Jets react to missing the playoffs, struggle down the stretch after 6-3 start

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The New York Jets entered Sunday with an arduous but clear path to the playoffs: win out, and if the Bills beat the Patriots next week, they’re in.

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Sadly, the Jets’ quest was truncated at Step 1, as a 23-6 loss in Seattle eliminated them from playoff contention, meaning a season that started 6-3 before their bye will end under .500 and without a postseason berth.

“It’s disappointing,” head coach Robert Saleh said after the loss. “Obviously we made too many mistakes in all three phases to give ourselves a chance, and we couldn’t get anything going in the second half. No one's hurting more than the people in the locker room, especially me, but it stings big-time right now.”

Saleh tried to mitigate that failure by looking at the Jets’ growth, saying, “I know it’s hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but there’s a lot of really cool things to look at from this season,” but in the moment, after that 6-3 start, it’s tough to know that they’ve gone 1-6 over the last seven weeks to fall from contender to potential Week 18 spoiler.

Moral victories? Maybe some other time, but not today.

“It stings, it’s tough, it’s gut-wrenching, whatever adjective you want to use,” quarterback Mike White said. “In the grand scheme of things, we’re playing meaningful football late in the season, but I think we're at the point where we don't care about moral victories. We don't care that we're playing meaningful games because we know that we're capable of it; now we need to win meaningful games."

No one is taking the loss tougher, it seems, than White, who threw for 240 yards but had two back-breaking interceptions that led to six Seahawks points. White was the jolt that gave the Jets their only win in the last seven weeks, but unfortunately, coming off missing two weeks with fractured ribs, White was just as ineffective as most Jets quarterback play has been this year.

“I was cleared to play, and those guys in the locker room deserve a certain standard,” White said. “I did not play to that standard today. I know every single person, myself included, will use this as fuel, but right now, it stings.”

Why no moral victories? Just ask Garrett Wilson, who watched his Ohio State Buckeyes blow a 14-point fourth quarter lead in Saturday’s CFP semifinal before his current team saw their season ostensibly end in a much less grand fashion Sunday.

“We feel like we blew the season,” a somber Wilson said. “We wanted a chance at the playoffs, and this means we’re not going. We wanted to prove ourselves beyond that, and we didn’t get there, so we don’t feel good about it at all.”

Sauce Gardner, who was picked six spots ahead of Wilson and could be a bookend Rookie of the Year with Wilson, was just as solemn as his rookie season ended short of a postseason berth.

“It’s kind of hard, considering we started off hot,” Gardner said. “We have to put the work in so that we don’t have this feeling anymore; that’s the main thing.”

It’s not just rookies who are disappointed, either – Carl Lawson, who sat out last season with injury and watched his old team, the Bengals, reach the Super Bowl, was hoping to be part of a resurgence that Gang Green just didn’t quite get to yet.

“It hurts really bad and emotions are high right now, but we just have to go back to the tape and evaluate and see where it went wrong,” Lawson said.

So, too, was Tyler Conklin, who was a Viking last year when the team went 8-9 and just missed the playoffs, and now is in a similar situation where Week 18 means nothing while his old team has a chance to be the No. 2 seed in the NFC.

“We feel shitty as players. No one’s happy about this,” a blunt Conklin said. “I feel for everybody, I feel for the fans. We wanted this, but didn’t play well enough to make it happen, and it hurts – and it sucks because we’re not going to get another opportunity to change that until next season. In the past, we’ve had a chance to right the wrongs, but now we don’t have that next week.”

The Jets will miss the playoffs for the 12th consecutive season, but their finale will have playoff implications for some – Miami needs to win and hope New England loses to Buffalo to make the playoffs, and the Steelers have an outside chance if they beat Baltimore Sunday night and Cleveland next week while the Dolphins and Pats both lose.

Maybe no moral victories, but they can play spoiler in a way, and go out of the 2022 season on a victory, which is at least something.

“Our only opportunity is to go out there and try to finish on a strong note with a win against a division opponent,” Conklin said, “and one thing I know about this team is that we’ll prepare this week like we always do and play as hard as we always do, even though there aren’t any playoff implications.”

Follow Lou DiPietro on Twitter: @LouDiPietroWFAN

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