Glauber: Jets' offensive woes just a 'hiccup', Ryan says

FLORHAM PARK, N.J.

If you need a little perspective on the Jets' offensive ineptitude in the team's two losses this season, then Rex Ryan is only too happy to provide it.

Flash back a decade ago to the 2000 Ravens, who won the Super Bowl that season despite having one of the most abysmal teams on offense in recent memory. Ryan, the team's defensive line coach that year, remembers it well.

"You think this is bad?" Ryan said Monday, barely 24 hours after his Jets were shut out, 9-0, by the Packers. "This is nothin'. This is a hiccup. The year we won the Super Bowl in Baltimore, we went five straight games without scoring an offensive touchdown. Five in a row."

So Ryan isn't pushing the panic button just yet, despite Sunday's woeful performance. Coupled with the Jets' opening-game loss to the Ravens at home, the team has totaled a measly nine points in their two losses. Neither Ryan nor the players say there is any danger of the team fracturing over the offensive woes.

"Our guys are way too professional for that," Ryan said. "There's none of that here. There's plenty of blame to go around. We're not in the blame game. We just want to win. We need to execute better as a football team in all aspects. If we do that, we'll be just fine."

It's an important issue for any team, and Ryan is well aware that promoting locker room chemistry is vital. He needs to avoid the kind of intrasquad bickering that can occur when one side of the ball isn't performing up to snuff.

In this case, the Jets' offense has been a somewhat erratic group this season. Quarterback Mark Sanchez recovered from his clunker in the opener to help key the Jets' five-game winning streak, although his spotty performance against the Broncos two weeks ago might have portended more sloppy play against the Packers. The Jets barely pulled out a fourth-quarter victory in Denver before the bye week, then put on a lackluster offensive performance in the team's first shutout loss since the 2006 season.

If the Jets are to achieve their goal of winning the Super Bowl, they'll have to pull off a rare feat: Only two teams in NFL history suffered a shutout during the regular season, then won the Super Bowl: The 1974 Steelers and the 2003 Patriots.

Will there be an undercurrent of ill will in the Jets' locker room if the offense doesn't pull out of its funk? The Jets insist it won't happen.

"We win and we lose as a football team," linebacker Bart Scott said. "We didn't win [Sunday] as a football team, and that's the way it is.''

Wide receiver Santonio Holmes, who shoulders some of the blame for the loss after he dropped what likely would have been a touchdown pass early in the third quarter, said he hoped the Jets wouldn't fracture.

"When one group of guys isn't getting the job done, it's tough to win a ballgame," Holmes said. "We expect our offense to get the job done every time.''

But there will be patience from the other side of the ball, namely a defense that is championship caliber. Take it from the Jets' best defensive player.

"You can't sit here on the defensive side of the ball and point the finger at the offense, because they're our teammates and two, we don't want to separate this locker room and guys are pointing the finger and it's getting personal," cornerback Darrelle Revis said.

Revis cited last year's offensive struggles that led to the Jets losing six of seven games midway through the season, as proof the team will stay together.

"Even in that losing streak last year, everybody just kept pushing," he said. "Everybody had one goal, and that was to get to the playoffs and get to the Super Bowl. Everybody has that mind-set again."

Encouraging words at a time when the Jets can use them most. Then again, the only thing that will make it better is if the offense starts scoring.