and enough guilt to go around in the CS.

 

Yep. Not to reach too far into the Civil War analogies, but it's like Lee at Gettysburg. The parallel only goes so far, because before Gettysburg Lee relied so much for implementation of his overall stategy on Stonewall Jackson, and THAT analogy I do not intend here.

But Lee saw his job as positioning his "team" and then letting his subordinates give tactical and operational effect to his overall strategy. To some extent this is necessary - the alternative at the other extreme is micromanagement, and to carry the war analogy further, Lee could not be in all places on the battlefield at all times.

But at Gettysburg, perhaps not yet used to Jackson's absence, Lee was vague in telling his people what he wanted, and more to the point arguably did not listen enough to them, particularly Longstreet, to understand the flaws in the army's dispositions and strategy.

The point is that erring too much on the side of deference means not only that subordinates might not adequately understand what is expected of them, but like you are alluding to on the Jets that the commander, the HC, might not understand enough to do HIS job what is going on, what his junior commanders are doing, dealing with, thinking.

The other useful analogy from Lee at Gettysburg is that Gettysburg followed five large victories by Lee's army, and this led to an over optimism, and expecting his opponent to be as poorly led as in those five victories. But his opponents by then maybe did not have game film of him, heh, but they surely understood him better, and did not make the same mistakes they had before.

Anyway, pardon the Civil War analogy.

 

No. Read the article and the subsequent posts. The single problem tying all other problems in O together is that opponents have figured out what the Jets are trying to do on O, and have seen others come up with ways to defeat the Jets.