Plaxico: Too many mistakes by Jets offense

FLORHAM PARK, N.J. -- When Plaxico Burress took a gander at all the talent around him in training camp, seeing the kind of playmakers the Jets had assembled on offense, he thought they were destined for greatness.

Burress was certain the Jets had the firepower to post somewhere in the neighborhood of 28-30 points per game, something that easily would put their offense among the NFL's upper echelon. Sure, it's still possible -- if the Jets score 120 points in Sunday's regular-season finale against the Dolphins, that is.

The Jets' offense has been one of the team's biggest disappointments and is a key reason they no longer control their own playoff fate. They're ranked 27th in the league, averaging 24 points and a modest 307.7 yards per game, numbers that pale to the gaudy statistics Burress & Co. thought they'd have compiled by now, and has them searching for reasons why they've faltered.

"Just not being consistent enough to go out and play well each week," Burress said Wednesday. "It's one of those things where I would jump offsides or we have a penalty that brings back a touchdown. You have a sack, you have a negative play, and we have so many that we can never get on a roll or be consistent enough to go out and play well to get to that 28-30 point mark that we want to a game.

"Can we do it? Yes. We just haven't been disciplined enough to go out and play to the level to which we are capable of."

Collecting big chunks of yardage has been an arduous task for the Jets, especially via their aerial attack. They have only 38 plays of 20-plus yards and have ripped off 40 or more yards just twice, with the latter being the worst output of any team in the league.

That high-powered offense just hasn't been there.

"When you look at it, teams know we have some explosiveness," Rex Ryan said. "So sometimes it's due to what they're playing defensively. Other times, maybe we haven't been able to hold up to throw it down the field. Sometimes we haven't been accurate. Sometimes it's a wrong route. Those are the things that are driving us a little bit crazy. We've got to be more consistent."

Burress said the Jets haven't dialed up a bevy of deep passes. Whenever they are called, though, he agreed with Ryan's thinking: Something always seems to break down.

"It's one thing here or a guy getting loose or one of those things," Burress said. "We've definitely got guys that can get out on the edge and make plays . . . Just putting it up there and giving guys an opportunity to make plays, crazier things have happened. Santonio [Holmes] is one of the faster guys in the league at wide receiver. You'd like to see him go down the field and make more plays, but it hasn't happened. We all have to take the criticism because it takes each and every one of us to block it up, to get open and to make the play.

"It doesn't mean we can't make them. Things just happen that negates those big plays or something crazy happens."

Such as early in the fourth quarter in Saturday's loss to the Giants. Mark Sanchez appeared to be looking deep for Jeremy Kerley on the first play of the quarter and was intercepted because the rookie wideout broke off his route. "We were on two different pages," Kerley said. "He read one thing and I read another. I blame myself for it. It was just miscommunication."

But those are the kinds of plays that can't keep happening.

"We are really close to being an amazing offense, but just small little things are holding us back," guard Matt Slauson said. " . . . The problem is we kind of took a step back over these last two weeks and things kind of started to come apart again. So we can easily do it. It doesn't matter who we play, as long as we play tight and together, we can beat anyone."