Where was the ground-and-pound in 1st half?

INDIANAPOLIS - Remember that talk about the Jets returning to their ground-and-pound style to keep the ball away from Colts quarterback Peyton Manning? Offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer apparently didn't.

It was as though the Jets' offense spent the entire first half playing against type. They called pass plays on first down six out of 13 times, and overall, they ran only 13 times for 74 yards compared to 20 pass plays, including one sack. All five Jets possessions reached Colts territory and one got into the red zone, but they came away with nothing to show for it as they trailed 7-0 at halftime.

The Jets opened the game with LaDainian Tomlinson as the starter at running back behind an offensive line that had Damien Woody at right tackle after he missed the previous three games while recovering from arthroscopic knee surgery.

The positive vibes for the ground-and-pound approach began on second down when Tomlinson blew through a hole on the right side behind Woody and Brandon Moore, cut to the outside and went 23 yards to midfield.

That opening drive bogged down, and when the Jets got the ball back, Greene was on the field. After a first-down sack of quarterback Mark Sanchez, he broke off a 6-yard run. It was his first carry at Lucas Oil Stadium since the rib injury that knocked him out of last season's AFC title game early in the third quarter. But another first-down incompletion helped stall the second drive.

Finally, on the Jets' third possession, they operated like a ground-and-pound attack, handing the ball to Greene on first and second down for a total of 8 yards and bringing Tomlinson in as the third-down back, but Sanchez overshot open wideout Santonio Holmes on a deep third-down pass.

Starting at the Jets' 10 on the next drive, Tomlinson was the first-down back, and he caught a dump over the middle for 13 yards. After a 24-yard completion to Braylon Edwards at the Jets' 48, Tomlinson gained only 3 yards on first down, and again, the Jets went back to throwing the ball. They got into Colts territory for the fourth straight drive but again wound up punting.

Next thing the Jets knew, they were behind 7-0 because Colts quarterback Peyton Manning kept going to his running backs until he set up a play-action fake that fooled safety Brodney Pool, who was out of position to help when Pierre Garcon beat cornerback Antonio Cromartie for a 57-yard touchdown. That was supposed to be the Jets' plan of attack, but Manning, despite having an ineffective running game, used it to set up the TD.

The Jets moved 60 yards on their final drive of the first half to a first down at the Colts' 19-yard line with about a minute remaining in the half. Once again, Sanchez threw incompletions on first and second down even though the Jets had the timeouts to stop the clock had they chosen to run the ball. Forced into an obvious passing situation on third down, Sanchez was picked off.