As Gang Green Turns: Jets 24-19 Loss to Steelers Ends the Green Dream

Article first published as As Gang Green Turns: Jets 24-19 Loss to Steelers Ends the Green Dream on Blogcritics.

Whether Jets head coach Rex Ryan realizes it or not, all that talking kind of takes its toll. The Jets were really good talkers, sometimes in a yada-yada-yada kind of way. Ryan and his guys talked so much they gave those ladies on The View a run for their money. Even Joy (there's no key to turn off my mouth) Behar can't compete with the likes of Rex, but then again she doesn't have to go out on a field and prove something every week the way he does, so it is kind of funny when Joy goes off, but not so much when Rex does.

Ryan talked a good talk all season (and even during the preseason on the HBO series Hard Knocks), but in the end all the swagger kind of caught up with him and the team. You can just get by so long on being verbose when you have to throw or run a football.

What did the Jets in yesterday was a combination of too much sound and not enough fury. The great writer William Shakespeare wrote about a tale told by an idiot that was full of sound and fury but signified nothing. In essence these words from Macbeth can be applied to Ryan, who strove to take the castle and then the kingdom, but forgot that words are fine in dramas but not as important on the playing field.

If Jets fans weren't ready to pack it in at the half (when their team was down 24-3), it is only because we have seen it all before. It's the old Tug McGraw "You gotta believe" mentality, and we Jets fans as well as Mets fans have been suckered by the concept of being the underdog and loving it. Well, as good old Maxwell Smart (played by Don Adams on the great television show Get Smart) used to say, "Missed it by that much." We go home and they move forward and that's that.

Sure, we fans got into the second half. The Jets defense did what it should have done in the first half. They had Steelers' quarterback Ben Roethlisberger falling apart at the seams, but that is the problem with the Jets. They make you think the comeback is possible. They lull you into hoping that there will be one more pass, one more play, the Nick Folk field goal that just makes it to win with zero seconds left.

Alas, no storybook endings happened in Pittsburgh. The better team is going to the Super Bowl; Gang Green gets to stay home and watch all those expensive commercials and drown their sorrows in beverages of their choice. In the end Mark Sanchez was no Joe Namath on this day, though he played valiantly and would have had a chance if the defense played the first half right. Instead, Sanchez gets to rest a sore shoulder and Ryan his wounded ego.

Now that we have seen the Jets get to the AFC Championship game two years in a row and not move on, we fans are going to expect much more next year. Yes, we Mets and Jets fans are always looking at calendars and dreaming. How many more more next years can there be? When does this year ever become the next year we hoped it would be?

The soap opera As Gang Green Turns now goes on hiatus. One can only wonder what will happen? Will some of the cast be let go? Will new characters be brought in? Maybe the most important question is this: what will Rex Ryan do to engineer a team that will allow Jets fans to not only believe in the dream but to see it realized in February 2012?

Photo Credits:
Rex Ryan - usspost.com
Don Adams - corpsstories.com

As Gang Green Turns: Jets Sack Pats 28-21 - Bring on the Steelers!

Article first published as As Gang Green Turns: Jets Sack Pats 28-21 - Bring on the Steelers! on Blogcritics.

Today Jets fans are bursting with green pride, while fans of the New England Patriots just might be green with envy, but no matter what the game last night settled - at least for this season - the score between the two teams in favor of the Jets. The Jets now head into their second AFC Championship Game in a row, and one has to give a great deal of credit to Jets' head coach Rex Ryan as the man who has got them there.

Make no mistake, this was a battle of wits and wills between two tough competitors. You could say that Mark Sanchez beat Tom Brady, or you could say the Jets' defense beat Tom Brady (sacking him five times in the process), and you could even say the Jets' offense was just better than the Pats' offense. While these things are all true in regard to last night's game, the real battle - as stated during last week by Ryan - was between the head coaches Ryan and Bill Belichick.

Last week I referred to Ryan and Belichick as Luke Piewalker and Darth Bull respectively (alluding to the famous Star Wars characters), but as I watched the game last night, something made Belichick lose his imposing status. Wearing a frumpy Patriots' hoody and his headphones, Belichick looked more like a worn-out Yoda who the force did not have with him. At times Belichick seemed lost, as if the proceedings could not be happening before his eyes as his padawans were getting clobbered.

What even seemed more impressive was that the Jets defense got to Brady. Besides sacking him five times, Darrelle Revis, Antonio Cromartie, Drew Coleman, and company rattled Brady's cage. During every possession he seemed rushed and even flustered, trying to find someone to throw the ball to but being dogged by that relentless Jets defense that had him flinching even when no one was close to him.

Sanchez was impressive going 16 - 25 for 194 yards with three touchdown passes and no interceptions. While he no doubt had to be nervous going into this game at Foxborough, he showed the grit and determination of one more experienced on this night, and this ongoing maturation process has been happening though not always obvious in the later games of the season. Now it seems Sanchez has found himself, is comfortable with his receivers, and is playing the game smarter than he ever has before.

Last week Rex Ryan said that there was the only one bigger game in Jets team history than this one, and that was the victory of Joe Namath and his team in Super Bowl III. At the time I thought this was more typical Ryan bluster, but now I see the wisdom of this comment. Beating the Patriots - and especially beating Belichick - was indeed crucial and exorcises the haunting 45-3 loss to the Pats last month.

Now the Jets will turn their attention to the Pittsburgh Steelers. If the Jets can indeed beat the Steelers next week and reach the Super Bowl, the achievement will be even more amazing because they will have won three playoff games in a row against the best teams around: the Colts, the Patriots, and the Steelers. Even more amazing is the fact that they will have done this on the road.

There will be lots of talk going on this week, and I am sure much of it will be coming from Ryan as per his usual routine. Still, despite all the talk and all the hype, Ryan and his men came out and walked the walked. In two more weeks, they may even get to walk the walk of Super Bowl champions. If they do win it all, should we worry that Rex will finally run out of things to say? Not a chance.

That's it until next week at Pittsburgh in the ongoing sports soap opera As Gang Green Turns.