Carroll: Sanchez will "bounce right back"

Don’t worry, Mark. Coach Pete’s got your back!

Pete Carroll, who coached Mark Sanchez at USC, said the Jets’ quarterback’s troubles are more about the teams he’s playing than anything he’s doing.

“I don’t maybe see it the same way that he’s struggling so much as that they’re playing some good teams that have made hard nights for him,” Carroll said in his conference call with the Giants media. “The other night (against Baltimore), that was a ridiculously challenging defense they went against. I thought he was battling like crazy. I know he wants to be cleaner and all and those numbers start to add up a little bit, but just like he has in the past I think he’ll bounce right back and he’ll be the guy who everyone is counting on and he’ll work with his team really well.”

Carroll's Seahawks are playing the Giants this week, but he keeps tabs on many of his former players in the NFL. He said he’s seen progress from Sanchez over the years.

“He had it in his first season, he went through two or three lives living that thing out,” he said of the experience of being a rookie starter for the Jets. “They did a great job of staying with him and supporting him and their coaching staff is totally behind him and that’s so important when things are tough. They’ve been very consistent and that’s only going o help Mark be consistent and hang in there and fight his way through it until they get it going the way they want it to.”