For the Jets, the more things change, the more they stay the same
Keelan Cole of the Jets reacts after failing to make a catch on fourth-and-6 in the fourth quarter against the Saints at MetLife Stadium on Sunday. Credit: Jim McIsaac
They might have been the saddest words spoken on another sad, hopeless football afternoon at MetLife Stadium.
The clock was running down on the Jets’ 30-9 loss to the Saints on Sunday, and there was poor Bob Wischusen, the estimable radio play-by-play man, reading an ad urging fans to purchase tickets to upcoming home games.
Seriously? Like for the next one, against . . . the Jaguars? On . . . the day after Christmas?
Only if the Jets plan to offer free food, free adult beverages and free autographed Trevor Lawrence rookie cards — and also are planning to install a retractable dome to keep fans warm and dry.
And even then: no. No! NO!
Why bother? Fans are mad as heck and are not going to take it anymore. Or to update and paraphrase a famous banner unfurled by Giants fans in 1978: "11 Years of Lousy Football — We’ve Had Enough!"
The Jets (and Giants) too often over the past decade have wasted our December Sundays playing meaningless, awful football games.
(Incredible MetLife Stadium stat: The building has hosted one Jets or Giants playoff game in 12 seasons of existence.)
Sunday was just another boring, bumbling blur at gray gardens, and officially made it 11 seasons in a row for the Jets without a playoff berth, the longest current streak in the NFL.
This is the seventh of those years in which they have lost at least 11 games. Even the best of those seasons, 2015, ended with a catastrophic loss to the then-mediocre Bills.
This is ridiculous.
Sure, the current coaches and players had nothing to do with allowing Eli Manning and Victor Cruz to complete a 99-yard touchdown pass on Christmas Eve in 2011, a play that changed the course of local football history.
But fans remember that flop, and all the nonsense that has followed, and are allowed to blame everyone in green now, then and in between.
(Most) Jets supporters were smart enough to know that with a rookie head coach in Robert Saleh, a rookie quarterback in Zach Wilson and a roster in dire need of improvement, 2021 would be a challenge.
But every sign of progress has been countered by a dispiriting setback or three, and Wilson is not improving.
He was bad for most of Sunday’s game, at one point 10-for-26 for fewer than 100 yards passing before making his stats look less embarrassing during garbage time.
The defense was OK most of the day but ended up allowing 203 rushing yards, including a 44-yard scoring run by quarterback Taysom Hill that seemed to freeze Jets defenders.
Alvin Kamara rushed for 120 yards, including a 16-yard scoring run on which he put a world-class fake on Bryce Hall.
Afterward, the Jets acknowledged the disappointment but stuck to their "trust the process" script, which in fairness theoretically could come true next year or beyond.
"It’s always a challenge whenever you’re going into a building where you’ve had what you had over the last 10 years," Saleh said, "and you’ve got a lot of guys trying to figure out how not to lose football games and how to win games.
"We have been getting better. It’s just a matter of sticking to our guns and philosophy and what we’re trying to get done, and trust that we have these four games coming up. We have a lot of things to look forward to."
Asked what he would tell frustrated fans, the coach said, "The same thing that I have been saying. Does it suck right now? Sure. I feel you. Nobody in this locker room wants to lose football games."
But he added that the path to success remains "crystal clear."
"It’s going to flip," he said. "This crappy part is part of the process."
Said Wilson: "I never once told myself that this was going to be easy when I got here. I never look at it as being down on myself, like this is how my career is going.
"Everything I went through today was a learning process for the future, and I’m banking every single rep I got through."
Keep making those deposits, Zach, because right now, Jets football is bankrupt.
Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.
