12-6 in last 18
2015 NFL: 2-0
I watched every Jet game Rex Ryan coached. Here is the bottom line: players play for him and they play doubly and triply as hard when it's a game he really wants.
Don't believe me? Think your system plays and advanced metrics matter here?
Flush that crap down the hopper. Just like the game I posted last week, Rex Ryan is what matters here. And his players will come to play for him, and they will get him the win he so desperately wants.
And despite public denials, we know he wants it badly after he made the guy who broke Geno Smith's jaw, IK Enemkpali, team captain for this game. But he didn't even have to do that. Anyone who's seen Rex throughout the years knows he wants this game.
It's just like when he wants to beat his brother. He's made sure he's done that 7 of 10 times.
Want the biggest example? Go back to 2013 when a 4-4 Jet team lead by Geno Smith (as a rookie) played the high powered Saints at home. The Saints were 6-1 at the time and the world was on them at (what appeared to be a) generous -6.5, a number they could sleepwalk through to cover with the way they move the ball up and down the field like nothing.
On that day Rex had his guys and his rookie QB pull out all the stops for their best win of the year at 26-20. Watching the Jets that day you probably thought Geno was their QB of the future and the Jets could go to the SB under Rex one day. It didn't pan out that way. Why? Well good guy Rex, who players love, can't have them play at a 1,000 miles an hour every single week (see the disaster that was last week).
But that Saints game? Rob Ryan was on the other sideline and the week prior to the game Rex hinted at what the game meant to him. And his players responded tenfold.
The same thing will happen tomorrow. The Bills will beat the Jets and Rex will have a cat that are the canary grin on his face at the postgame presser. This is about pride and making Rex the fall guy for the Jets failure last season.
What about the Bills and Jets anyway, outside of Rex?
Well the Jets are clealry on the downswing of late.
You are getting this game at a sweet spot among these two teams.
Let's look at the Jets performances.
The Jets were, a mere three weeks ago, about to take over first place. And yet, if not for a 55 yard FG by Nick Folk in the closing minute, the Pats would have covered a ridiculous +9, a number virtually no one here posted as a side for the Pats. Forgivable to lose to the Pats? Yes. Forgivable to fail to get outside of a huge number at home in your biggest rivalry game with first place on the line? No. Right there, it should have been obvious something was a bit out of sorts with the Jets.
If we didn't the Jets were off then, we knew it after we saw them play the Raiders. Oakland put up 21 on the Todd Bowles alleged rock solid D Before you could blink (a defense Rex created), and the Fitz went down. And then Geno went down. And then Fitz had to come back in literally holding his thumb like a child in the huddle just to relieve the pain of receiving snaps. You want to put that loss on Fitz going down? Please. That game was over before it started.